Paper touch upon the problems of criminal policy in Lithuania after 1990. The author concentrates on two aspects of the problem: legislative criminal policy and practical criminal policy. 79 The author investigates the changes in present Penal code of Lithuania and their impact on the practical application of the laws by courts and other criminal justice institutions. The author describes the direction of major alterations of the laws and practical consequences of these changes. The author provides statistical material concerning application of penalties and other forms of sanctions. These data are being compared with the data in other European countries. The author makes conclusions concerning further development of criminal policy.
Paper touch upon the problems of criminal policy in Lithuania after 1990. The author concentrates on two aspects of the problem: legislative criminal policy and practical criminal policy. 79 The author investigates the changes in present Penal code of Lithuania and their impact on the practical application of the laws by courts and other criminal justice institutions. The author describes the direction of major alterations of the laws and practical consequences of these changes. The author provides statistical material concerning application of penalties and other forms of sanctions. These data are being compared with the data in other European countries. The author makes conclusions concerning further development of criminal policy.
Crimes against Humanity is one of the most dynamic categories in the International Criminal Law since it first appearance in the Charter of Nuremberg Military Tribunal in 1945 as an outgrowth of the war crimes. The concept of crimes against humanity in the Charter of Nuremberg Military Tribunal may be characterised by the following elements: crimes shall be carried out towards any civilian population, crimes can be carried out by the civil or military officers or actual agents of the state (policy element), crimes may be committed during the war or in peace time however such crimes requires conjunction with war crimes or crimes against peace. The concept of the crimes against humanity in later sources has developed steadily towards overall protection of fundamental human rights of civil population. First way of development concerns the elements and qualification criteria. First of all the conjunction between crimes against humanity and war crimes has been eliminated. It made crimes against humanity as an independent criminal category. Said development has been affirmed by the Rome Statute of International Criminal Court and were reflected in the Statute of International Criminal Tribunal for the Rwanda (ICTR) and UN Draft Code of Offences Against Peace and Security of Mankind. The jurisprudence of International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) has significantly amended the element of policy. It was established that crimes against humanity may be carried out by the organisation or political group which controls territory and performs civil, military, politic administration de facto as well. The United Nations Draft Code of the Offences Against Peace and Security of Mankind in 1991 has introduced two alternative qualification criteria: requirement of large scale or systematic actions. Large scale (or widespread) criteria has been introduced in order to eliminate an isolated inhumane act committed by a perpetrator acting on his own initiative and directed against a single or couple of victims. According to the said criteria crimes against humanity may be committed only as an massive, frequent, large scale action carried out collectively with considerable seriousness directed against multiplicity of victims. Systematic criteria means that crimes against humanity shall be result of systematic actions as a thoroughly organised and following a regular pattern on the basis of a common policy involving substantial public or private resources. ; Nusikaltimai žmoniškumui yra viena iš dinamiškiausių tarptautinės baudžiamosios teisės kategorijų. Ši sąvoka pirmą kartą buvo pavartota 1945 m. Niurnbergo karo tribunolo įstatuose išplėstiniam karo nusikaltimui įvardyti, tačiau ilgainiui buvo papildoma ir tapo savarankiškesnė. Niurnbergo tribunolo įstatuose pateiktą sąvoką galima apibūdinti šiais požymiais: nusikaltimai žmoniškumui gali būti įvykdyti prieš bet kokius civilius gyventojus tiek taikos, tiek karo metu, juos įvykdyti gali civilinės arba karinės valdžios pareigūnai, arba faktiniai agentai (politikos elementas), jų kvalifikacijai būtina sąsaja su karo nusikaltimais arba nusikaltimais taikai. Nusikaltimų žmoniškumui sąvoka plėtojosi dviem kryptimis. Pirmoji plėtros kryptis apėmė nusikaltimų žmoniškumui požymių ir kvalifikavimo kriterijų pokyčius. Pirmiausia buvo atsisakyta reikalavimo, kad nusikaltimų žmoniškumui kvalifikavimas turi būti siejamas su karo nusikaltimais arba nusikaltimais taikai. Šis pokytis lėmė nusikaltimų žmoniškumui kaip savarankiško nusikaltimo atsiradimą. Šią traktuotę patvirtino ir vėliausias tarptautinės baudžiamosios teisės šaltinis – Tarptautinio baudžiamojo teismo Romos statutas, ji taip pat atsispindėjo Jungtinių tautų nusikaltimų taikai ir žmonijos saugumui kodekso projekte, Tarptautinio tribunolo asmenims, atsakingiems už genocidą ir kitus sunkius tarptautinės humanitarinės teisės pažeidimus Ruandos teritorijoje teisti (Ruandos tribunolo) statute.
