THE UKRAINIAN LEGAL SYSTEM Legal system? You have uncles, brothers, cousins, and

THE UKRAINIAN LEGAL SYSTEM

Legal system? You have uncles, brothers, cousins, and friends. Why do you need a legal system? 😉 (as it should be.)

They have at least criminal, civil, state, and human rights courts. IN other words, aside from our criminal and civil, you can legally petition the state if you’re unjustly served by the state. (something we don’t have but need – desperately).

The law has been upgraded to match european laws in most cases as of 2010. The problem isn’t the law or the lawyers but the judges – all of whom are corrupt. (as are their staffs).

Business law is fine other than it’s too hard to produce international contracts. usually you write two columns (one english, one russian or ukrainian), and there are translators who perform that service for you.

There is still some lagging soviet shit like the requirement that you are ‘registered’ to a physical address. And this is punitive and archaic everywhere and a great source of corruption. It’s a holdover from state-allocated-property.

The cops in my experience are more like our sheriff’s. They aren’t messianic like our cops. they just want to ‘restore harmony’. I love ukrainian police and have had nothing but good experiences with them. Especially the younger generation.

Their courts are pay-as-you-go corrupt. Their prisons hell holes that you do not come out of alive. Everyone knows this is the central problem in ukraine. Why? a judge makes $700 per month. Right? and they are often the wealthiest people in the community. Right? The USA offered to take over the payroll of the entire Ukrainian Judiciary. This would have fixed the problem. Ukrainian government refused. Why? ’cause you know why.

If you don’t engage in predatory crime you will never have a reason to need a cop or the legal system. Even car accidents, are just a matter of negotiating the cash cost of repairs on site.

But if you get on the wrong side of the law – or even get hostile with a cop – you are in… well. I would never want to get into the system over there. You are lucky to come out of it alive. Seriously. They are’t animals like the muslims but it’s a poor country and criminals are at the end of the line.

More importantly, *the government really hates prosecuting foreigners* for paper crimes, and to some degree you are safer as a foreigner for it. In many cases you need very high level approval to prosecute a foreigner. As high as the office of the presidency. The reason being that the soviets (and the russians still do it) were notorious for fabricating charges in order to extort money from foreigners. And Ukraine can’t afford any of that – at all.