Criminal investigation procedure for academic and administrative personnel working in higher education institutions due to duty offence

As a rule, special criminal investigation procedures regarding the prosecution of public officials are applied in our law. Although there are various legal regulations about our study subject from past to present, the most important of these are the Law No. 4483 on the Trial of Civil Servants and Other Public Officials and the regulations in Article 53/c of the Higher Education Law No. 2547. Article 53/c of the Law No. 2547, which is the subject of our study, regulates how the criminal investigation will be conducted about the crimes alleged to have been committed by the higher education personnel due to their duty and during their duty. Accordingly, upon learning of the allegation of committing a crime, an investigation will be initiated at the discretion of the competent authorities or the investigation stage will be initiated directly. According to the law, the investigation phase is divided into two stage as "first investigation phase" and "decision phase for the final investigation". In the regulation, which also provides the opportunity to file an appeal with the Council of State upon the decision taken, it is stated that the deficiencies will be completed in accordance with the Law No. 4483. However, many problems are encountered in practice due to the different investigation procedures adopted by Law No. 2547 and Law No. 4483, and the fact that investigators and decision boards are not experts in the field of administrative and criminal law. In our study, by identifying the differences and deficiencies, we tried to explain how the criminal investigation procedure should be carried out, by giving place to the decisions of the Council of State and the views in the doctrine, and to propose solutions.