Of course the lawyer is horrified: the judge is lying to his eyes and thus shows that you are a complete idiot

As Delfi told A. Ručienė, he participated in the questioning of the suspect on Sunday and the arrest issue had to be resolved the next day. On Monday, the attorney received a call from the prosecutor regarding a scheduled court hearing.

“I say show me the evidence. The prosecutor must provide the suspect and the defense attorney with the evidence from which the person is arrested. When I asked him to do the work, he told me to wait, ”he said.

The interlocutor says that he waited patiently for half a day until he finally learned that the suspect had been detained for ten days, and was represented in court by a state-appointed lawyer, because allegedly A. Ručienė could not participate.

“I called the judges, I told them how they could have lied to the suspect that I could not attend the court hearing. She said, ask the prosecutor and hung up. I told the prosecutor how you humiliated me, if you notice. A person has the right to have a lawyer of their choice and you take away that right. I lost my word after such a situation. The prosecutor and the judge, in my opinion, may have abused the service ”, the lawyer was outraged.

The lawyer has addressed the Attorney General, the Council of Judges and possibly a complaint before the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR).

“Lithuania must be responsible for this, it must carry out an investigation into the actions of the officials,” he said. – It deprives a person of the right to have a lawyer of their choice. It takes a lawyer for a minute who gets involved in a case without defending it. He told me that I just got online and that’s it. In this situation, it is worse here than in Belarus. Belarus has probably not been deprived of the right to have a lawyer of its own choosing. “

There was a need to hurry

The Vilnius City District Court said there was an urgent need to decide on the arrest, as the 48-hour detention period had almost expired.

“Judge Lilija Tarčevskaja reported that on Monday around 10 am she was contacted by a prosecutor for the arrest of a suspect whose detention had expired (it was to end around 12.50 pm). Until then, the question of the Pre-trial detention had to be resolved. A meeting was scheduled. According to the judge, the prosecutor reported that lawyer A. Ručienė could not participate in the judicial hearing at the specified time, for which he requested the State’s Guaranteed Legal Assistance Service to select a a lawyer. The State Guaranteed Legal Assistance Service selected a lawyer, Ramūnas Vanagas, who attended the hearing and represented the interests of the suspect. According to the data provided by the judge, the suspect did not express any objection regarding the defense during the court hearing, ”said judicial representative Gintarė Vosyliūtė.

However, according to A. Ručienė, her defendant was simply deceived in the courtroom, so she did not object to having another lawyer defend her.

“My defendant wrote an explanation that he had been misled by the judge because they told him he could not attend and it was very easy to verify. Is Lithuania a state governed by the rule of law or not? The judge lies to your eyes and thus shows that you are complete garbage with us, ”said A. Ručienė.

Prosecutor Antanas Stepučinskas, who spoke to Delfi, explained that the main problem arose because remote access to the file is not yet available, but that this problem must be resolved in the future.

“The lawyer warned me not to attend without being familiar with the case. I asked the judge if I could not postpone the hearing because the lawyer had not had access to the case, the prosecutor explained. – I think the whole process should have been organized differently. The lawyer did not receive my login details, in my opinion those details should have been obtained from the court that is organizing the hearing. In my opinion, while inappropriate, such a thing is not practical, but the reason was lack of communication and lack of time. I tried to apologize to the attorney, partly blaming for this misunderstanding, but it fell short of my words. “

Suspicion of drug smuggling

This whole story grew out of the problem of a man suspected of smuggling drugs from Spain to Sweden.

As the prosecutor said, since the person was suspected of having committed a very serious crime, he had to request his arrest.

However, the convictions of the suspect’s lawyer have been gathered, no evidence has been obtained regarding his defendant. He alluded to the fact that the decision had been made on the basis of a certificate from the Lithuanian Criminal Police Office, although in the ruling the judge stated that he had not seen the certificate.

“I have never seen such a decision in my life. There is a mystical testimony, and let the man sit down. Records were made, nothing was found in that person,” A. Ručienė was surprised.

The prosecutor explained that he had a certificate that the lawyer was talking about, although the judge couldn’t really see it in the system for some reason.

“Once again, there are such technical problems that the judge may not have seen the document,” said A. Stepučinskas. “And whether there is sufficient data or not, it is clear, as a general rule, that the defense does not seem to have sufficient data, but it is the judge who decides.”

The decision to detain has already been appealed to the High Court, but the judges will only be able to process the appeal in early June, when the ten-day detention is almost over.

Of concern

President of the Council of Lawyers prof. Ignas Vėgėlė, commenting on the situation, said that it is not normal. The law provides only a few exceptions to the possibility of appointing a lawyer other than the one chosen by the person.

“If a person has chosen their lawyer, neither the prosecutor nor the court can appoint a lawyer guaranteed by the state. There are several exceptions, when a lawyer cannot come several times, when it is necessary to guarantee the continuity of the hearings”, said I. Vėgėlė.

According to him, this situation could be a violation of the right to a fair trial and the right to a defense.

“It just came to our attention then. Such an approach is inappropriate, judges should pay attention to such things in the first place. If it were found that there were no exceptions here, I would have to wait for a very clear assessment of why it was done.

Due to such situations, when the defense becomes formal, unrealistic, it is only a matter of time before Lithuania receives the verdict from the ECHR that such things do not guarantee a real defense. The designated attorney has serious doubts as to whether he was able to access the case or whether he was able to meet and speak with the defendant. It is only a matter of time before Lithuania receives and loses the case before the ECHR, because there is no real right of defense ”, said the interlocutor.

It is true that I. Vėgėlė dubiously indicated whether malicious behavior had been committed to remove the lawyer.

“It just came to our attention then. But generally this is not the case, we have not had such a case,” he said.

The president of the Bar Association added that such actions also waste state funds.