Special trends in the protection of juvenile persons in criminal proceedings in the Republic of Serbia

Modern legal systems are based on the principles of the rule of law, the rule of law and the protection of fundamental human rights. The tendency to protect human rights is particularly expressed in criminal law, which most often takes the position of denying some guaranteed human rights. These denials of human rights must be based and grounded on legal and statutory principles. The subject of this scientific work is the position of minors in criminal proceedings, while the basic hypothesis of the work is that minors in criminal proceedings are particularly sensitive because they are under eighteen years of age and are in the process of psychological and physical development, and therefore should be treated in a special way, taking into account all their psychological and physical characteristics. In the work, the author discusses several important issues related to the protection of minors in criminal proceedings, namely the issue of the existence of specialized judicial bodies before which criminal proceedings involving minors are conducted, the issue of the protection of a minor who has the status of an injured party during questioning, as well as the position of a minor injured party in proceedings against an adult. The aim of this work is to point out the special sensitivity of minors who participate in any way in judicial proceedings, using analytical, normative and comparative methods.