Offences against public order and peace in Slovenia from 1949-2010

Povzetek

Slovene regulations on offences against public order and peace have been similar in many regards to the content of prohibited acts laid down in the regulations of the period of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (1850-1918) and the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (1918-1941). The prescribed penalties in the early years were also similar to those from the period of the Empire and Kingdom, although the severity of punishment for these violations tended later to diminish and penalties became milder. Nowadays, only fines are provided for these offences.

Competency for processing these acts has also been subject to change and passed from administrative bodies to judges for minor offences. Today, the punishment of perpetrators is partly entrusted to the police, that have become a body processing minor offences, and partly to local courts.

The number of prohibited acts of this kind has also changed over the years, either increasing or diminishing. A decrease in the number of these acts mainly occurred when such acts came within the legal framework of some other regulations and it was necessary to eliminate them from the existing act on offences against public order and peace. Regulations which derogated current violations of public order and peace concerned weapons, public assembly, protection against noise, control of the consumption of alcohol, protection of animals and similar. The present act on the protection of public order and peace provides some new prohibited acts of this kind, which had not previously been known or acts already abolished but which had to be reintroduced as minor offences.