Chair of Criminal Procedure and Criminology

The Chair of Criminal Procedure and Criminology was founded in 1972 based on the Chair of Criminal Law. Until 1982, the Chair was headed by its founder, Professor H. M. Pivazyan, and from 1983 until 2006, by Professor L. P. Ohanyan. In 2006 Dr., Professor S. A. Dilbandyan was elected as the head of the Chair.

From the first years of its establishment, the Chair has been engaged in the creation of textbooks and training manuals in the mother tongue. The first textbook "Criminal Procedure" in the native language (1989), and the complete textbook of "Criminalistics" were published with the efforts of the Chair (in 1993, the section "Criminalistics (technique)", and in 2004, the textbook "Criminalistics" was published as well.

After the adoption of the RA Constitution (1995), the Chair actively participated in the judicial reforms implemented in the Republic. The Chair's staff participated in the drafting of various laws and codes, in particular, "The Criminal Procedure Code of RA", "Judicial Code of RA", RA Law "On Prosecution" and many other legislative acts. In 2007, The Chair developed the concept of the new RA Criminal Procedure Code, based on which the draft of the RA Criminal Procedure Code was prepared, which was adopted by the National Assembly on June 30, 2021, and entered into force on June 1, 2022.

Activities are carried out in the Chair the publication of textbooks and training manuals in the mother tongue on the subjects taught. Since 1998, the following textbooks and training manuals have been published based on the existing legislation: "Criminal Procedure of the Republic of Armenia" (general and special parts), "Justice System of the Republic of Armenia", "Prosecution Office of the Republic of Armenia", "Criminalistics", and “Crime Investigation Methodology", “Criminology Methodology", "Legal Notation". In 2018, V. Yengibaryan also published the scientific and practical manual "Tactics of Conducting Individual Investigative Actions". In 2019, the Chair published "The Justice System of RA" and "Criminal Procedure of RA. Special part" textbooks.

The main directions of research activity of the Chair

Scientific research is carried out in the Chair in the direction of criminal procedure law, criminology, and other fields. The Chair's staff members are the authors of more than a dozen monographs dedicated to the general problems of criminal proceedings, ensuring the protection of the rights of victims of crime, the implementation of the right to defense, the judiciary, the protection of human rights, the application of European standards for the protection of human rights in criminal proceedings, pre-trial proceedings and issues of criminology (in particular, "Historical and Contemporary Issues of Criminal Procedure in Armenia" (2001), "Issues of Ensuring the Protection of Personal Rights and Legal Interests in Pretrial Proceedings of Criminal Procedures" (2011), "Casualty as a Form of Revision of Judicial Acts in Criminal Proceedings of the Republic of Armenia" (2017), "New issues of review of final court decisions in RA criminal proceedings" (2018), "Development of legal and theoretical foundations of juvenile proceedings in pre-trial proceedings of RA criminal proceedings", "Criminal and criminological foundations of the organization of crime investigation" monographs. In 2014, under the co-authorship of professors of the Chair, the monograph "Collection of scientific articles devoted to the issues of the RA Criminal Procedure Code" was published. In 2020, according to the results of the research on the scientific topic jointly with the Chair of Criminal Law, the monograph "Problems of Juvenile Crime Prevention in RA" was published as well.

In the 2020-2021 academic year, the Chair reviewed and organized a new Master's degree educational program "Criminal Justice and Advocacy", which is implemented with new, updated subject programs, as well as teaching a new subject that provides practical and up-to-date knowledge, especially in the field of advocacy.

The Chair prepares scientific and pedagogical personnel both for Postgraduate and Ph.D. students.