Started checking the prosecutors

The Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica started yesterday to control the work of the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Cetinje, while by the end of the year, supervision will be carried out in all other prosecutor's offices in Montenegro, as the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office also started monitoring two higher ones - Pogorica and VDT Bijelo Polje, according to the plan.

For now, it is not known whether the Plan of the VDT foresees that by the end of this year, the control of the legality of the work of the Special State Prosecutor's Office will finally be started.

The control of the prosecutor's offices followed at the beginning of the year the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office adopted the Supervision Plan because according to the Law on the State Prosecutor's Office it is stipulated that the work of prosecutors and managers of the prosecutor's offices be monitored every two years, but this practice has been absent for years.

With the supervision plan, colleagues from the higher prosecutor's offices announced on time the inspections of the work of the prosecutors in the lower prosecutor's offices, where they are asked to see the cases handled in the past few years. If everything goes according to plan, the work of controlling the work of Montenegrin prosecutors should be completed by the end of 2021.

Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, according to the Plan brought by the manager Beautiful Medenica, has already carried out work inspections in Podgorica, Nikšić and Kotor, while after Cetinje, in December it will visit Bar, Herceg Novi, Ulcinj, Danilovgrad and Kolašin...

"With the decision on the supervision of basic state prosecutor's offices from the area of ​​work of the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, the supervision was carried out in the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Nikšić and the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Kotor. In other state prosecutor's offices, the supervision will be carried out during the month of December this year. After the supervision in all prosecutor's offices, the state prosecutors in the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, who were designated by the decision of the head of this prosecutor's office to carry out supervision, will prepare a report on the supervision performed," Prosecutor Medenica replied to "Vijesta".

The control of prosecutor's offices is important in order to determine whether all prosecutors comply with legal deadlines during the resolution of cases, and the focus of supervision is also to determine the reason for the high percentage of criminal prosecution cases.

The work of supervision, they said, is made more difficult by the lack of prosecutors in the Higher State Prosecutor's Office, as well as the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office, and the deadlines are pushed due to the heavy workload of prosecutors with their daily work duties...

"Despite the fact that in the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, in accordance with the Rulebook on Systematization, four positions of state prosecutors are unfilled, while one prosecutor has been temporarily removed from duty by the Decision of the Prosecutorial Council, this prosecutor's office, with great efforts, takes all measures and fulfills all obligations prescribed by law. I would like to mention that the supervision by the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica of the work of the basic state prosecutor's offices is carried out in accordance with the Law on the State Prosecutor's Office, every two years", emphasized Medenica.

He also confirmed that the supervision of the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office over the work of the two higher prosecutor's offices in Podgorica and Bijelo Polje is ongoing.

The Law on the State Prosecutor's Office states that the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office supervises the work of state prosecutor's offices "by directly inspecting the work of each state prosecutor's office and taking other appropriate measures for the efficient and legal work of the state prosecutor's office"...

Considering that the prosecutor's office has been in an acting state for more than three years, and that the Prosecutor's Council has not even existed for almost four months, no one can predict what and whether the consequences will be borne by prosecutors who may be found to have irregularities in their work during supervision.

Podgorica was controlled twice

In the office of the Supreme State Prosecutor's Office at the beginning of August, it was confirmed to "Vijesta" that the summer lawyers' strike was used to allow five prosecutors of the Higher State Prosecutor's Office to take control of the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica.

After the first inspection, a new inspection of the Podgorica ODT followed in the fall, but in the response of the VDT cabinet and the head of the Higher State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, Lepa Medenica, they did not want to answer how many irregularities were found in the work, but also the statute of limitations of the case.

"Since during the supervision by state prosecutors in the Higher State Prosecutor's Office, some cases were not submitted for inspection, it was not possible to carry out a complete supervision of all cases. For this reason, additional supervision will be carried out, so that a final report can be drawn up, which you will be familiar with", it is written in the VDT's reply.