The author examines legal attempts to regulate digital property. By 'digital property' any valuable that is usable or available in electronic form is understood, including computer programs, databases, digital audio and video, etc. Due to authors' own expertise, legal protection of digital property is represented through issues on legal protection of computer programed First part of the assignment accomplished by this article deals with copyright protection of digital property. The article surveys most important international legislation and caee law, ae well as academic opinions on legal regulation of digital property. The significant transformations and differences from traditional principles of Intellectual property law that took place with the rise of digital property are emphasized, together with the challenges brought by digital technology. It is further argued that for the newly established national legal systems, such as Lithuanian, a simple extension of the existing Intellectual property legislation, or mechanical Implantation of foreign laws is not adequate, while the risks are crucial. Careful national approach may be needed in order to achieve socially desirable results and not to prevent establishment of national information economy. The article is conducted ae a result of the research done by the author during the research visit to Donald berman laboratory for Information Technology and Law with the La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, Australia. The author wishes to express his gratitude to Dr. Andrew Stranieri, whose views and thoughts inspired this article, and Dr. John Zeleznikow, whose efforts have made possible this research visit.
The author examines legal attempts to regulate digital property. By 'digital property' any valuable that is usable or available in electronic form is understood, including computer programs, databases, digital audio and video, etc. Due to authors' own expertise, legal protection of digital property is represented through issues on legal protection of computer programed First part of the assignment accomplished by this article deals with copyright protection of digital property. The article surveys most important international legislation and caee law, ae well as academic opinions on legal regulation of digital property. The significant transformations and differences from traditional principles of Intellectual property law that took place with the rise of digital property are emphasized, together with the challenges brought by digital technology. It is further argued that for the newly established national legal systems, such as Lithuanian, a simple extension of the existing Intellectual property legislation, or mechanical Implantation of foreign laws is not adequate, while the risks are crucial. Careful national approach may be needed in order to achieve socially desirable results and not to prevent establishment of national information economy. The article is conducted ae a result of the research done by the author during the research visit to Donald berman laboratory for Information Technology and Law with the La Trobe University, Bundoora, VIC, Australia. The author wishes to express his gratitude to Dr. Andrew Stranieri, whose views and thoughts inspired this article, and Dr. John Zeleznikow, whose efforts have made possible this research visit.
This paper presents an overview of legal aspects of the Information Society, especially, the role of the governments and new law regulation problems. It considers also what impact has for lawyers new information technology and artificial intelligence. The paper suggests (hat law can support Information Society formation processes or to be the obstacle for such processes. It is necessary as soon as possible to break the monopoly of telecom and to liberalize the market of integrated services. It is also necessary to establish the legal status of electronic documents and solve legal problems in order to protect documents and data in computer networks. It is especially important to avoid the split in the society into skilled professionals and "computer unliterate" people which are unable to work and even to live in new conditions. This problem is a great challenge for Government. The Government has responsibility also for solving other legal regulation problem which hinder to form Information Society. Lawyers must change their work style too. Artificial Intelligence (AI) plays an important role in this process because the legal knowledge is very complex, formalized in great degree and legal reasoning is logically based and uses precedents. AI can be helpful in order to conceptualize and to compare different law theories. It enables to use computers in knowledge management and can support the legislative engineering processes.
