A call for evidence published today signals the Commission’s intention to propose a regulation creating a shared IT mechanism allowing national prosecutors to check whether a suspect is already under investigation or prosecution in another Member State.
The European Commission published a call for evidence today for the Criminal Justice Cross-check Mechanism (CJCM), a proposed regulation that would allow judicial authorities across the EU to query other Member States’ prosecutorial databases during active criminal investigations. The initiative, led by DG Justice unit A4 and registered under reference Ares(2026)3950858, targets a Q4 2026 proposal.
While EU law already provides tools for cross-border criminal cooperation, they cover distinct phases of a case. The Prüm II framework allows law enforcement to search national police records before a case reaches prosecutors. The European Criminal Records Information System captures final convictions. Between those two points, during the investigation and prosecution phase itself, no shared EU mechanism exists. A prosecutor in one Member State currently has no reliable way to know whether the same suspect is already being investigated or prosecuted elsewhere, or whether proceedings in another Member State may have already concluded in a way that triggers the prohibition on double jeopardy.
This is a notable problem, as organised crime benefits directly from it by exploiting the absence of information sharing between national judicial authorities. Furthermore, parallel proceedings in different Member States risk violating the principle that no person should be tried or punished twice for the same acts, a fundamental right recognised across EU legal systems.
The CJCM would operate as a two-step process, which would start with a judicial authority conducting an investigation, and sending a hit/no-hit query to other Member States’ prosecutorial databases, asking whether a named suspect appears in ongoing or closed criminal proceedings. Queries must be case-specific, with blanket or systematic searches being prohibited. The mechanism would apply high-accuracy matching, with filters to prevent broad fishing expeditions, though the call for evidence acknowledges the need to handle transliteration challenges across different alphabets.
If a hit is returned, the second step triggers follow-up coordination in line with existing EU rules on resolving conflicts of jurisdiction between Member States.
Member States would retain full ownership and control of their data. The mechanism would operate on an index basis, using pseudonymised data, rather than giving direct access to national case files. The Commission notes that data protection by design is a core architectural principle, with pseudonymisation supporting data minimisation and storage limitation requirements under the GDPR framework.
One notable feature of the proposal is its intended scope regarding non-conviction-based measures. Decisions such as asset confiscation orders, which do not result in a criminal conviction and therefore do not appear in criminal records systems, would fall within the mechanism’s reach. A judicial authority in one Member State could check whether such a measure has been imposed against a person in another, which the Commission identifies as particularly relevant for financial and asset-tracing investigations.
The proposal is also designed to interact with the Transfer of Proceedings Regulation adopted in December 2024, which enters into force in February 2027 and allows criminal proceedings to be transferred to the most appropriate Member State. The CJCM would help authorities identify earlier whether a transfer might be warranted.
For now, this is a call for evidence, not a legislative proposal. No impact assessment will accompany the eventual proposal, given the Commission’s view that the initiative is sufficiently technical in nature and limited in scope to judicial authorities. A Staff Working Document covering financial, digital, and fundamental rights implications will accompany the proposal when it is published. The Commission expects to table the regulation in Q4 2026.
Feedback is open on the Commission’s Have Your Say portal under reference Ares(2026)3950858. The Commission is consulting national prosecutors and investigative judges, law enforcement authorities with prosecutorial powers, Member State representatives, EU criminal law academics and practitioners, and data protection experts.
