Oldal 407 [407]
THE RULE OF LAW REVISITED — FINNISH APPROACH
supervision of the administration of justice. Major reforms of criminal procedural
law have been carried out during the last thirty years in order to strengthen these
reguirements.
There are two special features in the institutions and actors of Finnish
procedural law: First, the pre-trial investigations are led by senior police officers
and not by prosecutors or judges. The decision as to whether an apprehended
suspect is to be arrested must be made within 24 hours by a senior police officer
or the prosecutor. A request that a person under arrest be remanded for trial
shall be made to a court without delay and not later than noon on the third
day following the day of apprehension. The court has also an important role
in deciding on the use of covert coercive measures. The prerequisites for these
measures are regulated in detail by the legal Act; covert coercive measures include
telecommunications interception, the obtaining of data other than through
telecommunications interception, traffic data monitoring, obtaining base station
data, extended surveillance, covert collection of intelligence, technical surveillance
(on-site interception, technical observation, technical monitoring and technical
surveillance of a device), obtaining data for the identification of a network address
or a terminal end device, covert activity, pseudo-purchase, the use of covert human
intelligence sources, and controlled delivery.
Second, the office of the prosecutor general is an independent authority outside
the judicial administration of the Ministries of Justice and Interior. When the
legislation on criminal proceedings was modernized in the 1990s, the main model
was Sweden’s accusatorial type of trial. The accusatorial principle requires that the
judge be an impartial third party, so that all the activities of bringing the criminal
charge forward are handled by a separate official, the prosecutor, and his or her
role is significant.
In addition to the accusatorial principle, the other leading principles governing
the main hearing in the proceedings are the requirements of orality and immediacy.
Therefore, all pleadings shall, as a rule, be oral, and the opposing party has the
right to cross-examine all evidence presented against him/her. The acceptability
of evidence other than oral evidence in open court is very restricted.
In the most recent years, ECtHR case law has influenced especially the fair
trial guarantees of evidentiary procedure (such as the privilege against self¬
incrimination and the exclusion of unlawfully obtained evidence) and the
significance and contents of the ‘ne bis in idem’ principle.?* In these respects
Finnish procedural law has been reformed and applied in line with the practice
2% Cf. generally Bérd, Karoly, Fairness in Criminal Proceedings. Budapest, Magyar Közlöny
Kiadó, 2008, passim.
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