I. General

1 The procedural provision of Art. 80a IMAC is directed at the executing authority and applies if the preliminary examination pursuant to Art. 80 para. 1 IMAC has been positive. Art. 80a para. 1 IMAC provides that the result of the preliminary examination must be recorded in a decision on admissibility, summarily justified, and that the necessary mutual assistance measures must then be ordered. The applicable procedural law for these mutual assistance measures is governed by Art. 80a para. 2 IMAC.

2 With the very general term legal assistance measure, Art. 80a IMAC refers in particular to procedural acts in criminal proceedings within the meaning of Art. 63 ff. IMAC.

3 The executing authority within the meaning of Art. 80a IMAC is the authority that conducted the preliminary examination, i.e. in particular cantonal public prosecutors (Art. 55 para. 1 CrimPC), the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland or administrative penal authorities (Art. 17 para. 4 and Art. 79 para. 2 IMAC) and the FOJ in cases under Art. 79a IMAC.

4 With regard to mutual legal assistance with the USA, Art. 10 BG-RVUS applies to the decision to grant mutual legal assistance and its execution.

II. The decision to grant mutual legal assistance

5 The decision to grant mutual legal assistance is made following a positive preliminary examination in accordance with Art. 80 IMAC. It states in particular that the relevant substantive and formal requirements for granting mutual legal assistance are met.

6 Apart from the cases regulated in Art. 18 para. 2 IMAC, the decision to grant jurisdiction is in principle a formal prerequisite for the execution of mutual assistance measures within the framework of minor mutual assistance. Unlike the opening decision in criminal proceedings, it therefore has more than just a declaratory effect.

A. Content and form

7 The decision to grant jurisdiction is generally issued in writing. It must be designated as such and contain information on the right of appeal and a summary of the reasons. The summary of the reasons may include the following points in particular:

• details of the request for mutual assistance (date of the request, name of the requesting authority, case number of the foreign criminal investigation, criminal offenses that are the focus of this investigation, and the names of the accused persons);

• a summary of the facts described in the request;

• the reason for the request;

• the legal basis for the mutual assistance proceedings, in particular the relevant international treaties;

• the result of the formal and substantive preliminary examination of the conditions for mutual assistance;

• the result of the examination of double criminality if coercive measures are to be carried out;

• a dispositive provision; and

• the opening formula.

B. Combination with other orders

8 The order to enter into proceedings may be combined with other mutual assistance orders. If the conditions are met, the following orders in particular may be issued at the same time:

• Interim order in which mutual assistance measures are ordered;

• Interim order concerning the presence of persons involved in foreign proceedings (Art. 65a IMAC);

• Interim order authorizing the hearing by videoconference;

• Interim order concerning the conditions for so-called dynamic mutual assistance (Art. 18b and 80d^bis IMAC);

• Final decisionin accordance with Art. 80d IMAC.

C. In the case of supplementary requests for mutual assistance

9 If the foreign law enforcement authority submits further requests for mutual assistance in the same criminal proceedings in relation to the same set of facts, these are referred to as supplementary requests for mutual assistance. For these supplementary requests for mutual assistance, the executing authority is not required to issue a new decision to enter the case, but may immediately order mutual assistance measures based on the original decision to enter the case.

III. Mutual assistance measures

A. General

10 Mutual legal assistance measures are procedural acts that require the granting of mutual legal assistance, namely criminal procedural acts such as:

• House searches (Art. 244 f. CrimPC);

• Interrogations (Art. 142 ff. CrimPC);

• Obtaining written reports (Art. 145 CrimPC);

• secret surveillance measures (Art. 269 ff. CrimPC);

• orders for surrender (Art. 265 CrimPC) and

• seizures (Art. 263 ff. CrimPC).

11 There is no numerus clausus for possible mutual legal assistance measures – the list in Art. 63 ff. IMAC is therefore not exhaustive.

