17 November, 2023
On Friday, November 17, the Judicial Council's working group for evaluating the organization of judicial work in cases related to domestic violence and threats to a person's life and health presented a report which provides analysis of the practice of the work organization of the judicial system and inter-institutional cooperation. The working group has identified the main causes that hinder the effective functioning of the courts with regard to violence cases, and the report provides proposals for improving court work.
Aigars Strupišs, the head of the working group, the chair of the Judicial Council, and the President of the Supreme Court, stated that "the causes of the Jēkabpils tragedy are a set of several systemic deficiencies in the mechanism of the protection of a victim of violence and the punishment of a violent person. The main shortcoming is the unavailability of complete information to judges who hear these cases. It is a common problem of the Latvian state; and the judiciary, as a part of the state power, bears co-responsibility for what happened. The state's duty was to do it all and to protect a person who had actually suffered from violence and asked for state’s help. Unfortunately, there were no functional mechanisms established by the state to effectively do this.”
The Chair of the Judicial Council stated that several solutions were sought and found by the working group on actions to be taken in order not to escalate the situation to such a degree which results in tragic consequences. A. Strupišs emphasized that "in order to ensure more effective protection of victims of violence, the proposals of the working group should be implemented immediately. One significant obstacle to the protection of persons has already been removed by the legislator by increasing the penalty for non-compliance with the court decision on protection against violence (from short-term detention to three years of imprisonment). This previous limitation of the law was one of the main obstacles to the long-term isolation of socially dangerous persons, which would allow them to work with their psychologists during the isolation.”
The working group analyzed the work organization practices of the judicial system and the shortcomings of inter-institutional cooperation in cases related to the protection of a person against domestic violence and threats to a person’s life or health. At the same time, the task of the working group was to develop proposals to effectively ensure the rights of injured persons to protection in the mentioned cases, as well as to improve court communication in crisis situations.
The report concludes that there is insufficient circulation of information both between the state institutions directly involved in the proceedings and within the institutions themselves. This affects the decision-making process and quality. The fragmentation of investigation, prosecution and litigation processes leads to the situation that a judge does not have a complete view of the processes. Also, judges do not have sufficient information about other reviewed cases and reports of other institutions. There is no psychological profiling of a potentially dangerous person in place in order to determine the most suitable type and amount of penalty for a particular person.
In order to improve inter-institutional cooperation, a cooperation group of all institutions directly involved in cases of violence should be formed in each region. Its functions would include the monitoring and forecasting of domestic violence cases within the relevant judicial district, as well as the development of individual action plans in certain complex cases.
The working group indicates that a judge who decides on the temporary protection against violence in civil proceedings should be provided with as much information as possible. This also includes broader access rights to data available in the Court Information System. Moreover; and the tool provided in the civil proceedings for the rehabilitation of a violent person (training for reducing violent behaviour) can be used more effectively. The training provider has to provide a court and a social service with information about training results, as well as the time period for completing the training should be shortened from 12 to 6 months.
The report concludes that active police control of high and very high-risk violent persons should be implemented in cases of temporary protection against violence. Whereas, changes in the regulatory framework should be considered with regard to criminal proceedings, so that the victim of violence could request more extensive protection, which could even include the transfer or change of identity of a person in the case of a high threat risk to a life or health of the person.
In the opinion of the working group, in case of violation of temporary protection against violence, the violent person should receive a penalty that is not only proportionate to the gravity of the offense committed, but also enables changes in his/her attitude and perception. In order to ensure this, the evaluation report on the violent person provided by the State Probation Service, which includes comprehensive and fact-based information about the person's manner of thinking, attitude and social conditions promoting certain behaviour, is more often used in criminal proceedings.
The report emphasizes that all professionals involved in cases of the mentioned categories must have not only general knowledge of violence issues, but also sufficient understanding of the types of violence, psychological aspects of an abuser and a victim. This is a prerequisite for the targeted and effective use of the existing means for the protection of the victim of violence. A special interdisciplinary curriculum on the psychology of violence and its manifestations should be created for the employees of courts and other law enforcement institutions, which would include the development of a methodology for situation analysis and risk assessment.
Whereas, in order to improve crisis communication of courts, it is necessary to include media training for court presidents and their deputies in the framework of the Academy of Justice training. This would develop the skills of communication even under stressful situations. At the same time, it is necessary to review the Communication Guidelines of the Judicial System, incorporating additions on crisis communication.
The full report of the working group is available here (in Latvian).
The working group was composed of Aigars Strupišs, Chair of the Judicial Council, President of the Supreme Court, Ilze Celmiņa, Judge of the Civil Division of the Riga Regional Court, Member of the Judicial Council, Sandra Kaija, Senator of the Department of Criminal Cases of the Senate (Supreme Court), Liene Mikulāne, Judge of the Riga City Court, Inita Ilgaža, Deputy State Secretary on Court Issues of the Ministry of Justice, Dana Rone, Representative of the Latvian Council of Sworn Advocates, sworn advocate, and Inga Niedre, Head Prosecutor of the Pre-trial Criminal Procedure and Judicial Proceedings Coordination Division of the Criminal Justice Department of the General Prosecutor's Office. Furthermore, industry experts and representatives of responsible institutions participated in the meetings of the working group.
Additional information about the Judicial Council meeting:
The Judicial Council appointed two new court presidents. Judge Ieva Čudina has been appointed as the chair of the Riga District Court for five years, and Judge Līga Ašitoka has been appointed as the chair of the Vidzeme District Court.