Statement of Comments on the Draft Amendment to the Regulations Governing the Organization of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission

Recipient: Department of Prosecutorial Affairs, Ministry of Justice
Date of Issue: July 6, 2020
Document No.: Szu-Kai-Tzu No. 109103
Speed: Urgent
Security Classification and Declassification Conditions or Confidentiality Period: Attachments:

Subject: Statement of comments on the draft amendment to the "Regulations Governing the Organization of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission," as detailed in the explanation. Please review and respond.

Explanation:

1. Pursuant to the Ministry of Justice Official Letter No. Fa-Chian-Tzu-10904521330 dated June 17, 2020, the comments on the draft amendment to the "Regulations Governing the Organization of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission" are presented as follows.

2. The draft amendment lacks explicit regulations regarding the selection of representatives of scholars and impartial individuals. It is recommended to add qualification standards and selection procedures for the Ministry of Justice in selecting representatives of scholars and social impartial individuals, and to explicitly stipulate the proportion of representatives who are "non-legal background" scholars and impartial individuals, in order to align with the legislative intent of pluralism and openness under Paragraph 1, Article 89, mutatis mutandis, Paragraph 1, Article 33 of the Judges Act.

3. Article 6 of the draft amendment stipulates that the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission shall have one Executive Secretary to manage overall affairs, who shall be assigned by the Ministry of Justice from among its staff. As the person in charge of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission, the Executive Secretary manages overall affairs and executes the resolutions of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission. To be appropriate, this should be a full-time position to safeguard the independence of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission.
   Furthermore, this Article fails to clearly stipulate the staffing composition within the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission, and aside from hiring dedicated personnel, personnel may be transferred from the Ministry of Justice or its subordinate agencies. This severely violates the requirement of the Judges Act to hire dedicated personnel and infringes upon the personnel autonomy of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission.

4. The newly amended Judges Act allows citizens to directly request evaluations. The current Prosecutor Evaluation Commission has not established branch offices, and the "Regulations Governing the Organization of the Prosecutor Evaluation Commission" do not stipulate that the Commission may establish branch offices or offices to accept individual case evaluation requests from citizens nationwide, thereby safeguarding the right of citizens in areas outside Taipei to request individual case evaluations.

5. The above are our comments on the amendments. We kindly request their adoption and respectfully urge your Ministry to broadly collect opinions from all sectors to facilitate the implementation of the new Judges Act.