Annulment of a production order by the public prosecutor's office by the Federal Supreme Court

Facts

The appellant, a physician, was ordered by the public prosecutor's office in Kreuzlingen to produce within 10 working days all documents containing indications of possible structural, personnel and organizational deficiencies in the forensic-psychiatric ward C2 of the Psychiatric Clinic Münsterlingen. The appellant filed a complaint against this production order with the High Court of the Canton of Thurgau, which had partially upheld the complaint. The appellant appealed against the decision of the High Court to the Federal Supreme Court.

Considerations

The Federal Supreme Court states that the procedural legal protection against production orders in the Code of Criminal Procedure (CCP) is regulated by the sealing procedure under Art. 248 CCP. If the person affected by a production order invokes worthy interests of confidentiality, the sealing procedure must be initiated. This also applies to accessory objections that do not directly concern confidentiality issues, such as questions of proportionality.

Since in the present case the appellant had raised not only grounds of confidentiality but also other objections,…