Between Reconciliation and Formalism: Crisis Phenomena in Private Prosecution Criminal Proceedings in Russia

The institution of private prosecution, maintaining its historical continuity since the reforms of 1864, occupies a special place in the Russian criminal justice system and embod a balance between private and public principles. However, recently this institution has been facing a systemic crisis, caused by contradictions between its declared dispositive nature and the actual dominance of public law regulatory means. Excessive procedural formalization, procedural inequality of the parties, limited opportunities for genuine reconciliation, and organizational problems associated with the overload of justices of the peace undermine the very essence of private prosecution as a mechanism for accessible and effective justice. Purpose: To analyze the crisis in private prosecution criminal proceedings and to develop scientifically sound proposals for its improvement. Methods: the historical method is used to retrospectively analyze the genesis of the institute in question and to identify its initial essence; the comparative legal method is used to compare the theoretical model of private prosecution and established judicial practice; the logical legal method and the formal dogmatic analysis are used to study the current criminal procedural norms and to identify contradictions and gaps in them; the systemic analysis makes it possible to consider private prosecution as an element of the entire criminal justice system and to reveal the relationship between procedural and organizational problems. Results: The study identifies a number of critical procedural problems in the private prosecution system. The formalization of the procedure for initiating private prosecution cases, requiring the victim to draft a semblance of an indictment, results in the majority of applications being returned by justices of the peace due to non-compliance with formal requirements, thereby discrediting the idea of accessible justice. The institute of reconciliation, historically the core of private prosecution, has undergone significant changes: limiting the possibility of reconciliation to the moment the court retires to chambers deprives parties of flexibility, and most reconciliations are formal, being conditioned either by the court’s desire to optimize its workload or by the victim’s realization of the impossibility of proving the charge. Organizational problems are particularly acute in the context of excessive workload for justices of the peace, making it impossible to provide a quality review of cases that relies on an individual approach to the parties. This turns legal proceedings into a mere production line, where the focus shifts from resolving disputes to the perfunctory issuance of decisions.