Correlation between the principle of competitiveness and the right of the court to instruct the representative of probation body staff to make a pre-trial report in criminal proceedings

The article highlights the issue of compliance with the general principle of competitiveness of criminal proceedings with the right of the court to instruct a representative of the probation body staff to prepare a pre-trial report on the identity of the accused, which the court implements at the stage of preparatory proceedings, both on its own initiative and at the request of the parties to the criminal legal dispute. It has been found that the principle of competitiveness imposes on the court the obligation, on the one hand, to facilitate the implementation of the procedural rights granted to the parties and not to interfere in the process of proving their own legal position. However, on the other hand, it obliges the court to fully, comprehensively and impartially investigate the circumstances of the commission of a criminal offense to achieve the truth in a criminal case. It has been established that in the case of instructing a representative of the staff of the probation body to prepare a pre-trial report on his own initiative, the court actually goes to the side of the prosecution, since, even before the investigation in the conditions of the trial of any evidence of the person’s guilt, it appoints a pre-trial report with a conclusion on the necessary type and extent punishing the accused for committing an incriminated, but as yet unproven, criminal offense. It was emphasized that the refusal of the court to grant the request of the party to the criminal proceedings regarding the necessity of appointing a pre-trial report is also incompatible with the requirements of the principle of competitiveness, because additional information about the identity of the accused can help the parties defend their legal positions before the court, since they can indicate the presence of circumstances that aggravate or mitigate the defendant’s punishment, or exclude his criminal responsibility. On the basis of the conducted research, a conclusion was formulated, according to which, the resolution on instructing a representative of the probation body staff to prepare a pre-trial report based on the request of a party to a criminal legal dispute will fully comply with the principle of adversarial criminal proceedings, since: 1) it will assist the parties in proving the circumstances before the court, which are included in the subject of proof; 2) will be an additional way to ensure the achievement of the objective truth in a criminal case; 3) will testify to the impartiality and impartiality of the court, which, in the absence of prosecution evidence, will leave to the discretion of the parties the necessity of appointing a pre-trial report with a conclusion on the possibility of correction of the accused without the application of imprisonment or restriction of liberty for a certain period.