Grounds for postponement of a court hearing at the stage of trial in criminal proceedings of Ukraine

The article is devoted to clarification of the types of grounds for postponement of a court hearing at the stage of trial in terms of clarifying the question whether the exhaustive list of grounds for postponement of a court hearing at the stage of trial is specified in Part 2 of Article 322 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine. It is substantiated that Part 2 of Article 322 of the Criminal Procedure Code specifies the grounds for postponement of a court hearing, but their list is not exhaustive. The following arguments are presented. Firstly, a systematic analysis of the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure leads to the conclusion that the grounds for postponement of a court hearing at the trial stage are specified both in Part 2 of Article 322 of the Code of Criminal Procedure and are clearly stated in other provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure (in particular, in: Part 3 of Article 324, Part 1 of Article 330, Part 5 of Article 338; Part 1 of Article 341; Part 2 of Article 339, etc.). Secondly, some grounds for postponement of a court hearing are not clearly enshrined in the Criminal Procedure Code, but are logically derived from the content of other provisions of the Criminal Procedure Code in terms of ensuring the exercise of both the rights of participants in court proceedings and the principles of criminal proceedings. Some grounds for postponement of a court hearing have been developed or recognized by court practice. For example, replacement of the court, military operations, pandemic, declaration of air alert, lack of Internet connection, etc. Proposals for improving the legislation are as follows. The provisions of Part 2 of Art. 322 of the Criminal Procedure Code should be amended to read: «cases of postponement of the court session, in particular, as a result of: <>». The provisions of clause 4, part 2, Article 322 of the Criminal Procedure Code shall be restated as follows: «preparation of the victim to support the prosecution in court if the prosecutor refused to support the public prosecution or changed the charge to a less serious criminal offense or reduced the scope of the charge». The provisions of Part 3 of Art. 338 of the Criminal Procedure Code shall be amended: «<>. If the victim agrees to maintain the charges as previously presented, the presiding judge shall grant him/her the time necessary to prepare for the trial».