This paper presents an overview of legal aspects of the Information Society, especially, the role of the governments and new law regulation problems. It considers also what impact has for lawyers new information technology and artificial intelligence. The paper suggests (hat law can support Information Society formation processes or to be the obstacle for such processes. It is necessary as soon as possible to break the monopoly of telecom and to liberalize the market of integrated services. It is also necessary to establish the legal status of electronic documents and solve legal problems in order to protect documents and data in computer networks. It is especially important to avoid the split in the society into skilled professionals and "computer unliterate" people which are unable to work and even to live in new conditions. This problem is a great challenge for Government. The Government has responsibility also for solving other legal regulation problem which hinder to form Information Society. Lawyers must change their work style too. Artificial Intelligence (AI) plays an important role in this process because the legal knowledge is very complex, formalized in great degree and legal reasoning is logically based and uses precedents. AI can be helpful in order to conceptualize and to compare different law theories. It enables to use computers in knowledge management and can support the legislative engineering processes.
The Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania was approved in the Referendum on 25 October 1992. It consolidated the doctrine of constitutional review and its practical form – the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania. The foundation of the Constitutional Court and its already developed practical activities stimulate to evaluate more thoroughly the place and role of this institution in the state's system of law. Such an aim is predetermined by an undoubtedly active work of the Constitutional Court in the process of the creation of Lithuanian law. The co-ordination of the inner relations in the organisation of the Lithuanian state is directly linked up with a dynamic development of law; however, while creating Lithuanian law one faces up with a lot of theoretical and practical problems. These processes determine some discrepancies of an objective and subjective character. One of them is the conformity of the laws and the norms of substatutory legal acts with the Constitution. The rulings of the Constitutional Court, evaluating the correspondence of legal norms with the Constitution, always cause legal social consequences. In the cases when a legal norm is recognised to be not in compliance with the Constitution, there appear real legal consequences - this legal norm becomes eliminated from a legal system, i.e., it can not be applied any more. In this and the other case, i.e. when legality of a legal norm is not negated, the arguments as well as motives of the ruling passed by the Constitutional Court may also be evaluated by the aspect of legal sources. Thus, it is obvious that the acts of the Constitutional Court – no matter how they might be estimated within the system of legal sources – are a real legal phenomenon, the more comprehensive scientific survey which will help to evaluate the problems of the creation of law in Lithuania in a broader legal panorama. According to the author's opinion, the most important and decisive role of the acts of the Constitutional Court is that they constantly underline the fundamental principle of the superiority of the Constitution. It is very important especially now when Lithuanian law is being formed. These acts are also important in the political process as they compose preconditions for avoiding more acute conflicts, and settling political disputes on the bases of the Constitution. Legal positions which are formed by the Constitutional Court in its rulings are often not new ones, they are known in comparative law. However, in one way or another, they are important especially now, when the formation of law often goes on spontaneously as well as contradictory. Here are some such legal positions: a law or a substatutory act can not be used retroactively; substatutory legal acts can not overstep the boundaries of the functioning of laws; in the system of legal norms there can not be such legal norms which would contradict or negate each other; the general aim of a law has to correspond to the content of norms of a law. These are only some legal positions which are also being examined in this article.
The Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania was approved in the Referendum on 25 October 1992. It consolidated the doctrine of constitutional review and its practical form – the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania. The foundation of the Constitutional Court and its already developed practical activities stimulate to evaluate more thoroughly the place and role of this institution in the state's system of law. Such an aim is predetermined by an undoubtedly active work of the Constitutional Court in the process of the creation of Lithuanian law. The co-ordination of the inner relations in the organisation of the Lithuanian state is directly linked up with a dynamic development of law; however, while creating Lithuanian law one faces up with a lot of theoretical and practical problems. These processes determine some discrepancies of an objective and subjective character. One of them is the conformity of the laws and the norms of substatutory legal acts with the Constitution. The rulings of the Constitutional Court, evaluating the correspondence of legal norms with the Constitution, always cause legal social consequences. In the cases when a legal norm is recognised to be not in compliance with the Constitution, there appear real legal consequences - this legal norm becomes eliminated from a legal system, i.e., it can not be applied any more. In this and the other case, i.e. when legality of a legal norm is not negated, the arguments as well as motives of the ruling passed by the Constitutional Court may also be evaluated by the aspect of legal sources. Thus, it is obvious that the acts of the Constitutional Court – no matter how they might be estimated within the system of legal sources – are a real legal phenomenon, the more comprehensive scientific survey which will help to evaluate the problems of the creation of law in Lithuania in a broader legal panorama. According to the author's opinion, the most important and decisive role of the acts of the Constitutional Court is that they constantly underline the fundamental principle of the superiority of the Constitution. It is very important especially now when Lithuanian law is being formed. These acts are also important in the political process as they compose preconditions for avoiding more acute conflicts, and settling political disputes on the bases of the Constitution. Legal positions which are formed by the Constitutional Court in its rulings are often not new ones, they are known in comparative law. However, in one way or another, they are important especially now, when the formation of law often goes on spontaneously as well as contradictory. Here are some such legal positions: a law or a substatutory act can not be used retroactively; substatutory legal acts can not overstep the boundaries of the functioning of laws; in the system of legal norms there can not be such legal norms which would contradict or negate each other; the general aim of a law has to correspond to the content of norms of a law. These are only some legal positions which are also being examined in this article.
