Trends and Challenges in European and National Criminal Policy

Abstract

Every year, the International Scientific and Practical Conference invites to discuss topical issues of criminal policy, to review the latest trends in European Union law, criminal policy decisions of Lithuania and other European countries, and practical problems of law application. The focus of this conference is on contemporary trends in criminal policy, as reflected in European Union law, the case law of the European Court of Human Rights, the innovative criminal policy solutions of European countries and the latest scholarly debates. The conference focused in particular on areas of EU criminal law such as electronic evidence and data retrieval from EU Member States. Other topics were also presented: the application of conventional criminal norms in the grey area of interpretation, the problem of distinguishing fraud from financial crimes, the assessment of the quality of indictments (based on the results of a study conducted by experts of the MRU School of Law on the assessment of the quality of the procedural activities of prosecutors’ offices), etc. Many speakers, while presenting individual topics, highlighted the problems of legal uncertainty and inconsistency in the areas of legal regulation and its application. It is also pleasing that the conference, and its second session, was attended by German and Polish scholars from a distance, whose legal experience and views really enriched the scientific debate and allowed us to hear how different countries deal with similar problems.