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In this article, the author analyzes extensively the issue of the status of the judges of the Constitutional Court from Romania, as it was prefigured in the theses debated by the Constituent Assembly in 1991 and regulated in the provisions of the Constitution approved by the national referendum of 8 December 1991 and revised by the Law No 429/2003. The status of the constitutional judges is analyzed by reference to the role and attributions of the Constitutional Court. The status of the constitutional judges derives from the role of the Court as guarantor of the supremacy of the Fundamental Law. The constitutional provisions regarding the status of the constitutional judges are developed by the Law No 47/1992 on the organization and functioning of the Constitutional Court, as well as by other special laws. The judges enjoy independence and are obliged to impartially exercise their attributions. The constitutional provisions provide that the constitutional judges are incompatible with any other public or private office, except for higher legal education teaching activities, are independent in the exercise of their mandate and irremovable during their term of office. The Law No 47/1992 establishes that the judges are not legally responsible for the opinions and votes cast in connection with the cases pending before the Court. For any other deeds, the constitutional judges may be tried in criminal proceedings with the consent of the plenum of the Constitutional Court, under the conditions provided by the Law No 47/1992.
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The paper aims to emphasize the consequences of the Judgment Costanzo pronounced by the Court of Justice in 1989 on the competences and powers of the public administration authorities, when these authorities are acting within the scope of application of the European Union law. From the perspective of the persons of private law directly concerned, the paper makes available to them the manner in which they can invoke the Union law – as a right opposable against the national administrative authorities – without requiring the intervention of the courts to obtain the removal from the application of the measures of national law contrary thereto.
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This scientific approach debates and proposes solutions for a problem of judicial practice also reflected in the doctrine of speciality, namely whether it subsists the offence of tax evasion provided in Article 9 (1) b) or c) of the Law No 241/2005, whose active subject is a legal person, in case of absence of the accounting records of the taxpayer. The author’s certain conclusion is based on arguments related to the legal text and which the practice has embraced as a corollary, and he proposes a solution in the sense that the judicial bodies may analyse that all the constituent elements of the reference offence are present even in the absence of the documents of accounting records. Likewise, the article also deals tangentially with a possible problem related to the constitutionality of a legal phrase that is part of the constituent elements of the offence of tax evasion and criticizes the redundant and incoherent phrasing of the legislator.
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In this paper the author makes an analysis of the provisions relating to „Aggravated theft” (Article 229 of the Criminal Code), from the perspective of the comparative law and of the requirements of the principle of legality. There are emphasized a series of errors produced during the drafting of the text (setting an excessively large number of circumstantial elements, their arbitrary grouping, etc.) and, at the same time, there are presented some solutions to overcome the deficiencies.
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The article presents the evidentiary standards in case of the extended confiscation, claiming the necessity to establish the difference between the legal income and the value of assets acquired, also taking into account the expenses made by the accused and their family members, mentioning the assets or sums of money subject to extended confiscation, based on an evaluation report drawn up by an expert, by the indictment.
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Within this article the author presents the main opinions which were expressed in the literature of speciality on the matter of deviated offence. This reveals that there is no unitary point of view referring to this institution, three opinions being expressed in the matter. According to a first opinion it is deemed that the deviated offence concerns an apparent plurality of offences (natural unity), whether we refer to error in personam/error in objecto or to aberratio ictus. According to a second opinion, in case of deviated offence, regardless of the form it takes, there is a real plurality of offences, in the form of concurrence of offences. There is also a third opinion that, in the case of error in personam/error in objecto, it should be noted the existence of a single offence, while in case of aberratio ictus it should be noted the concurrence of offences. The judicial practice in Romania, in order to avoid any problems that might occur, has opted to note the perpetration of a single offence, both in case of error in personam and in case of aberratio ictus.
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The study intends to provide an overview of a recently established public institution, namely the National Agency for the Administration of Seized Assets. Its establishment was an objective included in the National Anti-corruption Strategy for 2012–2015, approved by the Government Decision No 215/2012. The analysis will focus on aspects concerning its general status, structure, personnel and it will be made from a critical perspective on some legal provisions inclusively. In this way, we will try to draw attention to some deficiencies of the regulation, by proposing solutions which hopefully will be considered in the future.
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In this article, the author discusses the issue of limitation of the exercise of certain rights and freedoms, as debated and regulated by the Constituent Assembly in 1991. There are analyzed in detail the theses for the draft Constitution that set out the constitutional conditions for which compliance is imperative, so that the Romanian State and the Romanian Parliament be able to make the decision of limiting some rights or freedoms of the citizens. The author gives a significant consideration to presenting the philosophy of the constitutional norm that recognizes the State’s right to limit under certain circumstances the exercise of some fundamental rights and freedoms of the Romanian citizens. It is noted that constitutional limitation of the some rights or freedoms of the citizens fully complies with the European doctrine of constitutional law and of the judicial practice of ECHR. The author analyzes in detail every case which may determine the Parliament to limit the exercise of some rights and freedoms, as well as the conditions for imposing the limitation.
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The disciplinary misconduct related to the „non-compliance with the duty to abstain when the judge or the public prosecutor knows of the existence of one of the causes provided by law for his abstention, as well as the filing of repeated and unjustified applications of abstention in the same case, which has the effect of delaying the judgment”, regulated by Article 99 i) of the Law No 303/2004 on the by-law of judges and public prosecutors, was introduced by the Law No 24/2012 amending and supplementing the Law No 303/2004 on the by-law of judges and public prosecutors and the Law No 317/2004 on the Superior Council of Magistrature; it could not be found in the original version of the Law No 303/2004, nor in the Law No 92/1992 on judicial organization. The material element of the objective side of the disciplinary misconduct regulated by Article 99 i) of the Law No 303/2004 includes two distinct hypotheses: the first hypothesis has as object the non-compliance with the duty to abstain when the judge or the public prosecutor knows of the existence of one of the causes provided by law for his abstention, and the second relates to the filing of repeated and unjustified applications of abstention in the same case, which has the effect of delaying the judgment.
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In this article, the author analyzes the parliamentary procedure for the review of laws, pursuant to the request of the President of Romania, in the light of the case law of the Constitutional Court. In its judicial practice, the court of constitutional administrative disputes found that the provisions included in the parliamentary regulations of both legislative Chambers, which regulated the procedure of review of the laws on the initiative of the President of Romania, do not comply with the constitutional provisions. The author analyzes in detail the objections of unconstitutionality of the Constitutional Court and shows, in the end, that the elaboration of a clear, unambiguous parliamentary procedure is necessary in order to review the laws following the request addressed by the President of Romania, which reflects the letter and the spirit of the constitutional provisions.
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This study proposes a comparative analysis of the main economic and financial offences from their regulatory perspective, given the significant amendments of the Romanian criminal legislation occurred starting with 1 February 2014. The author makes a presentation of how the incrimination of these criminal acts has been amended, regardless of the relevant provisions, the Criminal Code or the special laws. He insists on the situations where amendments of substance occurred and it is analyzed their opportunity, as well as the effects reflected by the judicial practice. Similarly, critical notes are exposed, with the necessary arguments on some of these legislative amendments.
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Important matters of law generate the verification of the legality of the acts of the legal persons of private law specified in the title. Such verification, as revealed by the judicial practice in this matter, involves the relation of the theory concerning the legal acts within the scope of public law to the corresponding theory within the private law. This interdisciplinary approach is necessary in order to correctly identify the conditions of validity related to the legal acts qualified as being acts of authority, given their nature, purpose and addressees.