Decision No. 18/2002/QD-TTg Issuing the Regulation on Management of Evidence Storage

DECISION

Issuing the Regulation on the Management of Evidence Storage

_________

 

PRIME MINISTER

Pursuant to the Law on Organization of the Government dated December 25, 2001;

Pursuant to the Criminal Procedure Code dated June 29, 1988, and amended and supplemented by the Laws amending and supplementing certain articles of the Criminal Procedure Code adopted by the National Assembly on June 30, 1990; December 22, 1992; and June 9, 2000;

Pursuant to the Civil Procedure Law dated December 7, 1989; the Civil Enforcement Law dated April 26, 1993; the Economic Procedure Law dated March 29, 1994; the Labor Dispute Procedure Law dated April 20, 1996; the Administrative Procedure Law dated June 3, 1996, and the Law Amending and Supplementing Certain Articles of the Administrative Procedure Law dated December 25, 1998;

At the proposal of the Minister of Public Security, the Minister of Defense, and the Minister of Justice;

DECISION:

Article 1. Now promulgates this Decree the "Regulation on the Management of Evidence Storage."

Article 2. This Decree shall take effect fifteen days from the date of signature. All previous regulations contrary to the Regulation promulgated herein are hereby abolished.

Article 3. The Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of Defense, and the Ministry of Justice within their respective duties and powers shall monitor, inspect, and urge the implementation of this Decree.

Article 4. The Ministers, Heads of ministerial-level agencies, Heads of government agencies, Chairpersons of People's Committees of provinces and centrally governed cities are responsible for implementing this Decree./.

PRIME MINISTER OF THE GOVERNMENT SOCIALIST REPUBLIC OF VIETNAM

INDEPENDENCE - FREEDOM - HAPPINESS
REGULATION ON THE MANAGEMENT OF EVIDENCE STORAGE

(Issued together with Decree No. 18/2002/NĐ-CP dated February 18, 2002 of the Government)

This Regulation stipulates the management, transfer, receipt, storage, and preservation of evidence and other items and documents collected in criminal, civil, economic, administrative, labor, marriage, and family cases (

Chapter I

GENERAL PROVISIONS

Article 1hereinafter referred to as cases) for the purpose of serving investigation, prosecution, trial, and enforcement activities.1. An evidence storage facility is a place where evidence, items, and other documents collected from cases during the course of litigation are concentrated, stored, and preserved, established and managed in accordance with the provisions of the law and this Regulation.

Article 2.

2. An evidence storage facility must ensure safety, dryness, ventilation, equipped with necessary and appropriate facilities; strictly managed, reasonably arranged to avoid confusion, loss, damage, environmental pollution, or harm to state assets, organizations, individuals, and human life and health; facilitate the entry, exit, and preservation of evidence, items, and other documents in the facility, effectively serving investigation, prosecution, trial, and enforcement activities.

1. An evidence storage facility is a place that receives, manages, and preserves evidence, items, and other documents collected from cases to serve investigation, prosecution, or trial and enforcement activities conducted by the same-level or higher-level investigative agencies or other agencies assigned to conduct certain investigative activities.

Article 3.

2. The management of evidence storage facilities must comply with relevant legal provisions; all acts of infringement, loss, damage, reduction, or destruction of the value, utility, or evidentiary value of collected evidence, items, and documents are strictly prohibited.

ORGANIZATION OF EVIDENCE STORAGE FACILITIES

 

Chapter II

1. Each district police force, each provincial police force, each city police force under a province, and the Ministry of Public Security shall organize an evidence storage facility to serve criminal investigation and prosecution work.

Article 4.

2. The Minister of Public Security shall decide specifically on the establishment and internal rules of evidence storage facilities within the People's Public Security Force.

1. Each military region (

Article 5.

and equivalent level) and the Ministry of Defense shall organize an evidence storage facility to serve criminal investigation and prosecution work and another evidence storage facility to serve trial and enforcement of criminal cases according to their authority within the People's Army.2. The Minister of Defense shall decide specifically on the establishment and internal rules of evidence storage facilities within the People's Army.

1. Each Enforcement Team at the county, district, town, and city level under a province and each Enforcement Department at the provincial and centrally-administered city level shall organize an evidence storage facility to serve trial and enforcement work.

Article 6.

2. The Minister of Justice shall decide specifically on the establishment and internal rules of evidence storage facilities under the enforcement agencies specified in Clause 1 of this Article.

MANAGEMENT REGIMES FOR EVIDENCE STORAGE FACILITIES

Chapter III

1. The head of the evidence storage facility has the following responsibilities and authorities:

Article 7.

a) Organize the management and preservation of evidence and other items and documents in the facility in accordance with the provisions of the law;

b) Carry out the issuance and receipt of evidence, items, and other documents collected from cases upon the order of the head of the agency handling the case;

c) Immediately report to the agency managing the evidence storage facility when evidence, items, and other documents in the facility are lost, infringed upon, seized, damaged, and witness the inspection of the scene by the competent authority;

d) Propose the head of the agency managing the evidence storage facility to organize repairs, expansions, upgrades, and provision of necessary equipment for the evidence storage facility.

2. The head of the agency managing the evidence storage facility has the following responsibilities and authorities:

a) Monitor, inspect, supervise, and carry out other management activities related to the operation of the evidence storage facility;

b) Take the lead and coordinate with relevant agencies and units to urgently move evidence, items, and other documents in the facility to a safe location in case natural or human factors threaten the safety of the evidence storage facility;

c) Request local authorities and people's armed forces to provide support for the protection of the evidence storage facility if necessary;

d) Immediately notify the investigating agency and the same-level Prosecution Office in cases where evidence, items, and other documents in the facility are lost, infringed upon, or seized.

d) Immediately notify the investigating agency and the同级检察院在物证、物品、其他文件从仓库中丢失、遭受侵害或被侵占的情况下。

d) Determine the cause of damage to evidence items, objects, and other documents stored in the warehouse and report in writing to the agency handling the case;

e) Request relevant agencies to guide and support with personnel and specialized expertise to properly preserve evidence items, objects, and documents that require specialized management;

g) Require the agency handling the case to immediately process evidence items, objects, and other documents stored in the warehouse when there are signs of damage, risk of damage, or threat to the safety of the evidence storage facility, environment, people, and property.

