The second half of this year has been full of changes and events of the Supreme Court, and this is also reflected in the latest issue of the Supreme Court Bulletin.

Aigars Strupiss has taken over the position of the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. The Bulletin provides information on the Chief Justice's first conversations with the highest officials of the state and the judiciary. The Plenary Session elected Normunds Salenieks as the Chair of the Department of Civil Cases of the Senate – his vision of the future activities of the Department, as well as the vision of Dzintra Balta, the representative of the Supreme Court in the Judicial Council, running for a position in the Council, are included in the Bulletin.

The Senate has an active dialogue with the Constitutional Court, regional courts and courts of first instance, as pointed out in the Bulletin. There is also an information about the project in which the Supreme Court shares with its Ukrainian colleagues the experience of work organization in the conditions of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The section of the Judicial Council tells about the solemn sitting of the Judicial Council dedicated to its first decade. One can also read the concept of the development of the activities of the Prosecutor's Office drawn up by the Prosecutor General Juris Stukans, and the vision of the new members of the Judicial Council Juris Silins and Ilze Celmina regarding the court system and the work to be performed by the Judicial Council. In its turn, the working group established at the request of the Judicial Council provides proposals on how to reduce the duration of legal proceedings in Latvian courts.

A section of legal thoughts is rich in interesting ideas. Who is responsible for the rule of law in Latvia – this was discussed at the Conversation Festival LAMPA by the State President, the Prime Minister, the Deputy Speaker of the Saeima (Parliament), the President of the Constitutional Court, and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. What is a good application to the court – a topic discussed by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court Aigars Strupiss when meeting with the employees of the State Revenue Service. Dace Sulmane, Adviser to the Secretariat of the Judicial Council, points out an interesting question about the status of regulatory enactments issued by the Judicial Council – are they internal or external regulatory enactments? Rihards Gulbis, Legal Research Counsel of the Department of Civil Cases of the Senate, who is also the Deputy Head of the Working Group for the Improvement of Copyright Regulation established by the Ministry of Culture, speaks about the forthcoming amendments to copyright regulation in Latvia and their impact on examination of copyright disputes in courts. Broad insight in the field of criminal law has been prepared by legal research counsels of the Department of Criminal Cases; Oskars Kulmanis writes about the examination of a police officer's report as a written testimony in a court investigation; Janis Baumanis focuses on a fine in the juvenile criminal liability reform; Nora Zvejniece speaks about the competence of a court in establishing deliberately false testimony of a person who has committed a criminal offense and in imposing a sentence. In the field of administrative law, Veronika Krumina and Kristine Zemite elaborate on the interworking of legal proceedings in children’s rights protection disputes, and Aleksandrs Potaicuks speaks about the recognition of cross-border administrative acts in the field of finance.

In the history section on the 25th anniversary events of the restored Senate there is an information regarding the discussion “Personality of a Senator”, a gallery of portraits of former Chief Justices of the Supreme Court, an exhibition “Senators in the Field of Legal Literature”, and digitized decisions Supreme Court Plenary Session.

The Supreme Court Bulletin is published twice a year. It is received by Latvian courts and other judicial institutions, libraries and law faculties of higher education institutions. The 21st issue of the Bulletin is still in print in the printing house, but it is already available electronically on the Court's website.

The Bulletin is available here (in Latvian)

 

Information prepared by

Rasma Zvejniece, the Head of the Division of Communication of the Supreme Court

E-mail: rasma.zvejniece@at.gov.lv, telephone: +371 67020396, +371 28652211