Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) (最高人民检察院) | Practical Law

Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) (最高人民检察院) | Practical Law

Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) (最高人民检察院)

Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) (最高人民检察院)

Practical Law UK Glossary 0-530-5897 (Approx. 3 pages)

Glossary

Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) (最高人民检察院)

China's highest procuratorial organ, reporting directly to the National People's Congress (NPC) and its Standing Committee.
The SPP's functions include:
  • Supervising local people's procuratorates at all levels and specialised procuratorates within the military and railway systems.
  • Formulating interpretations, policies and guidelines as well as deploying prosecution tasks.
  • Acting as public prosecutor in criminal cases.
  • Reviewing cases investigated by the public security agencies, and deciding whether a suspect should be arrested, and whether a case should be prosecuted.
  • Lodging protests (抗诉) with the Supreme People's Court (SPC) concerning judgments and verdicts issued by local people's courts that it considers erroneous.
(See SPP website.)
The powers of investigating corruption and bribery, or dereliction of duty and preventing duty-related crimes were previously performed by the SPP's anti-graft bureau (and its local counterparts), but have been passed to the National Supervision Commission (NSC) after China's massive government institutional reform in 2018 (see Practice note, Understanding the 2018 government institutional reform: China: Anti-graft super agency).