3. The custodian of evidence must be trained in necessary specialized expertise and possess good moral character.

4. Staff members of the evidence storage facility shall enjoy benefits and policies according to general regulations of the State and their respective sectors.

Article 8.

1. All evidence items, objects, and other documents collected from cases must be stored and preserved in the evidence storage facility, except for the following cases:

a) Items that cannot be moved to the evidence storage facility and have been handed over to agencies, organizations, or responsible individuals for preservation in accordance with the law;

b) Documents (such as papers, paintings, photographs...) in small quantities, already filed in the case file and managed by the case handler under the file work system;

c) Items that have been handed over to the case handling agency for management during usage for investigative, prosecution, and trial purposes;

d) Items such as money, gold, silver, precious metals, gems, antiques, weapons, explosives, flammable materials, poisons, radioactive substances, animals, plants transferred to specialized agencies for preservation;

đ) Items that deteriorate quickly and cannot be preserved long-term in the evidence storage facility (such as fresh food, live animals, medicines, medicinal herbs...), shall be transferred to competent authorities to organize public auctions in accordance with the law.

2. In cases where objective conditions prevent the immediate transfer of items specified in points d and đ of Clause 1 of this Article, they must temporarily be admitted into the evidence storage facility for preservation; once the objective conditions are resolved, they must be transferred immediately.

Article 9.

1. When it is necessary to admit evidence items, objects, and other documents collected from a case into the evidence storage facility or remove them from the facility to serve litigation activities or transfer them to another evidence storage facility, the head of the agency currently handling the case must issue an admission order or removal order. Admission orders and removal orders must clearly state the type, quantity, weight, characteristics of the evidence items, objects, and other documents to be admitted or removed, the reasons, time of admission or removal; the name and position of the person issuing or receiving the order must be signed by the head of the case handling agency and stamped by the case handling agency.

2. When transferring or receiving evidence items, objects, and other documents at the evidence storage facility, the person transferring or receiving must present the admission order or removal order and identification documents. The custodian of the evidence storage facility will only admit or remove items when all required procedures and documents are complete.

3. The agency currently handling the case is responsible for organizing transportation, preservation, and protection of evidence items, objects, and other documents collected from the case from one evidence storage facility to another or during direct use for investigative, prosecution, trial, and enforcement purposes.

Article 10.

1. Staff members of the evidence storage facility are responsible for promptly accepting or transferring evidence items and other objects of cases to serve timely investigative, prosecution, trial, and enforcement activities.

2. When admitting or removing evidence items, objects, and other documents collected from the case according to the order of authorized persons, the custodian of the evidence storage facility is responsible for:

a) Checking the admission order or removal order and other necessary procedures and documents of the person coming to transfer or receive;

b) Conducting weighing, measuring, counting, calculating, inspecting the condition and characteristics of the evidence items, objects, and other documents collected and the sealing status (if applicable);

c) Recording fully in the warehouse ledger and creating an admission form or removal form, clearly stating the hour, day, month, year of admission or removal; the name and position of the person issuing the admission order or removal order and the person transferring, receiving; the reason for admission or removal; the type, quantity, weight, characteristics, condition of the evidence items, objects, and other documents belonging to the case, owner, lawful manager. The admission form or removal form is created in two copies, signed by both parties; each party keeps one copy;

d) Creating a record regarding the damage, shortage, or violation of sealing of evidence items, objects, and other documents admitted or removed and reporting to the agency managing the evidence storage facility. The record is created in two copies, signed by both parties; each party keeps one copy.

Article 11.

1. The storage and preservation of evidence items, objects, and other documents in the evidence storage facility must be carried out strictly according to technical procedures in accordance with prescribed principles and standards; labeling must be done to avoid confusion and facilitate inspection and supervision.

On June 25 and December 25 of each year, the custodian of the evidence storage facility must conduct an inventory of the warehouse and submit an inventory report to the agency managing the evidence storage facility.

Article 12. Funds for managing, constructing, repairing, expanding, upgrading the evidence storage facility, purchasing equipment and means, costs for preserving, transporting, transferring, and receiving evidence items, objects, and other documents of the case in the evidence storage facility are guaranteed by the state budget and allocated in the annual state budget plan assigned to the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of National Defense, the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme People's Procuracy. The Ministry of Finance takes the lead and coordinates with the Ministry of Public Security, the Ministry of National Defense, the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme People's Procuracy to inspect and urge the implementation of this provision.

 Chapter IV

IMPLEMENTING PROVISIONS

Article 13.

1. Any person violating these Regulations shall be subject to disciplinary action, administrative violation handling, or criminal responsibility pursuit depending on the nature and degree of violation; if causing damage, compensation must be provided according to the law.

2. Any person who achieves outstanding results in implementing these Regulations shall be rewarded according to the law.

Article 14. The Chairman of the People's Committee of provinces and centrally-administered cities is responsible for providing land and creating favorable conditions for the construction and management of the evidence storage facility in their locality; directing relevant agencies in the locality to cooperate and ensure security and safety for the evidence storage facility.

Article 15. The Ministers, Heads of ministerial-level agencies, Heads of government agencies, Chairpersons of People's Committees of provinces and centrally governed cities shall be responsible for implementing this Regulation./.