THE DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF EUROPEAN CRIMINAL LAW
THE DISTINCTIVE FEATURES OF EUROPEAN CRIMINAL LAW

Summary/Abstract: This study aims to analyze the case law of the ECJ and ECHR on the nature of administrative sanctions and their relation to criminal law. Also, some important criteria used by different Member States in their own legal systems in differentiating between criminal and administrative sanctions are presented. As it will be shown in this study, in establishing the difference between administrative and criminal offence sanctions, the case law of both the European Court of Human Rights and the Court of Justice of the European Union offer an indirect definition of criminal offence through its penalty. Thus, a certain behavior, if sanctioned in a procedure that could be labeled as ‘criminal procedure’, is necessarily a criminal offence.

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