Bystrík Šramel’s research while affiliated with University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Trnava and other places

The specialization of public prosecution offices has been a growing international trend, particularly in addressing complex forms of crime such as corruption, economic crime, and organized crime. Many countries have established specialized prosecution bodies to enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of law enforcement in these areas. However, Slovakia has recently taken a different approach by abolishing its Office of the Special Prosecution, a decision that contrasts sharply with prevailing global tendencies. This paper explores the reasons behind this shift, analyzing the political and legal arguments presented by both proponents and opponents of the abolition. The paper examines whether this move aligns with the rule of law and international legal obligations and considers its potential consequences for the effectiveness of criminal justice in Slovakia. While the paper is based on legal principles and comparative methods, it acknowledges the inherently political nature of decisions concerning the structure of prosecution services.

This paper deals with the issue of the independence of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Slovak Republic as an attribute that allows the Prosecutor’s Office to actually carry out its mission, regardless of the individual interests of the parties concerned and regardless of the government’s political goals and basic beliefs. In the first chapter, the paper deals with the current constitutional regulation of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Slovak Republic in the context of the legal regulation of its independence. The author points out the problems that arise from the absence of granting the attribute of independence to the Slovak Prosecutor’s Office and emphasizes the need for its legislative anchoring. Subsequently, the paper deals with the issue of external independence, which allows the public prosecution office to carry out its tasks without being influenced by various entities from the external (political) environment. In the last chapter, the paper presents the possibilities for strengthening the current degree of external independence of the Slovak Prosecutor’s Office. The author considers it crucial to reconsider and redefine the current system of appointing the Prosecutor General and to remove political ties in the creation of this function. The author of the paper considers two variants of the system of selecting a suitable candidate for the Prosecutor General. First, it is possible to strengthen the existing system of self-government of prosecutors and to increase the scope of the powers of authorities of prosecutorial self-government, the current task of which is to ensure the protection of the rights and legitimate interests of prosecutors. The second possibility for strengthening the external independence of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Slovak Republic could be the creation of another type of Council of Prosecutors, the composition of which would be balanced and would not represent a closed system accessible only to prosecutors.

Autor sa vo svojom príspevku zaoberá problematikou dozoru prokuratúry nad dodržiavaním zákonnosti orgánmi verejnej správy. Ide o tému, ktorá je v Slovenskej republike dlhodobo predmetom početných diskusií, a to predovšetkým v kontexte zachovania tohto právneho nástroja, príp. jeho úplnej eliminácie. Autor sa v prvej časti príspevku zameriava na objasnenie pojmu „prokurátorský dozor“ vo všeobecnosti, na jeho povahu a klasifikáciu v slovenskom právnom prostredí. Následne autor objasňuje historické pozadie vzniku a vývoja inštitútu dozoru prokuratúry vo verejnej správe, analyzuje jeho premeny v čase a upriamuje pozornosť na jeho súvislosti s inými právnymi inštitútmi. Autor v príspevku tiež poukazuje na niektoré problematické prvky a snaží sa sformulovať vlastný právny názor týkajúci sa relevancie a opodstatnenosti existencie tohto právneho inštitútu v právnom poriadku Slovenskej republiky.

The author of this paper deals with the issue of the referendum in the Slovak legal order, which has long been the subject of numerous professional debates in the Slovak Republic. It is a legal institution that is relatively problematic in Slovakia because the legal regulation concerning the referendum is written in many respects vaguely and raises many questions from a practical-application point of view. For this reason, in the first chapters, the author examines the legal regulation of the referendum in the Slovak Republic in general and outlines the questions to which Slovak legal science does not have clear answers. At the same time, the author analyses the latest decision of the Constitutional Court of the Slovak Republic, which has enriched the issue in question with some new and necessary answers.

The recodification of criminal law realised in the Slovak Republic in 2005 brought several new elements to criminal proceedings. One of them was the expansion and significant strengthening of the discretion of the public prosecutor in criminal proceedings. However, this authority of the public prosecutor’s office is, in many cases, perceived sensitively and controversially in Slovak society, especially in connection with many cases and scandals, when the prosecutor simply stated that ‘the act did not occur’. One of the related problems is the fact that the injured party in the Slovak Republic has essentially no powers that would, independently of the prosecutor’s office, ensure the control of the prosecutor’s discretionary powers directly through an independent and impartial court. This situation also stems from the fact that the public prosecutor’s office has a prosecution monopoly in Slovak criminal proceedings. However, the current prosecution monopoly of the prosecutor’s office is not a rational consequence of its historical development in our territory but a consequence of the coup d’état in 1948 and the subsequent onset of the communist regime. The possibility for other entities (e.g., the injured party) to exercise their rights through criminal law institutions has thus been minimised. Based on the above, the aim of this paper is to examine the existing scope of the discretion of public prosecutors in Slovakia, analyse the possibilities of controlling the exercise of these powers, and answer the question of how to improve the current possibilities of the control.

