ARTICLE 7 – Ensuring Access to Case Materials in Hungary (2015-2017)

Promoting access to case materials of defendants and their defense counsels in criminal proceedings has been a long-standing priority of the HHC, and is related to activities involving a series of successful applications submitted to the ECtHR. The implementation of the Right to Information Directive by Hungary in 2014–2015 constituted a major step in ensuring the right to access of case materials.

Through its project “ARTICLE 7 – Ensuring Access to Case Materials in Hungary”, launched in 2015, the HHC aims to monitor the implementation of the Directive’s respective Article 7 on access to case materials in practice, to advocate for the correct implementation of Article 7 of the Directive in Hungary by identifying deficiencies in law and practice and to produce concrete proposals to address them, and to contribute to the correct implementation of Article 7 of the Directive across the EU by developing, testing and disseminating a method for assessing whether the right to information of defendants is respected. Related research activities include interviews with judges and prosecutors, and in-depth interviews with defense attorneys, coupled with case file review.

Research results and the HHC’s related recommendations were discussed with stakeholders and experts at a workshop held in June 2017. The research report finalized on the basis of the results of that workshop is available here in English and in Hungarian:

• Article 7 – Access to Case Materials in the Investigation Phase of the Criminal Procedure in Hungary
• 7. cikk – A büntetőügyek irataihoz való hozzáférés a nyomozati szakban Magyarországon

Further publications produced in the project:

• country studies on the implementation of Article 7 of the Right to Information Directive in Belgium, England and Wales, Germany and Romania (in Hungarian and in English);
• methodological manual (in English);
• executive summary of research results in French, Polish, German, Italian and Spanish

Supported by the Justice Programme of the European Union