Can a prosecutor become a lawyer in Vietnam? How long does it take to train a prosecutor to become a lawyer?
Can a prosecutor become a lawyer in Vietnam?
Pursuant to Article 10 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam and Article 11 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam, the criteria and conditions for becoming a lawyer are as follows:
Criteria of lawyers
Vietnamese citizens who are loyal to the Fatherland, observe the Constitution and law, have good moral qualities, possess a law bachelor diploma, have been trained in legal profession, have gone through the probation of legal profession and have good health for law practice may become lawyers.
Conditions for law practice
A person who meets all the criteria specified in Article 10 of this Law, if wishing to practice law, must possess a law practice certificate and join a bar association.
According to the above regulations, with the above-mentioned criteria and conditions for law practice, it is not required that individuals belong to or do not belong to any profession. As long as they meet the prescribed standards and conditions, the person who used to be a prosecutor can still become a lawyer.
However, according to the provisions of Clause 4, Article 17 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam, as amended by Clause 8, Article 1 of the 2012 Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of Law on Lawyers, the person who is currently an officer, official, professional soldier or commissioned officer, national defense worker in an agency belonging to the army; a commissioned or non-commissioned officer, a worker in an agency belonging to the Police shall not be issued with the lawyer practicing certificate.
Thus, if an individual is still a procurator at the People's Procuracy, he/she cannot simultaneously become a lawyer.
Can a prosecutor become a lawyer in Vietnam? How long does it take to train a prosecutor to become a lawyer?
How long does it take to train a prosecutor to become a lawyer?
Pursuant to Article 12 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam as amended by Clause 4, Article 1 of the 2012 Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of Law on Lawyers stipulating the duration of lawyer course as follows:
Training lawyers
1. Holders of bachelor’s degrees in law may take a lawyer course at an institution licensed to train lawyers.
2. A lawyer course lasts for 12 months.
People that complete the lawyer course shall be issued with the Certificate of completing the lawyer course by the training institution.
3. The Government shall specify the requirements of lawyer training institutions.
4. The Minister of Justice shall specify a general program for lawyer training, and the recognition of lawyer training overseas.
Thus, those who want to attend the lawyer training course must first have a bachelor's degree in law and the duration of lawyer course is for 12 months.
However, Article 13 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam stipulates the cases exempt from lawyer training in Vietnam as follows:
Persons exempt from lawyer training in Vietnam
1. Those who have been judges, procurators or investigators.
2. Professors, associate professors of law; doctors of law.
3. Those who have been senior court examiners; senior procuracy inspectors; senior legal experts, researchers or lecturers.
4. Those who have been principal court examiners or principal procuracy inspectors; principal legal experts, researchers or lecturers.
According to the above regulations, those who are already procurators will be exempt from lawyer training.
Should a procurator wishing to become a lawyer join a lawyer apprenticeship?
According to the provisions of Article 16 of the 2006 Law on Lawyers of Vietnam (amended by Clause 7, Article 1 of the 2012 Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of Law on Lawyers) on exemption from or reduction in the period of lawyer apprenticeship as follows:
People exempted from lawyer apprenticeship
1. People being judges, procurators, senior investigators, intermediate investigators, professors, associate professors of law, Doctors of law, senior inspectors of the court, the senior inspectors of the procuracy, senior law experts, senior law researchers, senior law lecturers are exempted from lawyer apprenticeship.
2. People being junior investigators, major inspectors of the court, major inspectors of the procuracy, law experts, researchers, lecturers are eligible for 2/3 reduction in the lawyer apprenticeship period.
3. The people that have worked as law experts, researchers, and lecturers, inspectors of the court, inspectors of the procuracy for at least 10 years are eligible for 50% reduction in lawyer apprenticeship period.
Thus, according to the above provisions, the former procurator is not only not required to attend the lawyer training course but also is exempted from participating in the lawyer apprenticeship.
However, in order to be exempted from participating in lawyer training and lawyer apprenticeship, the procurator must prepare appropriate proofs as prescribed in Clause 1, Article 4 of Circular 05/2021/TT-TTg of Vietnam as follows:
Proof of exemption from law practice training and exemption from or reduction in legal traineeship period
The proof demonstrating that a person is exempt from lawyer training as prescribed in Article 13 of the Lawyer Law or is exempted or reduced from his/her legal traineeship period as prescribed in Article 16 of the Lawyer Law is one of the following documents:
1. A copy of the decision on appointment or re-appointment of a judge, procurator, investigator, or the resolution of the People's Council, the minutes of judge election of the People's Council, for a case where the judge is elected by the People’s Council at the district or province level.
According to that, a person who used to be a procurator needs to provide a copy of the decision on appointment of a procurator in order to be exempted from law practice training and from legal traineeship period.
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