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Hungary Penal Code and Criminal Procedure
Hungary's legal system has been influenced by Roman
law. The
country's first written law code, compiled by Stephen
Werboczy in
1514, codified the unwritten laws and customs that had
existed up
to that time. The Tripartitum, as this codification was
called,
was modified over the following centuries, but a written,
formal
law code was not officially published until 1878. This
publication formed the basis of the Penal Code appearing
in the
early 1950s, but many articles remained unchanged until
the
entire code was republished in 1961.
The Penal Code and a decree on criminal procedures that
appeared in 1972 incorporated constitutional revisions
made at
that time
(see Amendments of 1972
, ch. 4). Both the code
and the
decree reflected the subordination of the legal system to
the
state, and harsher penalties were meted out for crimes
against
the state and state property than for crimes against the
person
and private property. The Penal Code was revised in late
1978 and
again in September 1989. The latest revision, which still
required the approval of the National Assembly as of
September
1989, abolished the use of the death penalty for crimes
against
the state.
Hungary's system of justice did not subscribe to the
adversary system; neither did it recognize common law or
precedent
(see Judicial Organs
, ch. 4). The prosecutor in
a
Hungarian court was responsible for presenting all the
evidence,
both for and against the defendant. Defendants had the
right to
legal counsel, who attempted to ensure that the
prosecutor's
presentation of the case was unbiased. Judges were bound
by the
law as written, not by the decisions of other judges. The
judge's
interpretation applied only to the specific case; it set
no
precedent for other cases.
Data as of September 1989
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