Criminal defence lawyer in Cluj-Napoca.

You are informed of your right to have a lawyer present at the search. If you ask for one, the start of the search is postponed until they arrive, but by no more than two hours from the moment that right is communicated to you. In exceptional cases requiring the search to be carried out urgently, or where the lawyer cannot be contacted, the search may begin earlier (art. 159 para. (9) Criminal Procedure Code). You are handed a copy of the warrant and asked to hand over voluntarily the items being sought. You may also be assisted or represented by a person of trust. More on home searches.

The search is carried out in your presence if you are a suspect or a defendant, and if you are in custody or under arrest you must be brought to it. You may be assisted or represented by a person of trust (art. 168 para. (11) in conjunction with art. 159 paras. (10) and (11) Criminal Procedure Code). You have the right to a lawyer, whether chosen or appointed, but the two-hour rule from the home search does not apply here: art. 168 refers only to paragraphs (10) and (11) of art. 159, and not to paragraph (9), which is the one providing for the postponement until the lawyer arrives. You also have the right to read the search warrant and the prosecutor’s order, to take part in unsealing the device, to raise objections about how the search was carried out, not to sign the report, and to be told which data was identified and obtained. You have, equally, the right not to incriminate yourself. Full guide to computer searches.

As a person under accusation, no. You have the right not to give any statement, and your refusal carries no unfavourable consequence (art. 78 in conjunction with art. 83 lit. a) Criminal Procedure Code). The right not to incriminate yourself also covers refusing to disclose a password or a PIN. The privilege is not universal, however: it protects the person accused or at risk of being accused. Outside that situation, an unjustified refusal may be discussed in terms of obstruction of justice. One practical distinction: refusing to cooperate is one thing, deleting the data is something else entirely. More on passwords and PIN codes.

Yes. If you fail to appear without justification, you may be brought before the judicial body under a warrant (art. 265 Criminal Procedure Code) and you may be fined between RON 250 and RON 5,000 (art. 283 para. (2) Criminal Procedure Code). Appearing remains mandatory even if you intend to rely on a right to refuse to give a statement. More on being summoned as a witness.

As a rule, yes, with two exceptions. The following have the right to refuse to be heard as witnesses: the spouse, ascendants and descendants in a direct line, and the brothers and sisters of the suspect or defendant, former spouses, and persons who have established relationships similar to those between spouses (art. 117 Criminal Procedure Code). Separately, every witness has the right not to state facts that would incriminate them, and the judicial body is obliged to inform them of that right before each hearing (art. 118 Criminal Procedure Code).

The court verifies its competence and the lawfulness of the referral, the lawfulness of how evidence was gathered and of the acts carried out by the investigating bodies, and this is the stage at which the exclusion of unlawfully obtained evidence is sought. The rules on nullity divide the objections in two: some absolute nullities may be raised at any stage of the proceedings, others only up to the closing of the preliminary chamber procedure, where the breach occurred during the criminal investigation (art. 281 paras. (3) and (4) Criminal Procedure Code). In practice, the preliminary chamber is the last stage at which most objections of unlawfulness can usefully be raised. More on the preliminary chamber.

The fee of a lawyer specialising in criminal law depends on the stage of the case, on its complexity and on the volume of documents, and the difference between attending a single interview and a file with two years of technical surveillance is substantial. A realistic estimate can be given once we have seen the referral document and the stage the file has reached. Our guide to legal fees.

If you are the injured party, you may file a complaint against the dismissal, first with the hierarchically superior prosecutor and, if that is rejected, with the preliminary chamber judge. Time runs from communication of the decision and the deadline is short. How to challenge a dismissal.

Three are mandatory: to appear whenever you are summoned, to inform the judicial body without delay of any change of residence, and to report to the police unit designated to supervise you, in accordance with the schedule it draws up. The judicial body may add others, from a ban on leaving a set territorial area to a ban on contacting certain persons (art. 215 Criminal Procedure Code). Failing to observe them may lead to a more severe measure being substituted. The measure can be challenged, and revocation or amendment of the obligations imposed can be sought in the meantime. More on judicial supervision.

Signal and WhatsApp encrypt content end to end, so it cannot be read by intercepting traffic. Telegram does not do so by default: ordinary conversations are stored on the provider’s servers, and only secret chats are end-to-end encrypted. Watch out for backups, though: a WhatsApp backup in iCloud or Google Drive is not end-to-end encrypted by default, and in practice that is one of the routes by which conversations reach the judicial authorities. Whatever the application, content can also be obtained directly from your device or from that of the person you were speaking to, through a computer search (art. 168 Criminal Procedure Code), which is an evidentiary procedure distinct from the special surveillance methods listed in art. 138 Criminal Procedure Code. What can be challenged, and how, depends on the legal basis used. More on intercepting messaging apps.

Driving on public roads with a blood alcohol concentration above 0.80 g/l of pure alcohol is punishable by one to five years’ imprisonment and a ban on exercising certain rights (art. 336 Criminal Code). Below that threshold the act remains, as a rule, an administrative offence. The moment samples are taken and the retrograde calculation of blood alcohol are frequently decisive. More on drink-driving.