European standards of judicial control at the stage of pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings

The article examines the European standards for the judicial control at the stage of pretrial investigation in criminal proceedings, with an emphasis on the compliance of the provisions of Article 303 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine with the standards of the European Court of Human Rights. In the conditions of reforming the Ukrainian legal system with the aim of integration into the European community, the problem of ensuring effective judicial control is extremely urgent. It is proposed under the European standards of judicial control at the stage of pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings to consider a set of legal norms, principles and guarantees enshrined in the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms and precedent practice of the European Court of Human Rights, which ensure an effective, fair and legal judicial review and control over the actions, decisions or inaction of pre-trial investigation bodies for the purpose of protecting the rights and freedoms of a person. Groups of European standards in criminal proceedings are highlighted: firstly, standards relating to the legality of detention and detention, secondly, standards relating to the reasonableness of suspicion, thirdly, standards of effectiveness of pre-trial investigation, fourthly, standards of access to justice in criminal proceedings. It has been established that part of the standard of access to justice is the standard of effectiveness of judicial control. It has been proven that the standard of effectiveness of judicial control at the stage of pre-trial investigation is, in our opinion, an important element of access to justice, as it ensures: protection of the rights of individuals at the stage of pre-trial investigation in criminal proceedings, transparency and accountability of the process, prevention of human rights violations, appeal of procedural decisions. It was concluded that although Article 303 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine provides tools for judicial control, the existing mechanisms do not always meet European standards due to problems of access to justice and speed of trial. The need to implement international standards is to ensure effective protection of the rights and freedoms of citizens and to strengthen trust in the judicial system of Ukraine. The work emphasizes that further adaptation of national legislation to European requirements will contribute to increasing the effectiveness of judicial control at the pre-trial investigation stage.