Are courts violating the law with the imprisonment of persons for trafficking violations

Officials at the Constitutional Court in Prizren confirm for Radio Free Europe that for years, the court has made decisions concerning the issue and they have been executed.

“In all-powerful convictions, there are sentences pronounced for criminal acts, the risk of public trafficking, and for criminalizing the theft of the forest, which as the principal punishment has been pronounced fine and because of the non-paying of the same on the part of the convicts, the court has replaced the penalty with prison sentences, always given the Penal Code <x1) provisions, said Aferdita Kicaj, for submitting to the Constitutional Court in Prizren.

Kicaj said fines or penalties that were not paid with money, which were pronounced prison sentences, have been of low money values, but, as she says, had high sentences.

Also, from the Kosovo Correcting Service, it has been confirmed to Radio Free Europe that in prisons because of the lack of traffic fines there are some people.

There are two people who, due to the failure to pay the fine, are obliged to pay off the payment in prison”, the Kosovo Correcting Service reported.

With the law for Resurrected, which has been implemented since 2017, justice ministry officials had pledged that with the law's entry into force, accountability for paying fines would increase.

I achieved Rezniqi from the Kosovo Institute for Justice, says the courts in case of pronounced jail sentences due to a fine of wrongdoing are committing violations, even constitutional.

The question of prison sentences for cases of counter-injury is seen as violating the Constitution, so the sentence has been lifted. So there shouldn't be prison sentences for people who don't pay counter fines”, Rezniqi said.

She says courts across the country have different legal provisions in force that they can exploit and not turn the fines of counter-inference into prison.

For example, when talking about cases of procedural or similar spending, there is another law that goes into the master procedure. In such cases all of these provisions of law that are in force to enable them to execute fines afterward. It means, there is no need either for prison sentences, but there is no need even to be left under the mercy of those self-preservators, but must use all mechanisms that offer positive legislation to power”, she said.

The executive director of the Council for Protection of Freedoms and Human Rights in Kosovo, Behxhet Shala, told Radio Free Europe that it is not fair that a person who has a traffic fine goes to jail.

We don't have to go to jail for a 25-euro fine, because 25 euros costs a night's stay in prison and no account. But it must be found and implemented an alternative way of carrying out the sentence, and it is, for example, to do a job for the community in the value of the prescribed fine, and therefore they will pay off the fine and will not be forced to go to court or jail, and there is no reason for anyone to be sent to jail for 25 euro<1>, Shala said.

Shala said that people who do not respect court decisions should be sent to prison.

If you are lawbreakers and continue to violate the law further by ignoring the court, then it is normal that every legal state takes such action, so neither does Kosovo make the exception in that direction”, Shala said.

In contrast, security connoisseurs have also said that many who receive fines for wrongdoing choose to pay off their debt in prison so that the payment, often said to be linked to their economic situation.