Maria Shklyaruk

junior fellow
EURIAS cohort 2015/2016
discipline Sociology
Research Fellow, European University at Saint-Petersburg, Institute for the Rule of Law

Research project

The organizational context of criminal procedure in Germany and Russia: from the crime to the sentence

The difference between empirical reality of law enforcement and the one prescribed by the law was described by Eugen Ehrlich. Since then the mechanism of laws transformation into everyday practices has been studied in detail, but many questions still remain. Between law and sociology lies the primary research question of the project - how do provisions of laws that regulate key moments of criminal prosecution transform under the influence of organizational structures of criminal justice (from police to courts) and how do they reflect interactions between criminal procedure participants?

 

The “criminal case” is constructed from a chain of actors’ actions regarding the supposed crime from the moment the information about the crime appears on the radar of the police to the moment the court delivers a verdict. The global academic trend is to investigate the problem of prosecutorial discretion, i.e. the transfer of the primary locus of decision-making from the litigation to pre-litigation stage. The aim of the project is to determine the key factors responsible for significant differences  in the process of filtering of criminal allegations and suspects i.e. which cases assign to court and why, in otherwise similar legal systems of Russia and Germany.

 

Performed preliminary research of Russian law enforcement practice shows, that it organizational structure is the key factor in formation of selection and criminal investigations practices in Russia. Next step is to investigate influence of organizational factor on German juridical system. Through Germany has a similar legal system to Russia, organizational structure of German police and prosecutor offices are significantly different. Thus compression of real life juridical practices will allow to test the hypothesis of a strong influence of organizational factors on everyday practice of criminal prosecution.

 

In order to assess the role and relative contributions of filters envisaged by formal (law) and informal factors (interaction with existing system) I will use analysis of publications/reports on the work of police and prosecutors in Germany in combinations with the field work, e.g. non-participant observation of the work of German courts. I will describe the “criminal case trajectory” in German’s law and everyday practices of criminal justice by using as well traditional comparative-legal methods, as well as sociological methods (“thiсk description” and sociological reconstruction created on the basis of non-participant observation).

Biography

 

Maria  Shklyaruk is Research Fellow at the Institute for the Rule of Law of the European University at Saint-Petersburg. She holds a PhD in Economics from the St. Petersburg Polytechnic University.

 

Her main research interest are Economic Analysis of Public Law, Criminal Law and Criminal Procedure Law, Comparative Legal studies, Economic Crime, Law Enforcement, Law and Economics.

Selected publications

 

Crime statistics: how it is constructed, tampered with, and could be reformed, with D. Skougarevskiy, Institute for the Rule of Law, St. Petersburg, 2015. [in Russian]

 

The processing of criminal cases in the official statistics published by the Russian law enforcement agencies, Institute for the Rule of Law, St. Petersburg, 2014. [in Russian]

 

'Concept for Comprehensive Organizational and Managerial Reform of the Law Enforcement Agencies of the RF', with V. Volkov et al., Statutes and Decisions, vol. 48, no. 5,  2013, pp. 5–91.

 

'Is the 37th Year possible Now?', Otechestvennye Zapiski, vol. 53, no. 2, 2013, pp. 267-275. [in Russian]


'Comparative Legal Analysis of Criminal Law Protection of the Financial Concerns of the European Union and the Russian Federation', International Criminal Law and International Justice, 2013,  pp.10-12. [in Russian]


'An Integrated Approach to the Evaluation of the Effectiveness of Promotion of the Renewable Energy Development', with T. Malininа,  Scientific and Technical Bulletin, St. Petersburg State Polytechnic University, vol. 4, 2012, pp. 222-224. [in Russian]


'Responsibility for Illegal "Cashing". Comparative Legal Analysis of of Russian and Germany Legislation', Notary Bulletin, vol. 12, 2011, pp. 56-59. [in Russian]

 

 

institut

senior fellow
EURIAS promotion 2018/2019
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
discipline Psychology
2018
junior fellow
EURIAS promotion 2013/2014
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
discipline History of Science and Technology
2013
junior fellow
EURIAS promotion 2016/2017
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
discipline
Law
Social Sciences
2016
junior fellow
EURIAS promotion 2011/2012
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
discipline Biology
2011