Procedure Governing the Crimes of Legal Persons in the Preliminary Investigation Stage in Iranian and French Law

Article 143 of the Islamic Penal Code has anticipated criminal liability of legal persons. Since investigation of the crimes committed by these persons requires the existence of a criminal procedure relative to their nature, following the French law, the Code of Criminal Procedure has established rules by allocating a separate section. The specific provisions codified by the legislator in the Code of Criminal Procedure 22 mainly related to the investigative actions of the legal person accused, which seeks to adapt investigative actions to the nature of these persons. Therefore, anticipating the rules of summon, arraignment, criminal security orders, and so forth is considered a positive step in new legislation, and other cases, which have been not mentioned in the law, are included in the general rules that also apply to natural persons. These specific rules have their own drawbacks. For example, regarding the criminal security orders for legal persons, contrary to the French Code of Criminal Procedure, none of the orders has been established with the aim of compensating for victims. Therefore, this research attempted to criticize and analyze specific rules of the preliminary investigations of legal persons and provide appropriate solutions by raising the relevant ambiguities and objections.