Legitimate interests of a criminally prosecuted person: theoretical and legal analysis and problems of legislative consolidation

Introduction. The relevance of the scientific development of the category "legitimate interests of a person subject to criminal prosecution" is determined by a set of interrelated theoretical and law enforcement problems. Firstly, there is still no consensus in Russian doctrine on the essential content of this concept and its place in the system of legal phenomena, especially in relation to the category of subjective law, which predetermines a permanent scientific discussion. Secondly, the analysis of sectoral legislation, primarily criminal procedure and operational investigative legislation, reveals a stable terminological eclecticism and fragmentation in the use of the construction "legitimate interests". Such legislative inconsistency is an indicator of the lack of a holistic concept of protecting this legal good at the law-making level. Thirdly, the specifics of the initial stage of criminal prosecution (identification and identification of the person who committed the crime) are characterized by a paradoxical combination of maximum intensity of restrictions on individual rights with a minimum level of procedural publicity and competitiveness.

Purpose. To carry out a comprehensive analysis of the concept of "legitimate interests" in relation to a criminally prosecuted person, identify contradictions in its legislative regulation in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation and the Federal Law "On Operational Investigative Activities" (the Law on Criminal Investigations) and formulate proposals for improving legal regulation.

Methods. The research is based on the application of general scientific (analysis, synthesis, systematic approach) and private scientific methods: comparative law, formal law, logical, legal modeling method.

Results. A systematic terminological inconsistency in the use of the category "legitimate interests" in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation and the Federal Law "On Operational Investigative Activities" has been established, leading to legal gaps. The analysis of theoretical approaches to understanding "legitimate interests" is carried out and their content and essential characteristics in the context of criminal prosecution are determined. The differences between the categories of "legitimate interests" and "subjective rights" of a criminally prosecuted person are determined. A dynamic model of legitimate interests is substantiated, evolving from abstract protective barriers at the stage of identifying and establishing a suspected person who has committed a crime, to specific active procedural remedies at the stages of establishing the involvement of a suspected person and exposing the accused person in committing a crime.

Conclusions. The author presents a dynamic model of the evolution of the system of legitimate interests of a criminally prosecuted person, determined by the stages of criminal prosecution and the changing procedural status of the person (suspected → suspect → accused). The proposals to overcome the identified conflicts are substantiated, aimed at unifying terminology in the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation, which provides for the consolidation of the category of "rights and legitimate interests" for all procedural statuses of participants in criminal proceedings and recognizing legitimate interests as the object of judicial protection at all stages of criminal prosecution. To assess the legality of the actions of officials (especially in operational investigative activities), the author suggests a five-level hierarchy of law enforcement benefits (from life and health to property interests). The key criterion for the legality of the intervention should be the principle of proportionality (proportionality) – the protected interest should not be lower than the one that is being harmed, and the damage should be minimized.

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