On December 15, the HACC Appeals Chamber overturned the first-instance conviction that had sentenced two former investigators of the Podil District National Police Department of the Kyiv Main Department of the National Police and a former operative officer of the Kyiv Main Department of the National Police to nine years’ imprisonment, with a three-year ban on holding positions in law enforcement and confiscation of half of their property.
Yesterday, the full text of the appellate ruling was released, allowing a closer look at the judges’ reasoning.
In brief, the case concerned allegations that the three police officers took a USD 50,000 bribe in exchange for not adding an additional charge of laundering proceeds from drug-related crimes (Article 306 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine), not changing the suspect’s interim measure from bail to pre-trial detention, and halting further potential criminal prosecution.
However, the inevitability of criminal liability was derailed by a 17-day lapse in the pre-trial investigation deadline. On this ground, the HACC Appeals Chamber closed the case. The court established that the pre-trial investigation period expired on April 26, 2019, while the indictment was submitted to the Shevchenkivskyi District Court in Kyiv on May 13, 2019.
The appellate panel emphasized that the statutory definition of pre-trial investigation time limits is a key manifestation of the principle of legal certainty, which requires predictability of legal procedures in the event of a breach.
Notably, the trial chamber of the HACC had examined this issue thoroughly and concluded that the short interval between the end of the investigation and the submission of the indictment did not violate the defendants’ rights.
Nevertheless, this approach failed to persuade the appellate judges, underscoring the absurdity of automatically closing cases solely due to expired investigation deadlines. As a result, because the indictment reached the court 17 days late, the conviction of law-enforcement officers for accepting a USD 50,000 bribe from a suspect in drug-related crimes was overturned.
