Ruling No. 13 of 26 November 2024 on Constitutional Case No. 27/2024
Referring Authority and Subject Matter of the Case
The case was initiated upon a request by the 16th panel of the Sofia City Court. The petitioner asks the Constitutional Court to declare unconstitutional a part of Article 272, paragraph 1 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CPC), which obliges the presiding judge, when verifying the identity of the accused, to ask about the place of birth, nationality, citizenship, residence, education, marital status, and whether the accused has prior convictions. According to the referring court, these questions are not necessary for establishing identity and violate the accused’s right to privacy (Article 32, paragraph 1, first sentence of the Constitution) and the guarantee that no one may be compelled to incriminate themselves (Article 31, paragraph 4).
Summary of the Court’s Reasoning
A mandatory condition for the admissibility of a request based on Article 150(2) of the Constitution is that the provision of law challenged before the Court must be relevant to the outcome of the specific court proceedings, i.e., to the resolution of the specific legal dispute. This requirement stems from the wording of Article 150(2) of the Constitution after the 2023 amendment – "law applicable to the specific case."
The Constitutional Court has been consistent in its position that it is the obligation of the referring court to be the first to substantiate that the question raised is relevant to the resolution of the specific case and to determine the applicable law. Referring a matter to the Constitutional Court must be not only possible but necessary, arising from the circumstances of the concrete case. [...] This means that without an answer to the question raised, the referring court is unable to perform its judicial function in accordance with the Constitution" (Decision No. 2 of 13 March 2024 on Case No. 8/2024 and the case law cited therein).
The subject of the constitutional case is part of the provision of Article 272(1) of the Penal Procedure Code. Its systematic place is in Section II, "Actions for the commencement of the case in the court hearing," of Chapter Twenty of the Penal Procedure Code. The contested provision regulates one of the first actions that the presiding judge must perform at the beginning of the court hearing, and its purpose is to establish who is appearing before the court as a defendant and to verify the information already collected about his identity.
The petitioner has based the request on the applicability of the directive cited therein, which, in his view, has not been transposed into Bulgarian law through the necessary amendments to Article 272, paragraph 1 of the Criminal Procedure Code, without taking into account the legal framework in Chapter Eight of the Personal Data Protection Act, “Rules on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by competent authorities for the purposes of the prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences or the execution of criminal penalties, including the safeguarding against and the prevention of threats to public order and security,” which transposes the directive. He further argues that it is impossible to interpret the contested provision of the Criminal Procedure Code in conformity with the provisions of the directive he considers relevant, without taking into account that the fulfilment of his obligations arising from the contested part of the provision is a matter of law enforcement.
Grounds for the Ruling and Disposition
Pursuant to Article 13 of the Constitutional Court Act (the Constitutional Court determines on its own whether the question referred to it falls within its jurisdiction) and Article 25, paragraph 1 and Article 26, paragraph 1 of the Rules of Procedure of the Constitutional Court, the Constitutional Court dismisses the request of the Sofia City Court, 16th panel, for establishing the unconstitutionality of Article 272, paragraph 1 of the Criminal Procedure Code, in the part: “[...] and the place [...], regarding his nationality, citizenship, residence, education, marital status [...], as well as whether he has prior convictions” (promulgated in SG No. 86 of 2005, last amended and supplemented in SG No. 39 of 2024), terminates the proceedings in constitutional case No. 27/2024, and returns the request to the petitioner.
Председател: Павлина Панова