How effective is the Unified register of pre-trial investigations today? What information is not disclosed by law enforcement agencies? Is everything so open, transparent, and understandable, as they declare? Grigory Mamka, deputy chief of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine (2016), the honored lawyer of Ukraine, adviser to the Chairman of the political party “Rozumna Sila” gave expert assessment to the work of the URPI in an interview to the information portal “Nova Vlada”.
The Unified register of pre-trial investigations is a special electronic database in which the collection, storage, protection, registration, search, generalization of information on criminal offenses and the course of pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings are carried out. On November 20, 2012 the Criminal Procedure Code came into force simultaneously with the launch of the URPI. The register is running by the General Prosecutor’s Office of Ukraine. In fact, the pre-trial investigation begins just after entering data in the Unified register of pre-trial investigations.
The URPI must contain, in particular, set and recovered material damage information, the amount of filed cases in criminal proceedings, the value of seized property. And according to this information, law enforcement bodies report on the amount of damages that are reimbursed to the state or legal entities and individuals.
“However, nobody knows about the real damage caused by illegal activity. They are not evaluated and fixed. So, when you will hear once again the next “decanoidze” will tell that “the total amount of damages in open criminal cases reached 508 million hryvnias a year”, – you should know that it is a impudently playing with statistics. Or when the director of the NABU (National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine) Sitnik will tell in the media that “the losses from the crimes that under the NABU investigation seem to exceed the budget deficit”, ignore it. Because real numbers, the real amount of damage from crime will never be anounced to society. Do you know why? Because they are shocking, as real information about committed crimes as well, “said Hryhoriy Mamka.
Against any person, on the statement of anyone and on any, even fictitious reasons, you can file a criminal offense statement according to which law enforcement agencies must enter data in the URPI. Therefore, a lot of situations apear when there can be a bunch of violated cases concerning one citizen and, accordingly, information in the URPI. According to those information, investigative bodies have the right to obtain permission from the citizen without the citizen privity, for example, holding secret investigatory actions against him as wiretapping. And the URPI simply does not do its main function – accounting and generalization of information on criminal offenses and the course of pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings.
“We have only two exceptions: either at the legislative level to adjust information to the URPI and clearly identify the grounds for the closure of criminal proceedings, or to establish the work of the URPI without duplication of criminal proceedings against one person. And this is the task of the registry holder and administrators, what is called prosecutor’s office. And now, having received real information about how the URPI works today, compare it with the hundreds of billions of hryvnias from the state budget allocated annually to the support of the National Police, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the NABU, the GPU (General Prosecutor’s Office of Ukraine), the SSU (The Security Service of Ukraine). Perhaps it is worth considering, does the law enforcement system fulfils their duties in the right way.
Translation – Kateryna Omelchuk
