Transnational Investigations and Prosecution of Cross-Border Cases in Europe: Guidelines for a Model of Fair Multicultural Criminal Justice

This study analyses the issue of transnational prosecution and investigation. It starts with the premise that transborder criminal investigations and the gathering of overseas evidence cannot be adequately dealt with independently of the assignment of the power to prosecute and adjudicate cross-border crimes. The present study analyses the solutions provided by some of the main models of international cooperation and stresses that in the European scenario, characterised by an increasingly transcultural criminal law, the choice of the forum and of the applicable criminal law cannot be left to a bargaining among the competing authorities on the basis of uncoordinated national laws. The need for legal certainty requires clear rules on the assignment of the prosecutorial power that meet the requirements inherent in the essential principles of criminal law, such as nullum crimen sine lege and nulla pena sine culpa. Moreover, in a common area of freedom, security and justice, any form of discrimination among EU citizens must be avoided. The choice of the forum pursuant to these fundamental requirements is of crucial importance for establishing both the form of conducting cross-border investigations and collecting evidence overseas, and the applicable procedural criminal law.