The vulnerability thesis is one of the most important legal concepts in contemporary legal theory. Apart from being studied by legal scholars, the notion of vulnerability has been embodied in concrete legal rules and transferred to national case law allowing courts to set its boundaries by the power of judicial interpretation. Even though it would be hard to contest Schroeder and Gefenas’s statement that it is not necessary for an academic to say what vulnerability is because common sense dictates the existence of it, recent scholarly analysis clearly shows that the concept itself has become intolerably vague and slippery. More precisely, it is not quite clear what the essence of vulnerability is and what the effects of its gradation as well as repercussions are on other constitutional institutes across the human rights spectrum. The noted vagueness poses a great concern, particularly in the time of COVID-19, the greatest social stressor that humanity has faced in recent months. The COVID-19 crisis has had untold consequences on our health, mental well-being, educational growth, and economic stability. In order for the state to bear the COVID-19 social burden and adequately protect the vulnerable, it is of the utmost importance to set clear guidance for the interpretation and implementation of the vulnerability concept. Seeking to contribute to literature on these issues, the author brings light to constitutional and criminal legal standards on vulnerability set within the current jurisprudence and doctrine. Bearing in mind the influence of the European Court of Human Rights (hereinafter, the ECtHR or the Court) on developments in human rights law, 196 judgments related to vulnerability have been retrieved from the HUDOC database using a keywords search strategy. The quantitative analysis was supplemented with more in-depth qualitative linguistic research of the Court’s reasoning in cases concerning vulnerable children, persons suffering from mental illness and victims of family violence. Although the vulnerability reasoning has considerably expended their rights within the ambit of the Convention, the analysis has shown that inconsistencies and ambiguities emerge around the formulation of the applicant’s vulnerability and its gradation with respect to positive obligations. The full creative and transformative potential of the institute of vulnerability is yet to be realized.

The offence of trafficking in persons, as a modern form of slavery, was introduced in Croatian Criminal Code four years ago. During this time there have been nine criminal procedures running against perpetrators who were charged with trafficking of minors. According to the official criminal records of Croatian National Committee for the Suppression of Trafficking in Persons the Public Prosecutor desisted from prosecution after investigation in the 2006 case in front of the County Court in Zadar. In the same year the Public Prosecutor decided not to prosecute a case in front of the County Court in Zagreb bearing in mind the accused were already being prosecuted for the same offence in Italy. Seven cases are still pending. Taking into account the fact there have been no final court judgments, and therefore, that these cases could have various outcomes, the main aim of this article is to analyze pending cases and to determine the modalities for committing the offences. Consideration will be given to cases with excessive threats or use of force against the minors and cases in which minors were deceived by perpetrators. Special attention will be given to endogenous and exogenous causes of trafficking of minors in Croatia. Impact and possible consequences of the offences on victims will be detected.

In recent years, numerous studies have focused at the phenomenon of child sexual abuse (hereinafter, the CSA) offering valid conclusions about its phenomenological structures, etiological causes and impact on victims and society as a whole. Although the bulk of research has furthered our understanding of different aspects of CSA, scientific work that would focus on child victims' rights from constitutional and criminal law perspective is still scarce. Seeking to fill the noted gap, the author presents the first academic study on standards for protection of sexually abused children's rights set by the European Court for Human Rights (hereinafter, the ECtHR or the Court). Relaying on Faye Jacobsen set of blended methodologies, 10 judgments related to protection of rights of sexually victimised children are retrieved from the HUDOC system and analysed in detail. A special attention has been paid to safeguards and guarantees under the Article 3 and 8 of the Convention as well as their critical evaluation with respect to already established constitutional legal solutions. The qualitative analysis has revealed that judicial activism in the Strasbourg Court case law has been for years a driving force to enhance the protection of sexually abused children, and that today, this protection has significantly evolved, forming a concept of particularly vulnerable victims and child-sensitive approach within the context of child friendly justice. Although the evolutive line of the scope and content of CSA protection standards created by the Court can be noted, judicial reasoning techniques behind their development are susceptible to criticism.

The paper is divided into two parts to facilitate a clearer understanding of different aspects of the violent death of previously abused female victims. The first part offers a brief overview of the most recent phenomenological conclusions on violence ending in death and explains the need to focus on gender differences in homicide victimisation. A bulk of research has confirmed that most women are more vulnerable to homicide within home and that the lethal outcome is an escalation of previously experienced abuse. In order to contribute to a more in-depth study of female intimate homicides, the authors focus on a variety of definitions and draw a clear line between the term femicide and the aggravated murder of a closely related person. In the second part of the paper, the authors have analysed the case-law of the Supreme Court of the Republic of Croatia in which the perpetrators were found guilty of the criminal offence of aggravated murder of a closely related person (Art. 111, Para. 3 of the Criminal Code) in the period from 1 January 2013 to 1 June 2020. The research primarily focused on the circumstance of previous abuse, especially on the relationship between the victim and the perpetrator, the duration and frequency of abuse, and the reaction of the environment and competent authorities in cases where they knew about the abuse or when it was reported.

Problematika obiteljskog nasilja u fokusu je hrvatske znanstvene išire javnosti zadnja dva desetljeća. O ovoj temi napisani su mnogi radovi, no mali je broj studija o slučajevima teškog ubojstva žrtava kojeje počinitelj ranije zlostavljao. Kako bi se pridonijelo raspravi i upotpunila uočena praznina u znanstvenoj i stručnoj literaturi, u prvomedijelu rada objašnjava se zašto je to kazneno djelo posebno u odnosuna ostale delikte nasilja. Upozorava se na činjenicu da žene nose pojačani rizik od gubitka života od počinitelja s kojim ih veže odnos bliskosti i da njihovo ubojstvo može predstavljati kulminaciju prethodnihrazličitih oblika zlostavljanja. S posebnom pažnjom analizira se postojeći normativni okvir za suzbijanje obiteljskih / intimnih ubojstava iobjašnjava zašto je zakonodavac za kazneno djelo iz čl. 111. toč. 3. propisao najtežu kaznu. U drugom dijelu rada istražena je sudska praksai provedena analiza na uzorku od 23 pravomoćne presude Vrhovnogsuda, 20 presuda županijskih te dvije presude Visokog kaznenog suda.Cilj je analize ustanoviti na koji način sudovi primjenjuju kompleksnapravila o izboru vrste i mjere kazne počiniteljima teškog ubojstva ranijezlostavljane osobe te pokušati u njima pronaći izvjesne zakonitosti, kaoi uočiti eventualna odstupanja.