The court's ruling on detention will be reviewed by the appeal: the Verkhovna Rada has determined the procedure

In the matter of keeping a person in custody, not only the goals of justice (including a reasonable time frame for the consideration of the case) must be ensured, but also the right of the accused to freedom must be guaranteed, as well as the rights of other participants in criminal proceedings must be respected.

With this arrangement, on December 2, the Verkhovna Rada adopted in general the Law "On Amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine regarding the enforcement of the decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine regarding the appeal of the court ruling on the extension of the period of detention" (based on draft No. 2315 of October 25, 2019). For the law voted 318 deputies.

We are talking about ensuring the execution of the decision of the Constitutional Court of 13.06.2019 No. 4-r / 2019, which recognized the provisions of Part 2 of Art. 392 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine regarding the impossibility of a separate appeal against the court ruling on the extension of the period of detention, issued during the trial in the court of first instance prior to the adoption of a court decision on the merits.

Also, the Constitutional Court imposed the obligation to introduce such a mechanism to guarantee the right to freedom of the accused, in respect of whom a decision was made on detention during the consideration of criminal proceedings in the court of first instance, which will not interfere with the achievement of the goals of justice, violate the rights of other participants in criminal proceedings and will ensure others principles of legal proceedings, in particular a reasonable time frame for the consideration of the case.

Therefore, after the entry into force of the changes, according to the new Part 5 of Art. 394 of the Criminal Procedural Code, a court decision on:

1) the choice of a preventive measure in the form of detention;

2) changing another preventive measure to detention;

3) extension of the term of detention,

what was decided during the trial in the court of first instance before the decision on the merits was made, it will be possible to appeal on appeal.

An appeal against such rulings by the first instance court will be filed directly with the appellate court. The corresponding right is given to the accused, his defense counsel, legal representative and the prosecutor.

The law amends a number of other articles of the Criminal Procedural Code, establishing elements of ensuring the implementation of this right. In particular, it determines the powers of the court of appeal based on the results of consideration of the appeal, the procedural procedure for the examination by the court of appeal of the relevant rulings of the court of first instance, the procedure for returning the relevant materials of criminal proceedings to the court of first instance.