Lithuanian lawyers allot more and more attention to the analysis of the constitutional status of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania. Those examinations reveal the problems of formation of the doctrines of constitutional justice as well as the perspectives of improvement of the activities of the Constitutional Court. And it is not accidental that scientists' attention towards the Constitutional Court increases. While studying urgent problems regarding implementation of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania one may reveal not only the development of constitutional justice but also more general laws of the Lithuanian constitutional system. However, one cannot leave unmentioned that not enough attention is paid to legal phenomena of the Lithuania between two World Wars, and, to be more precise, to development of the doctrine of constitutional review. Politically and legally acknowledging the continuity of the Republic of Lithuania, it is impossible not to look back at the past and not to appreciate those phenomena which influenced the concept of the now functioning Constitutional Court.One of those phenomena was the Statutory Court of Klaipėda region. The Law on the establishment of that institution was promulgated on 13 March 1935. True, while evaluating the legal status of the Statutory Court, one cannot avoid confronting a more general problem, i.e. the urgent issues of the interaction between the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania and the Statute of Klaipėda region. In this context one may consider differently the legal origin of the Statutory Court, however, in all cases one has to underline that for the first time in the history of Lithuania a possibility was created to examine the lawfulness of a legal act. The Statutory Court had to determine if legal acts of the Republic of Lithuania and those of the institutions of Klaipėda region were in conformity with the Statute of Klaipėda region. The author assents to the conclusion made by Lithuanian scientists between two World Wars that the Statute of Klaipėda region was a constituent part of the Lithuanian constitutional system. With regard to this there are preconditions to assert that the assessment of legal acts concerning their compliance with the Statute was the constitutional problem of these acts as well. Thus, when examining the urgent problems of constitutionality, one has to take into account that already in the Lithuania between two World Wars there were legal phenomena which were approaching the conception of traditional constitutional justice. Due to political reasons the Statutory Court did not really start functioning. However, passing of the Law on the Statutory Court and the conception of the Court formulated therein meant that in Lithuania of that time the question of constitutionality of legal acts was already urgent.
