Today, on 07.04.2022, at 09:00, the Appeal Chamber held the public plenary session of case (JD) no. 3/2021, dated 30.04.2021, pertaining to the appeal of the appellant Bujar Memia against decision no. 81, dated 31.03. 2021 of the High Prosecutorial Council “On imposing a disciplinary measure against prosecutor Bujar Memia”, with interested parties, the High Inspectorate of Justice (HIJ) and the High Prosecutorial Council (HPC).
Following the verification of the presence of the parties at trial, the presiding judge informed the parties that the appellant and his lawyer had filed several written acts, requesting their administration as evidence.
Once the representatives of the interested parties were acquainted with these acts, they requested that these acts should not be accepted as they are not related to the object of the disciplinary proceedings, while the appellant’s lawyer requested at the hearing the collection as well of a document obtained from the State Intelligence Service, in the context of the proceedings.
After being consulted, the court decided to administer the filed acts, including the document filed at the hearing.
Subsequently, once the parties stated that they had no further procedural requests, the Court decided to close the judicial review and invited the parties to submit their final conclusions.
The appellant’s lawyer requested that at this stage of the proceedings, he shall address several questions to the interested parties, pursuant to Article 43 of the Law on the Constitutional Court. The court, after being consulted in chambers, decided to reject the request, as the right of the parties to adress questions to one another was exhausted within this trial and the questions were not considered relevant in relation to the case, inviting the parties to submit their final conclusions.
Then, the appellant subsequently filed several procedural requests, such as the suspension of the trial until the conclusion of his vetting process, the recusal from the trial of the presiding judge, (the reasons and grounds thereof he shall file later in writing), requested the addition of the object of the appeal (which he would also submit in writing later), and requested to be defend at trial with a defense counsel, as his lawyer had left the hearing at the Appeal Chamber.
The court, after hearing the position of the interested parties, the representatives of the High Prosecutorial Council and the High Inspectorate of Justice, who requested the rejection of these requests, after being consulted on each request, decided to rebut them, considering them openly unfounded in law, and as such, abusive, as well as aiming to protract the proceedings. As regards the appellant’s request for the recusal of the presiding judge, the court decided to continue the hearing pursuant to Article 75, paragraph 5 of the Civil Procedure Code, inviting the appellant to submit this request to the Chamber in writing within three days, and stated that the Meeting of Judges will review this request in accordance with Article 37 of Law no. 8577, dated 10.02.2000 “On the organization and functioning of the Constitutional Court”, as amended.
Following the above decision-making, the presiding judge invited once again the appellant to submit his final conclusions. The appellant proceeded in submitting verbally the final conclusions.
The court, due to the considerable duration of the hearing, in order that all procedural subjects in this trial submit clearly their final conclusions, as well as to guarantee the attention of their attendance by each subject, decided to adjourn the hearing, to continue it on 10 May 2022, at 13:00, during which the appellant continued submitting the final conclusions, finally observing the requests in the appeal as well as the finding the decision of the High Prosecutorial Council as absolutely invalid and the remitting of the case for retrial to the HPC.
During the submission of the final conclusions, the representative of the High Prosecutorial Council held that the decision of the HJC is fair and requested that it be upheld, while the representative of the High Inspector of Justice stated amongst others, during the submission of the final conclusions, that the magistrate actions and the omissions have led to violations that not only discredit his position, but have also undermined the public confidence in justice, requesting ultimately the rejection of the appeal and the upholding of decision no. 81, dated 31.03.2021 of the High Prosecutorial Council.
The court, after hearing the final conclusions of the procedural subjects in this proceedings, decided to withdraw in chambers to continue with the decision-making deliberation on the case and informed the parties at trial that they will be notified by the court secretariat for the date the decision shall be announced.