Stefano Ruggeri Livres

This book analyses current developments in Europe and Latin America towards the greater involvement of the parties in the administration of criminal justice. Focusing on both national criminal proceedings and transnational cases, this study employs a comparative law approach to examine the shift experienced by Italy and Brazil from the long tradition of mixed criminal justice to unprecedented adversarial trends. The identification of common needs and divergences from the national approach to criminal justice paves the way for a subsequent analysis of new solution models emerging from international human rights law and EU law. To a great extent, these developments are due to the increasing impact of international human rights case-law on the criminal justice systems of the countries in question. The book concludes by proposing a set of qualitative requirements for a participatory model of criminal justice.

The protection of fundamental rights in the field of transnational criminal inquiries is of great delicateness in the current tangled web of domestic and international legal sources. Due to this complex scenario, this research has been carried out from a four-level perspective. The first part provides a critical analysis of the multilevel systems of protecting fundamental rights from the perspective of supranational and constitutional case law, and in the field of international and organized crime. The second part focuses on EU judicial cooperation in three main fields: financial and serious organized crime, mutual recognition tools, and individual rights protection. The third part provides the perspectives of ten domestic legal systems in two fields, i. e., obtaining evidence abroad and cooperation with international criminal tribunals. The fourth part analyses cross-border inquiries in comparative law, providing a reconstruction of different models of obtaining evidence overseas.

Over recent years most of the criminal justice systems in Europe have witnessed a tendency to enhance the role of pre-trial inquiries. Different kinds of pre-trial measures have had a heavy impact on the fundamental rights of individuals involved in criminal procedures. The book contains a comparative study of four European countries on pre-trial precautionary measures limiting personal liberty. This comparison is part of two general frameworks concerning the ECtHR case-law and the EU legislation in the field of the right to liberty and security. In its two level approach, the book provides a critical guide for understanding the most significant changes which occurred in the area of liberty and security in the pre-trial phases of criminal proceedings as well as the protection systems developed in Europe both at national and supranational level to face the new challenges of the modern criminal investigation.