The authors of the paper deal with the philosophy of the privatization of elements of criminal justice, which in the last decades influenced the development of criminal justice in European countries, including the Slovak Republic. The philosophy of privatization in relation to criminal justice represents a wider acceptance of the individual interests of the subjects of criminal procedure. It is the strengthening of powers of the parties to the proceedings and at the same time the entrusting of criminal dispute solution to their own hands. Therefore, the aim of the paper is to examine the expanding philosophy of privatization of the Slovak criminal justice system (the so-called negotiating procedure, a.k.a. plea bargain agreement) which, with the aim of facilitating and simplifying the resolution of a criminal case, has brought the possibility of negotiating with the State the conditions for admitting the guilt of the accused, in exchange for imposing a less severe punishment. However, the aim of the paper is not only to examine the current legal regulation of this expanding phenomenon but also to show its seamy sides and to present comprehensible and reasonable legal opinion relating to its suitability. In the paper, the authors, therefore, deal with the question of whether the philosophy of privatizing the criminal justice is in compliance with the traditional values of the continental legal system. At the same time, they try to answer whether the philosophy of the so-called negotiated justice is not contrary to the fundamental principles of criminal justice. In the paper, the authors also ask questions like: Can the punishment be subject to negotiating? Is it justified on the ground of the society’s morality and fundamental values of the legal system if the State negotiates with the perpetrators of crime the conditions of their confession and the length of the punishment? Does the negotiated punishment fulfill its basic functions (preventative, repressive, protective, moral condemnation by society)?

The law-making process is one of the extremely important forms of local self-government activities. By means of law-making, local self-government regulates the conditions of life and behaviour of the local community living in a particular area of local self-government. Through law-making, therefore, local self-government can significantly interfere with an individual's life. The paper is focused on the analysis of the current legal regulation of the local self-government law-making process in the Slovak Republic and the identification of its weak points. The authors examine the results of control activities of authorities performing the review of constitutionality and legality of local law-making. On this basis, we submit a number of suggestions and incentives for changing the current legal regulation of law-making competence of local self-government.

In a democratic state following the principle of rule of law, every person (including state authorities) must bear a legal liability for an unlawful act committed. However, recent socio-political events in Slovakia have brought to the forefront a number of legal questions regarding the liability of the head of the state for his unlawful acts. Therefore, the aim of this paper is to examine the current legal regulation of presidential liability, which belongs to one of the controversial issues of the Slovak legal order. At the same time, it is an issue which is not a frequented subject of legal science (jurisprudence) research. Therefore, its examination and critical evaluation is necessary. However, the aim of the paper is not only to point out to the current legal regulation of this relatively unexplored legal institution, but also to show its seamy sides and to present a comprehensible and reasonable legal opinion relating to key characteristics of legal liability of the President of the Slovak Republic. The authors are of the opinion that the legal regulation of the liability of the President of the Slovak Republic is extremely brief. In addition, it contains a number of ambiguities and questions which, in the future, can cause a lot of complications in the eventual prosecution of the president. For this reason, it is more than desirable to resolve at least some of the issues referred to in the paper before the dispute arises. In every democratic state it is essential that the terms of application of legal institutions or legal provisions are understandable, clear, and certain. In the case of the institution of liability of the Slovak President, this requirement is certainly not fulfilled.

The system of decentralized public administration creates a vital environment for better interaction between the state, its sub units and citizens. Despite all benefits, the growing nature of bureaucratic procedures and power distribution seem to attract more attention, mainly from the reasons of unprecedented mechanisms of control. The aim of the paper is to demonstrate the potential of Public Prosecution Service in Slovakia to control the decentralized public administration being provided with a statutory power to monitor the field of public administration as a whole. The paper is conceived as a case study of methods of prosecutorial supervision and their practical application in Slovakia.