The Ministry of Justice is a special institution with complex and diverse functions, involving criminal prosecution, judicial administration, legislation, civil agency and legal advisory services, among which the first two functions are its main and representative functions. The Department of Justice consists of five divisions and a task force, namely, the Law Drafting Division, the Criminal Prosecutions Division, the Civil Prosecutions Division, the Policy and Administration Division and the International Law Division. The Prosecutions Division is the largest business division, which undertakes the prosecution of most criminal cases in Hong Kong and is also the most important public prosecution department in Hong Kong.
Regarding the specific nature of the Department of Justice in Hong Kong, according to Article 63 of the Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, "the Department of Justice of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall be in charge of criminal prosecution without any interference." From the nature of the Department of Justice in Hong Kong in the Basic Law, we can see that the Department of Justice in Hong Kong is listed as a sequence of administrative organs and an integral part of the administrative power in Hong Kong. This has been clearly stipulated in the second paragraph of Article 60 of the Basic Law: "The Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall set up the Secretary for Home Affairs, the Financial Secretary, the Department of Justice and various bureaux, departments and offices".
2. The procuratorial organs of the Hong Kong SAR exercise much less power than those of the mainland.
First of all, the Department of Justice, the procuratorial organ in Hong Kong, has no substantive power to investigate duty crimes. In Hong Kong, cases of duty crimes are under the jurisdiction of the Hong Kong Independent Commission Against Corruption. The Hong Kong Independent Commission Against Corruption has the right to investigate and deal with corruption, whether it is illegal or criminal. After the investigation is completed, the suspected criminals can be directly referred to the Department of Justice for prosecution.
Secondly, the procuratorial organs in the Hong Kong SAR do not have the monopoly power of criminal prosecution as in the Mainland. The procuratorial system in Hong Kong is influenced by the British procuratorial system. The procuratorial organ, namely the judicial department, is a typical administrative organ, which mainly performs public prosecution and judicial administration of the government, and can also be regarded as a legal advisory service institution of the government. In Hong Kong, the power to prosecute criminal offences is exercised by prosecutors and the police respectively. However, influenced by the decentralized mode of criminal prosecution in Britain, the police actually still have the right to prosecute some minor criminal cases. After the investigation of the case is completed, the Hong Kong police can directly file a lawsuit with the court, but in name, they still file a lawsuit with the Department of Justice. Cases directly prosecuted by the police are mainly simple criminal cases with minor crimes, and important and complicated cases should be handed over to the Ministry of Justice for review and prosecution.