The Constitutional Court recognized the absence of the right to appeal the refusal to return temporarily seized property as unconstitutional
The Constitutional Court reports that on July 21, the Second Senate at a plenary session considered the case and adopted Decision No. 8-r(II)/2026 on the constitutional complaint of Serhii Volodymyrovych Hudirenko regarding the compliance with the Constitution of Ukraine (constitutionality) of part three of article 307, parts one and two of article 309 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Ukraine. The judge-rapporteur in the case was Oleh Pervomaiskyi.
According to part three of article 307 of the Code, "the ruling of the investigating judge following the consideration of a complaint against the decision, action, or inaction of the investigator, inquirer, or prosecutor cannot be appealed, except for rulings refusing to satisfy a complaint against the decision to close criminal proceedings, a complaint against the refusal of the investigator or prosecutor to satisfy a motion to close criminal proceedings on grounds specified in paragraph 9-1 of part one of article 284 of this Code, the cancellation of a notice of suspicion, and refusal to satisfy a complaint against the notice of suspicion."
Article 309 of the Code defines the rulings of the investigating judge that may be appealed during the pre-trial investigation, in particular establishing the list of such rulings (part one), and also states that "during the pre-trial investigation, rulings of the investigating judge refusing to satisfy a complaint against the decision to close criminal proceedings or the decision of the investigator or prosecutor refusing to satisfy a motion to close criminal proceedings on the basis of paragraph 9-1 of part one of article 284 of this Code, the cancellation of a notice of suspicion, refusal to satisfy a complaint against the notice of suspicion, return of a complaint against the decision, action, or inaction of the investigator or prosecutor, or refusal to open proceedings on it may also be appealed in appellate order" (part two).
Having examined the issues raised in the constitutional complaint, the Court found parts three of article 307 and parts one and two of article 309 of the Code unconstitutional to the extent that they do not provide the right to appeal during the pre-trial investigation the ruling of the investigating judge refusing to satisfy a complaint regarding the inaction of the investigator or prosecutor related to the non-return of temporarily seized property in accordance with the requirements of article 169 of the Code.
Parts three of article 307 and parts one and two of article 309 of the Code, recognized as unconstitutional in this respect, shall cease to be effective from the day this Decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine is adopted.
The full text of the decision and its summary will be published later by the "Judicial and Legal Newspaper".
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