Genesis of a preventive measure in the form of a bail in foreign countries

Abstract

The author has analyzed legal regulation of using preventive measures in the form of a bail under the criminal procedural law of the USA, France, Austria and Germany. Positive and negative features of the regulatory procedure of applying a bail in the national legislation have been highlighted; their improvement by amending the Criminal Procedural Code of Ukraine has been offered.

The findings have indicated that a bail as a measure of procedural provision has a long history, known to all existing criminal justice systems in the world; to criminal procedure in many countries, especially to the Anglo-American legal system; there are only 2 preventive measures – detention and a bail (collateral guarantee); in many countries a preventive measure as a form of a bail is provided as a type of the release from custody, while in the US and UK the right to be released on bail has the nature of constitutional guarantee of a person’s immunity; the characteristic feature of the legislation of some countries is the attempt to justify a preventive measure in the form of a bail with any legally significant factor, to point out their dependence on the circumstances that characterize the personality, possible criminal punishment for a committed crime, etc. On this basis, the legislator provides a direct prohibition, the need or opportunity to use a preventive measure in the form of a bail.

Criminal procedural law of foreign countries indicates on a lack of clear minimum and maximum sum of a bail that ensures, on the one hand, taking into account all circumstances while setting the mortgage sum, on the other – the possibility to use this preventive measure to people with different incomes. The exception is the Criminal Procedural Code of France, which requires the inclusion into the mortgage sum the funds to provide compensation for material damage from a crime, court costs and other funds that in terms of Ukrainian criminal procedure does not meet the main goals of a preventive measure and provides exclusive properties to a bail not typical for other preventive measures of compulsion.