Criminal investigation training of Slovene security forces

Abstract

The operation of gendarmerie and the state police was governed from their very establishment by two regulations: the code of criminal procedure and the rules governing the performance of service. True criminal investigation science was only in its beginnings and the first findings were summarized in a manual published in 1893 by a state prosecutor, Hans Gross. This manual is considered to be the first textbook of criminal investigation and was also used by gendarmes and police officers, in particular senior officers.

In the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, or the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, there were also two security forces: gendarmerie and the state police. Training of their personnel already contained a study subject called investigation service. The first criminal investigation textbooks appeared during this period, while professional periodicals published various papers on the repression of crime. Criminal investigation, although not (yet) officially so named, gained a place in the process of education, training and advanced studies of officers working in the security forces.

After World War II, the uniformed part of the state police and gendarmerie gave way to the militia, while the former state police preserved only criminal investigators and agents of the secret (political) police. A broad area of education and training programmes was developed in this period and an appropriate place was given to the subject of criminal investigation, first called inquiry. Secondary, higher and university level study curricula were formulated and criminal investigation held an important place in them. This development was accompanied by the publication of numerous study materials, from duplicated texts to textbooks.

After the independence of Slovenia, new subjects were introduced in the study programmes for the education of uniformed and criminal investigation police; criminal investigation not only retained its place in these curricula but was even consolidated. This was also connected with the growing involvement of Slovene police in international networks and the integration of Slovenia into the European Union and NATO. There is currently an increasing need for scientific criminal investigation. Today, there are two centres of criminal investigation teaching and development in Slovenia: the Faculty of Criminal Justice and Security in Maribor and the Faculty of Law in Ljubljana.