Lithuanian lawyers allot more and more attention to the analysis of the constitutional status of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Lithuania. Those examinations reveal the problems of formation of the doctrines of constitutional justice as well as the perspectives of improvement of the activities of the Constitutional Court. And it is not accidental that scientists' attention towards the Constitutional Court increases. While studying urgent problems regarding implementation of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania one may reveal not only the development of constitutional justice but also more general laws of the Lithuanian constitutional system. However, one cannot leave unmentioned that not enough attention is paid to legal phenomena of the Lithuania between two World Wars, and, to be more precise, to development of the doctrine of constitutional review. Politically and legally acknowledging the continuity of the Republic of Lithuania, it is impossible not to look back at the past and not to appreciate those phenomena which influenced the concept of the now functioning Constitutional Court.One of those phenomena was the Statutory Court of Klaipėda region. The Law on the establishment of that institution was promulgated on 13 March 1935. True, while evaluating the legal status of the Statutory Court, one cannot avoid confronting a more general problem, i.e. the urgent issues of the interaction between the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania and the Statute of Klaipėda region. In this context one may consider differently the legal origin of the Statutory Court, however, in all cases one has to underline that for the first time in the history of Lithuania a possibility was created to examine the lawfulness of a legal act. The Statutory Court had to determine if legal acts of the Republic of Lithuania and those of the institutions of Klaipėda region were in conformity with the Statute of Klaipėda region. The author assents to the conclusion made by Lithuanian scientists between two World Wars that the Statute of Klaipėda region was a constituent part of the Lithuanian constitutional system. With regard to this there are preconditions to assert that the assessment of legal acts concerning their compliance with the Statute was the constitutional problem of these acts as well. Thus, when examining the urgent problems of constitutionality, one has to take into account that already in the Lithuania between two World Wars there were legal phenomena which were approaching the conception of traditional constitutional justice. Due to political reasons the Statutory Court did not really start functioning. However, passing of the Law on the Statutory Court and the conception of the Court formulated therein meant that in Lithuania of that time the question of constitutionality of legal acts was already urgent.
The article addresses a range of problems relating to qualifying crimes against economic and financial management. The analysis of the said issues starts with a brief overview of the development of Lithuania's legislation regulating criminal responsibility for crimes against economic and financial management, as well as preconditions for adopting currently existing laws. Further, the article deals with specific aspects of the qualification of crimes against economic and financial management such as separation of crimes from administrative offences, disclosing the content of qualifying characteristics, blanket nature of norms, etc. The author maintains that one of the main reasons leading to problems of qualification is the absence in certain cases of a clear-cut content of legal provisions. While working out the norms of criminal law, the legislator sometimes take no regard of the existing legal provisions in Administrative Law. In addition, there are no well-formulated and clear criminalisation and decriminalisation criteria of the activities qualified as crimes against economic and financial management.
The article addresses a range of problems relating to qualifying crimes against economic and financial management. The analysis of the said issues starts with a brief overview of the development of Lithuania's legislation regulating criminal responsibility for crimes against economic and financial management, as well as preconditions for adopting currently existing laws. Further, the article deals with specific aspects of the qualification of crimes against economic and financial management such as separation of crimes from administrative offences, disclosing the content of qualifying characteristics, blanket nature of norms, etc. The author maintains that one of the main reasons leading to problems of qualification is the absence in certain cases of a clear-cut content of legal provisions. While working out the norms of criminal law, the legislator sometimes take no regard of the existing legal provisions in Administrative Law. In addition, there are no well-formulated and clear criminalisation and decriminalisation criteria of the activities qualified as crimes against economic and financial management.
Continuously changed criminal trial legislation has positive and negative sides. One of negative sides was the inconsistency of changed criminal trial regulations not only with different norms of various acts, but also with criminal trial norms. This also creates complexities criminalistic of character. One of similar norms is "check-up" introduced into Lithuanian criminal trial code in 1994 (2061 article). This norm rivals with 37 article of Law on Police, and also with various clauses of criminal trial code. In this article we endeavour not only gnosiologically to explore the conception of "check-up", but also to give the sample of criminalistic tactics of this criminal trial action. Checking sufficiently frequently is conducted by the economic and tax police, tax inspection and by other law enforcement officials. That is why recommendations regarding conducting of this criminal trail action are particularly urgent.
Continuously changed criminal trial legislation has positive and negative sides. One of negative sides was the inconsistency of changed criminal trial regulations not only with different norms of various acts, but also with criminal trial norms. This also creates complexities criminalistic of character. One of similar norms is "check-up" introduced into Lithuanian criminal trial code in 1994 (2061 article). This norm rivals with 37 article of Law on Police, and also with various clauses of criminal trial code. In this article we endeavour not only gnosiologically to explore the conception of "check-up", but also to give the sample of criminalistic tactics of this criminal trial action. Checking sufficiently frequently is conducted by the economic and tax police, tax inspection and by other law enforcement officials. That is why recommendations regarding conducting of this criminal trail action are particularly urgent.
