Theory and practice of mixing procedural models in the Pre-trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court mechanism of functioning

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The increasing interpenetration of the main models of the process and the approval of international standards for the production of criminal cases raise the question of the development and improvement of the form of legal proceedings in the category of the most relevant in modern science. On the one hand, the attention of many scientists is focused on strengthening the competitive core of the process and ensuring, as far as possible, a balance of power between the parties. On the other hand, it is stated that legal proceedings that do not pursue the goal of achieving material truth, especially due to the absolute nature of the principle of competition, lead to excessive formalism that has nothing to do with fair trial. The solution to the problem of combining trial models (the balance of adversarial and investigative cores) is seen in the International Criminal Court. The procedure of criminal proceedings in the International Criminal Court is the result of special scientific modeling taking into account the indicated doctrinal trends, and the degree of generalization of approaches of leading legal families in the structure of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court is so high that it allows us to speak about the universality of this procedural system. If the predecessors of the International Criminal Court preference were really given only one started (so, the ICTY was based on the example of the Anglo-Saxon adversarial procedure model with the “American accent”), the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court reflected the trend to the initial formation of a balanced trial procedures designed to overcome the deviations in the balance of power by introducing an adversarial process with “inquisitorial” elements: for example, the Pre-trial Chamber, duties of the Prosecutor fully and objectively investigate the circumstances of the case, the duties of the court of first instance to establish the truth in the case. However, this does not mean any disregard for the adversarial core at the pre-trial stage. The article is devoted to theoretical and practical aspects of the combination of adversarial and investigative cores in the activities of the pre-trial Chamber of the International criminal court and reflects the results of a study led by professor Anita Ušacka, honorary doctor of law, in the preparation of a Commentary to the Rome Statute in Russian.

About the author: Denis Pechegin – Candidate of Sciences (Ph.D.) in Law, Center of Criminal Law, Criminal Procedure and Judicial Practice of the Institute of Legislation and Comparative Law under the Government of the Russian Federation, Moscow, Russia.

Citation: Pechegin D. (2020) Teoriya i praktika sochetaniya modeley protsessa v deyatel'nosti Palaty pred­varitel'nogo proizvodstva Mezhdunarodnogo ugolovnogo suda [Theory and practice of mixing procedural models in the Pre-trial Chamber of the International Criminal Court mechanism of functioning]. Mezhdunarodnoe pravosudie, vol.10, no.4, pp.100–111. (In Russian).

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