PROBLEMS OF INTERPRETING THE CONCEPT OF "LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICER"

This article is devoted to the study of the problems of definition and interpretation of the definition "employee of a law enforcement agency". It has been established that the current legislation of Ukraine does not contain an exhaustive list of bodies that should be considered law enforcement, therefore, in connection with this, the very concept of a law enforcement officer remains undefined. In this way, the problem of the lack of a clear normative definition of the concept of "employee of a law enforcement agency" has been ascertained. In order to formulate an answer to the question of defining the concept of employees of a law enforcement agency and a law enforcement agency as a whole, we suggest exploring approaches to understanding these concepts based on reasoned scientific views. It was concluded that law enforcement officers do not have an administrative-legal or criminal-legal origin in their content. They are derived from legal norms that regulate the activities of judicial and law enforcement agencies, so they originate from the range of agencies that should be classified as law enforcement agencies. The research provides criteria by which one or another body can be rationally classified as a law enforcement agency. The legislation of Ukraine provides for a mixed (at the same time list and functional) method of determining such bodies. It is worth noting that the given list of law enforcement agencies is not exhaustive, so it can be supplemented by other law enforcement agencies guided by the functional distribution criterion. The place of the prosecutor's office was investigated indirectly through the prism of belonging to a law enforcement agency. Having analyzed the main views on the place of the prosecutor's office in the system of authorities, it must be said that the actually valid legislation of Ukraine is increasingly inclined to attribute the prosecutor's office to the judicial branch of government. However, time will tell whether such a situation is justified. The only thing that needs to be said is that prosecutor's offices should no longer be unequivocally classified as law enforcement agencies, but with a note indicating that they belong to the justice system. A comparative analysis was conducted between the concepts of "law enforcement agencies" and "law enforcement agencies".