On the need to differentiate the criminal procedure form of pre-trial proceedings in relation to minor participants in criminal proceedings
The article discusses the debatable issues of procedurally significant problems of ensuring the rights and legitimate interests of minors in the conduct of preliminary investigation, these include: the absence in criminal procedure legislation of the possibility of using information technology, special requirements for persons investigating criminal cases involving offences committed by minors and for defense lawyers of minors, as a means of ensuring the rights and legitimate interests of minors. By the decree of the President of the Russian Federation, the period from 2018 to 2027 is declared the decade of childhood, in order to improve the geopolitics in the field of child protection based on the results achieved in the implementation ofthe National Strategy of Action for Children for 2012-2017. There the need for an early and consistent transition to child-friendly justice was first identified, as well as such problems as the insufficient effectiveness of the mechanisms available in the Russian Federation to ensure and protect the rights and interests of minors, non-compliance with international standards in the field of children ’s rights, low efficiency of preventive work. In this regard, it is very important to develop and introduce into the criminal procedural legislation rational pre-trial proceedings in criminal cases involving crimes committed by minors in order to achieve the most efficient use of material, technical, human, procedural resources, while ensuring the observance of rights and legal interests of minor participants in criminal proceedings. The solution to this problem is possible by creating an optimal theoretical and legal model of pre-trial proceedings in criminal cases on crimes of this category, which makes it possible to eliminate unnecessary formalism, speed up access to justice, ensure a reasonable period of criminal proceedings and optimize pre-trial proceedings.