From left to right: Dr. V. Botnari, lawyer and university lecturer at the State University of Moldova; R. Talmaci, President of the National Union of Enforcement Officers (UNEJ); D. Šnirpūnė, Director of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania; O. Baciu Olga, Head of the Legal Department, UNEJ; Prof. habil. Dr. V. Nekrošius, President of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and member of the Council of the Faculty of Law, Vilnius University; O. Novicov Oxana, Secretary General of UNEJ; Butucea Ion, enforcement officer; O. Romah Oleg, President of the Northern Territorial Chamber of UNEJ; E. Belei, Head of the Department of Procedural Law of State University of Moldova; I. Gaidelis, judicial officer, Chairman of the Presidium of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania; A. Stanišauskaitė, judicial officer, member of the Presidium of Judicial Officers of Lithuania; Prof. Dr. J. Paužaitė-Kulvinskienė, Head of the Research Centre for Administrative Law and Administrative Justice, Faculty of Law, Vilnius University; S. Kastanauskienė, judicial officer, Chair of the Audit Commission; A. Petrauskienė, legal expert-consultant of the Chamber of JUdicial Officers of Lithuania; judicial officer N. Šiugždaitė.
The best practices developed by Lithuanian judicial officers will further strengthen the private enforcement system in Moldova, while successful solutions from Moldovan colleagues are inspiring Lithuania to expand the scope of judicial officers’ competencies.
This was the key takeaway from meetings held in Vilnius on April 15–16, attended by representatives of UNEJ and the State University of Moldova, as well as Vilnius University and the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania.
Discussions on the balance and future of the profession
Insights into the challenges of the judicial officer profession and its modernization prospects were shared at the conference “The Balance of Judicial Officer Activity: How Much State Authority and How Much Liberal Profession?”, held on April 15 at the Faculty of Law of Vilnius University.
The conference discussions were moderated by Prof. habil. Dr. Vytautas Nekrošius, President of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and Member of the Council of the Faculty of Law at Vilnius University, Prof. Dr. Jurgita Paužaitė-Kulvinskienė, Head of the Research Centre for Administrative Law and Administrative Justice at the Faculty of Law of Vilnius University, and Dovilė Šnirpūnė, Director of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania.
“The combination of strictly regulated duties of a judicial officer with a liberal professional status brings not only advantages but also challenges. The experience of foreign colleagues is very useful in overcoming them,” emphasized Irmantas Gaidelis, Judicial Officer and Chairman of the Presidium of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania.
As emphasized by Victor Palii, Representative of the Embassy of Moldova in Lithuania, while welcoming the conference participants, “it is particularly important for Moldovan colleagues to adopt the best practices of Lithuania in strengthening the country’s legal system and preparing for membership in the European Union.”
V. Palii, Representative of the Embassy of Moldova in Lithuania; D. Šnirpūnė, Director of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania; I. Gaidelis, Judicial Officer, Chairman of the Presidium of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania
Partnership driving change
This visit by Moldovan colleagues is a consistent step in the long-standing partnership between Lithuanian and Moldovan judicial officers and legal experts. Sixteen years ago, Moldova reformed its enforcement system based on Lithuania’s experience. Subsequently, representatives of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania repeatedly provided consultations and recommendations to their Moldovan counterparts on how to regulate the activities of professional self-governance institutions and how to develop legal services provided by judicial officers. According to Oxana Novicov, Secretary General of the National Union of Enforcement Officers of Moldova, as many as seven legal services provided by judicial officers in Moldova were introduced based on the Lithuanian model.
Preventing losses and securing evidence
“A protocol of factual circumstances drawn up by a judicial officer in accordance with the Code of Civil Procedure of the Republic of Lithuania is an official written piece of evidence. As we can see from practice, it is highly reliable evidence. Courts assess protocols drawn up by judicial officers very favorably, and there are very few legal disputes concerning them,” said Prof. habil. Dr. V. Nekrošius at the opening of the first session of the conference.
Prof. habil. Dr. V. Nekrošius, President of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences and Member of the Council of the Faculty of Law at Vilnius University
I. Gaidelis, Head of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania, in his presentation “Establishment of Facts as the Most Popular Service Provided by Lithuanian Judicial Officers,” reviewed the legal regulation of the service of establishing factual circumstances, its specific application possibilities, and its practical significance for evidence.
