Moldova (bbabo.net), - Chairman of the parliamentary commission on legal issues, appointments and immunities, Olesya Stamate, proposes to reduce the immunity of lawyers to the level of judges. She wrote about this on her facebook page. In her opinion, this could be a compromise solution for the period of legal reform in order to exclude the "disproportionate immunity" of lawyers compared to judges, infotag.md reports.
Earlier, Stamate proposed to exclude from the law "On the Bar" an amendment that does not allow the arrest of lawyers without the permission of the Council of the Union of Lawyers. She explained that her proposed amendment fits into the anti-corruption plan developed by the Action and Solidarity Party (PAS).
The lawyer recalled that the amendment, according to which lawyers received "disproportionate immunity", was introduced into the law "On the Bar" at the suggestion of Marina Tauber, a deputy from the Shor party, at a time when the Shor faction was in the parliamentary majority with the Party of Socialists.
According to Stamate, the lawyers insist that "because of the abuses that the prosecutor's office has committed in the past" they should be protected. "However, we are implementing a justice reform, the protective mechanism should be "the same for everyone," Stamate stressed.
She explained that from April 1, 2022, amendments that limit the immunity of judges come into force. This implies that the immunity of judges only works if they want to open a criminal case against them for their decisions. At the same time, functional immunity does not apply to investigations into cases of corruption.
In the same way, they plan to limit the immunity of deputies. The MP considers it fair that the same level of immunity applies to lawyers.
“There are many honest professionals among lawyers who do their job with dignity and fight corruption. But there are also cases when lawyers act as “intermediaries” between clients and judges or prosecutors. These cases should be investigated and punished.
It is true that the prosecutor's office has not yet been cleared. The compromise will be such a decision: lawyers will have the same immunity as judges, at least until the external attestation of judges and prosecutors is completed," Stamate wrote.
Lawyers have previously criticized the proposal to strip them of their immunity. The chairman of the Union of Lawyers, Dorin Popescu, called on lawyers to unite "to protect the profession," and lawyer Igor Khlopetsky called on the Union of Lawyers to call a general strike.
Khlopetsky is a lawyer for former Deputy Prosecutor General Ruslan Popov, who is accused of illegal enrichment.
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