12 Mutual legal assistance measures are, in the formal sense, interim orders.

B. Application of criminal procedure law

1. Sources of mutual legal assistance

13 Mutual assistance proceedings within the scope of the IMAC are governed primarily by the relevant international treaties and, subsidiarily, by the IMAC and the IMAC Implementing Act (Art. 1 para. 1 IMAC), whereby, in accordance with the principle of favorability, national provisions also apply if they impose less stringent requirements on mutual assistance. Since international treaties do not usually contain procedural provisions and the IMAC and the IMAC do not completely regulate the procedure for minor mutual assistance, other national provisions apply subsidiarily, namely the CrimPC and the VStrR for criminal proceedings and the APA for other matters (see Art. 12 para. 1 IMAC).

2. CrimPC/VStrR

14 Art. 80a para. 2 IMAC states that the executing authority shall carry out mutual assistance measures in accordance with its own procedural law, thus repeating the provision of Art. 12 para. 1 IMAC, according to which the CPC and the VStrR apply mutatis mutandis to criminal procedural acts.

15 However, criminal procedure law only applies insofar as it regulates the execution or modalities of the mutual assistance measure. For example, Art. 244 et seq. StPO applies to house searches, Art. 266 StPO to seizures, Art. 269 et seq. StPO to telecommunications surveillance, and Art. 142 et seq. StPO to interrogations. CrimPC and Art. 142 ff. CrimPC must be observed for interrogations.

16 Criminal procedure law does not play any further role based on Art. 80a para. 2 IMAC. In particular, it is not applicable to questions concerning the service of orders and legal remedies.

3. Foreign procedural law

17 Certain international treaties and Art. 65 IMAC provide that certain rules of evidence of the requesting state may be applied when carrying out criminal procedural acts.This is generally only done at the express request of the foreign authority and if it is compatible with Swiss law. In practice, this provision is applied in particular in the case of hearings, for example by instructing the witness in accordance with foreign law.

IV. Party rights and legal remedies

A. Party rights

18 Prior to the decision on admissibility and mutual assistance measures, potential parties have no right to inspect the files and no right to be heard in advance (Art. 80b para. 1 IMAC and Art. 30 para. 1 APA). Furthermore, there is no right to immediate notification of the decision on admissibility. In principle, the right to a fair hearing is guaranteed if the rights of the parties are granted in advance of the final decision.

B. Legal remedies

19 The decision to grant access is not independently appealable. The independent appealability of interim decisions (including mutual legal assistance measures) is governed by Art. 80e para. 2 IMAC. According to this provision, interim orders may be challenged independently if they cause an immediate and irreparable disadvantage through the seizure of assets and valuables (lit. a) or through the presence of persons involved in the foreign proceedings (lit. b). Deficiencies in the mutual assistance procedure (including incorrect decisions on admissibility or interim decisions) may be challenged in an appeal against the final decision (Art. 80e para. 2 IMAC).

V. Procedural issues

A. Time limits

20 Mutual assistance proceedings must be conducted expeditiously (Art. 17a IMAC). However, there are no statutory time limits for conducting the preliminary examination, issuing the decision on admissibility, or ordering criminal procedural measures.

21 In an obiter dictum in RR.2013.236-249, the Appeals Chamber of the Federal Criminal Court considered that the question of admissibility should generally be decided within a few days and should only take several weeks in complex cases. However, this consideration has not yet become established practice.

B. Refusal of mutual assistance

22 A request for mutual assistance may be granted even if not all of the requested acts of mutual assistance are admissible. In this case, the admissible criminal procedural acts are carried out and the requesting authority is informed of which acts cannot be carried out in Switzerland.

23 The executing authority may also refuse mutual assistance if it has complied with the request for mutual assistance and carried out various acts of mutual assistance. In principle, this does not require a formal decision by the executing authority, but merely a notification to the requesting authority.

Note:

Terms in the text that refer to persons apply equally to women and men.

About the authors

The author is a federal prosecutor in the field of international mutual assistance in criminal matters. His legal opinion is independent of that of his employer. The co-author is an assistant federal prosecutor in the field of cybercrime. His legal opinion is independent of that of his employer.

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Materials

Die internationale Rechtshilfe in Strafsachen, Wegleitung, Bundesamt für Justiz, 9. Aufl. 2009, abrufbar unter https://www.rhf.admin.ch/rhf/de/home/strafrecht/wegleitungen.html (zit. Wegleitung Bundesamt für Justiz).