According to him, this evidence-recording service helps clients resolve various disputes or avoid them. “A protocol of factual circumstances can be compared to an insurance policy: while an insurance policy helps protect against potential losses, the establishment of facts helps to record important evidence before it is lost. Once evidence is recorded, it prevents unfounded claims and thus helps to avoid potential losses or facilitates dispute resolution,” said I. Gaidelis.
Since 2003, when Lithuanian judicial officers were the first in the Baltic States to begin establishing facts, more than 64,000 unique factual circumstances have already been recorded in Lithuania.
Judicial officers in Moldova have been establishing factual circumstances since 2021 and have so far recorded more than 2,400 different facts. As in the first years of provision in Lithuania, the service of establishing facts is rapidly gaining popularity in Moldova: demand has more than doubled over five years. The areas of application are also very similar, including the recording of evidence in the electronic environment such as social networks and websites, the condition of various types of property and damage caused to property, and various circumstances in family disputes, including compliance with child contact arrangements, among others.
What can be recorded and what cannot?
Judicial officer I. Gaidelis shared numerous practical examples with conference participants of the specific circumstances he has recorded and for what purposes. These included misleading advertising and false information on the internet, correspondence on social networks and via text messages, images of specific locations and facts of property use, the return and takeover of leased premises, the condition of transferred property, the condition of adjacent buildings before construction, the volume and timing of completed construction works, the quality of works or goods, damage caused by fires, heavy rain, or household accidents, meetings of creditors and shareholders, the taking of various samples, and so on.
The legal regulation of the service of establishing factual circumstances differs somewhat between Lithuania and Moldova. Therefore, it was important for Moldovan colleagues to find out whether there is a legally defined list in Lithuania of factual circumstances that cannot be established.
“There are essentially no circumstances that a judicial officer could not establish. Anything that objectively exists, that can be seen or heard, may be recorded by a judicial officer. The main principle enshrined in the Law on Judicial Officers is that, when establishing factual circumstances, a judicial officer has the same rights to perform certain actions as the client requesting the service,” explained I. Gaidelis. At the same time, he noted that a judicial officer does not provide evaluative conclusions in the protocol of factual circumstances and does not determine ownership of items. Therefore, the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania recommends that judicial officers carefully clarify the client’s expectations so that they do not exceed the officer’s actual capabilities. It is also maintained that the course of a child interview should not be recorded with the involvement of a judicial officer. However, no conflict of interest is seen when two different judicial officers establish factual circumstances at the same location, as the requests of their clients differ.
Confidentiality is strictly protected
Moldovan colleagues were also interested in who and when in Lithuania has the possibility to access the content of protocols of factual circumstances.
“Many would like to obtain protocols of factual circumstances, but this information is confidential. No one, except the judicial officer and the client of the service, has the right to access a protocol of factual circumstances without a valid legal basis. The content of the protocol is confidential and is not known to the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania either,” emphasized Dovilė Šnirpūnė, Manager of the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania. All protocols of factual circumstances are registered, numbered, and stored in the Information System of Judicial Officers.
D. Šnirpūnė also noted that recently judicial officers have been adding an additional note at the end of the protocol stating that the client is responsible for ensuring the protection of personal data contained in the protocol in accordance with the requirements of the EU General Data Protection Regulation. According to UNEJ Secretary General Novicov Oxana, this is a very rational solution, and a similar practice should be applied in Moldova.
What Lithuania could learn from Moldova
Meanwhile, according to D. Šnirpūnė, Lithuania should consider several new forms of assistance by judicial officers and legal services that are successfully provided in Moldova. For example, in Moldova, in every case of overdue debt, a mandatory mediation process takes place at the judicial officer’s office, during which the debtor and the creditor may conclude a settlement agreement, and such an agreement acquires the force of an enforceable document. Moldovan judicial officers also provide administration services for homeowners’ associations, and in such cases, debts of a member approved at a meeting of the association may be subject to compulsory recovery without prior court judgment. The Chamber of Judicial Officers of Moldova also provides a service of public disclosure of debt-related information, whereby data on debts for sale and other information that creditors are required by law to publish are officially announced on a dedicated portal.
During meetings held on April 16 at the Chamber of Judicial Officers of Lithuania and at the offices of judicial officers Inga Karalienė, Neringa Lipeikienė, Gintas Badikonis, Andrius Bublys, and Ramūnas Kamarauskas, the guests were directly introduced to information technology solutions applied in the work of judicial officers. One of the ближайших improvements planned for implementation in Moldova is an automated system for the administration of debtors’ funds, similar to the system for the restriction of monetary funds operating in Lithuania.
Photos by Vilmantas Martinėlis
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