You are being searched: Your actions

A search is often an unpredictable event that can happen to anyone. We have collected all the necessary information for you to know your rights, what to look for and how to act.

Search. - is an investigative action that consists in a compulsory inspection of premises, structures, areas and other objects under the jurisdiction of certain persons in order to find and seize items and documents that may be relevant to the case or to find wanted persons, carried out in the presence of probable data that they are hidden in a certain place or with a certain person

Types of searches:

• search of residential premises (residential houses, cottages, apartments, castles, dormitory rooms, permanent or temporary residential premises, including in a hotel or other place, including a tourist tent in the lap of nature);
• search of another person's property (a country house, garage, yacht, airplane, car, shop, coffee shop, kiosk, garden, vegetable garden, yard, farm, land plot or land, etc;)
• search of office and other premises (warehouses, offices and production facilities, enterprises, institutions, organizations and other storage facilities);
• search of the territory (land, garden, vegetable garden, etc.);
• search of a person (personal search).

Priority actions to take after law enforcement officers come to your home to search it.

Stage 1.

Start video recording of the event, while warning the officials about the start of recording the event on your part.

1.1 Determine which law enforcement agency visited you and the number of officers.

1.2 Identify the other persons who are unknown to you.

1.3 Call the lawyer and inform him/her about the so-called "visit".

Stage 2.

2.1. Analyze the decision of the investigating judge (court) to conduct a search.

The analysis of the investigating judge's ruling should be carried out as follows:

• date (the decision is valid for exactly 1 month, regardless of the number of days in it and the fact that the last day may be a weekend);
• the address of the search (must match exactly, even an incorrectly indicated floor may be grounds for not letting law enforcement officers in);
• mandatory details and procedure for delivery (the original of the decision (copy) must be delivered);
• Persons involved in the search (request a certificate, power of attorney and a resolution on the creation of an investigative team, if it is a prosecutor, then a resolution of the prosecutor's team, an extract from the Unified Register of Pre-trial Investigations).

2.2. Based on the analysis of the investigating judge's (court's) decision, identify all possible deficiencies that you have identified.

2.3. Insist on determining your status in this investigative action, and then on explaining your rights and obligations, while the listing of articles of criminal law is not enough, and therefore insist on a full explanation of the rights and obligations listed by the official during the investigative action. By doing so, you will delay the time until your lawyer arrives.

2.4. After that, you must sign on one of the copies, which remains with the official and must be filed with the criminal proceedings. When signing, be sure to indicate the date and time, as well as the place of receipt of the said decision, your full name, and the violations identified during its receipt.

Important! If the official does not require you to sign one of the copies of the investigating judge's order, this is a violation and plays in your favor, so you do not need to remind the official and insist on signing.

2.5. Before the search begins, ask the officer to show you the device that will be used to record the search. You need to write down the serial number, make and model of the device. Next, you need to establish which media will be used to record the material (memory card), its number, make and model, and capacity.

Stage 3.

3.1 Determine the behavior during the search:

   The main thing is not to be afraid of a search! Do not be nervous and do not resist the officer during the search.

3.2. Identify positions during the search.

By analyzing the decision of the investigating judge (court), you will understand the purpose and object of the visit. And thus, you will be able to properly build your self-defense position.

In addition to determining the position of self-defense, it is necessary to determine the risks of the search in general (for example, seizure of a printing device on which a document may have been "forged").

The main goal should be to preserve the property. Of course, the property may still be seized, but as practice shows, it is extremely important to return the property after seizure, since during the seizure the official did not identify the property and did not indicate its individual characteristics, which are usually used to return the property in the future.

As for intermediate goals, they can be aimed at protecting personal property (cell phones) and valuable movable property.

STAGE 4.

3.1 Analysis of the actions of the official during the search.

It is necessary to analyze the actions of the officer during the search, as everyone makes mistakes. In practice, as a rule, an officer neglects some procedural steps during a search, thereby making shelves that play in our favor. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully observe the actions of officials, make notes on what to do, recording the time and name of the official who committed the violation, with a brief plot of the violation.

3.2. Analysis of the actions of witnesses during the search.

It is necessary to analyze the actions of witnesses during the search, since, as a rule, officials have their own witnesses. In practice, these are usually elderly people. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully observe what the witnesses see or do not see, whether they hear, what is being discussed, what to take notes on, recording the time and name of the witness who at one time or another could not see this or that element of the search.

3.3 Analysis of the search report and its annexes. Seized items and documents.

A "high-quality" search report is the key to successfully recognizing the search report as invalid. Therefore, it is necessary to carefully read the text written by the official.

The "correct" and "proper" seizure of things and documents is the key to the successful return of seized items. Therefore, you should closely monitor the procedure for seizing and packing items and documents.

After the protocol is drawn up, all participants in the investigative action must sign it; if at least one person involved as a participant in the investigative action does not certify the said protocol with his or her signature, such a protocol is incomplete, which in turn establishes its impropriety.

The search warrant must describe the seized items and documents, and the same must be duplicated in the inventory of seized items and documents, which is an appendix to the search warrant and its integral part.

The first copy of the search report must contain an indication and signatures of receipt of its copy and receipt of the original attachment.

The search report should and must include comments and identified deficiencies. Since, as practice shows, the investigating judge does not always examine the video recording of the search.