What Is A Criminal Case? How To Open A Criminal Case?
What is a Criminal Case?
A criminal case is a public case filed by the prosecutor’s office with an indictment in order to prosecute a person who has sufficient suspicion of committing a crime. After the indictment issued by the prosecutor’s office is accepted by the court, a criminal case is opened. All criminal cases are public cases. There are two main phases in criminal proceedings: investigation and prosecution.
The investigation phase is the phase from the learning that a crime has been committed until the court’s decision to accept the indictment. In this process, the prosecutor investigates the evidence of the crime and examines whether there is sufficient suspicion to file a public case. In case of sufficient suspicion, an indictment is prepared and submitted to the court. With the acceptance of the indictment, the prosecution phase begins. The phase called the prosecution phase lasts from the acceptance of the indictment issued by the prosecutor’s office by the court until the finalisation of the court judgement. In this process, criminal proceedings are conducted.
Which Courts are Responsible for Criminal Cases?
The courts in charge of criminal cases are listed as follows:
Serious Criminal Court
Criminal Court of First Instance
Juvenile Court
Juvenile High Criminal Court
Criminal Court of Intellectual and Industrial Property Rights
The Criminal Court of First Instance is the general court in charge of criminal cases. In cases that do not fall within the jurisdiction of other courts, the Criminal Court of First Instance is responsible for judgement.
Criminal Cases in which the Assize Court has jurisdiction
The Assize Court is a court in charge of first instance criminal proceedings. Article 12 of the Law No. 5235 “Law on the Establishment, Duties and Authorities of the Courts of First Instance and Regional Courts of Appeal” defines its jurisdiction. In accordance with the relevant article, the areas of jurisdiction can be listed as follows:
The offence of plunder
The offence of extortion
Offence of forgery of official documents
Qualified fraud offence
Fraudulent bankruptcy offence
Offence of intentional manslaughter
The offence of aggravated wounding
The offence of extortion
Offence of manufacture and trafficking of drugs and stimulants
Embezzlement offence
Bribery offence
Offences relating to the constitutional order
Offences falling within the scope of the Anti-Terrorism Law No. 3713
Offences punishable with aggravated life imprisonment, life imprisonment and imprisonment for more than ten years
Criminal Cases in which the Criminal Court of First Instance has jurisdiction
The duty of the criminal court of first instance is regulated in Article 11 of the same law. The relevant article is as follows: “Without prejudice to the cases and affairs that are outside the duties of the criminal judgeship of peace and heavy criminal courts, criminal courts of first instance shall hear the cases and affairs that fall outside the duties of the criminal courts of peace and heavy criminal courts.” Accordingly, the offences that the Criminal Courts of First Instance are responsible for can be exemplified as follows:
Intentional injury
Negligent injury
Sexual harassment offence
Threat offence
Blackmail offence
Offence of insult
Offence of disturbing the peace and tranquillity of persons
Offence of recording personal data
Offence of damage to property
Unrequited benefit offence
Violation of the right to privacy
Theft offence
Offence of forgery of money
Offence of insulting the President
These offences are listed as an illustration. The Criminal Court of First Instance is assigned for all offences that do not fall within the jurisdiction of the Serious Criminal Court and the Criminal Judge of Peace.
How to Open a Criminal Case?
In the process of opening a criminal case, firstly, the prosecutor prepares an indictment and submits it to the court. After the court accepts this indictment, a criminal case is opened. The points that the court focuses on in the process of accepting the indictment are as follows:
The existence of the conditions that must be present in the indictment clearly shown in Article 170 of the Criminal Procedure Code
Whether there is absolute evidence that will affect the conviction of the offence
Whether the offence is one of the offences covered by reconciliation or prepayment
In the absence of these conditions, the indictment is returned to the prosecutor’s office. In the absence of deficiencies, the indictment is accepted. The legal evaluation of the offence is not made during the evaluation of the indictment by the court in charge of conducting the trial. For example, in an indictment for the manufacture and trafficking of narcotics addressed to the heavy penal court, the court may not return the indictment on the grounds that the offence is the use of narcotics. In the absence of the above-mentioned reasons, the court must accept the indictment and conduct a trial.
Persons Involved in the Criminal Case
The parties to a criminal case are the prosecution and the defence. It is not possible to say that these parties come face to face. This is because the prosecutor is the defence. During the investigation phase, the prosecutor collects evidence not only against but also in favour of the suspect or defendant. The defence is the accused or the suspect and his/her defence counsel. Some important terms that may be encountered in a criminal case are as follows:
Victim: The victim is the person harmed by the offence. The victim personally experiences the negative effects of the crime.
Person Damaged by the Offence: The injured person is the person whose rights and interests are damaged.
Although the persons covered by these two concepts often overlap, they may also be separate persons. For example, in a manslaughter offence, the victim is the deceased person. The person harmed by the offence is the relatives of the deceased.
Complainant Crimes can be divided into offences subject to complaint or non-complaint. In offences subject to complaint, a complaint is required for punishment. İn other words, the prosecutor’s office does not take action ex officio. In these offences, the person who makes a complaint is called the complainant. These people are called complainants in practice.
Participant As we have mentioned above in public cases, the prosecutor’s office prepares an indictment if it reaches sufficient suspicion. In these cases, the victim or the damaged person can participate in the proceedings as a participant in the prosecution. As a result of participation, a legal remedy can be applied against the judgement rendered by the court.
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