D.Medvedev charged the SC and the SCA with stipulating “measures of liability for judges”, and the ministries – with considering the issue of extension of the practice of applying bail and restriction

Ten days before the expiry of his Presidential mandate, Dmitry Medvedev charged the respective ministries with the task of studying whether it will be useful to define in the Penal Code of Russia the corpus delicti of the fraud more precisely. He also tasked the higher courts with development of suggestions to oblige the judges to inform of the pressure on them regarding certain cases.

Such suggestions were drawn up as a result of a session of the workgroup on preparation of suggestions on forming of the “Open Government” system in Russia on the issues of development of competition and entrepreneurship. The list was published by the Kremlin press service today.

The list includes the suggestion, voiced by D.Medvedev two days ago while interviewed by the Russian TV channels, to oblige the judges to inform of the pressure on them. The Superior Court of Arbitration of Russia and the Supreme Court of Russia has been charged with studying this issue until July 1. They will have to draw up their suggestions on the matter of implementing the obligation for the judges to inform of contacts with persons who illegally influence them and of other interventions in the judicial activity which hamper the administration of justice. The Presidential instruction makes clear how D.Medvedev intends to make the judges “follow this model and not be afraid to inform about the telephone calls”. For this, he suggests stipulating “effective measures of liability of the judges for failure to communicate such information, as well as obligatory publishing of such information”.

The current law “On status of judges in the Russian Federation” contains the provision, according to which “any intervention in the judge’s activity of justice administration is subject to prosecution”. The press service of the SCA of Russia told “Pravo.Ru”: “The SCA of Russia has been publishing non-procedural requests, received by the Court’s Chairman Anton Ivanov, on its website for years, and similar sections have been created on the websites of other courts of arbitration as well”. By the way, last January A.Ivanov suggested the creation of own security services, endowed with the function of telephone taps, under the judicial community itself and controlled by the judges. He also supported creation of a special section in every electronic case file, where all requests and addresses by the parties and any persons to the judge would be introduced and displayed.

The Head of the State also demanded that the Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Economic Development decide whether it is useful to amend the legislation on economic crimes. In particular, he suggests that the Ministries pronounce themselves on the issue of the necessity to eliminate the possibility of initiation of economic criminal cases without the victim’s declaration, and on the issue of decreasing the time periods for cancellation of the conviction of those convicted of such cases.

D.Medvedev also tasked the Ministries with studying the matter of possible extension of the practice of applying bail and restriction as a restraint in economic crimes, and of the possibility to sentence those, who commit economic crimes for the first time and compensate for the damages, to a non-imprisonment penalty. Similar initiatives were implemented last December in the so-called “third package of amendments on liberalizing the Penal Code of Russia”.

Igor Pastukhov, Advocate of the Moscow Bar Association “Law Firm "YUST"”, reminded “Pravo.Ru”: “Article 76.1 “Exemption from criminal liability for cases of crimes in the sphere of economic activity” was introduced into the CCRF. It stipulates exemption from criminal prosecution of the persons committing a number of crimes in the economic area: fixed by parts 1 of Articles 171, 171.1, 172, 185, 185.2, 185.4, 194, and part 2 of Article 176, parts 1 and 2 of Article 180, parts 3 and 4 of Article 184, Articles 177, 185.1, 185.3, 193, 195-197 and 199.2 of the CCRF. It is conditioned by compensation for damages and monetary transfer to the federal budget of five times the amount of caused damages. In tax crime cases, such exemption is conditioned by compensation of damages in the form of unpaid tax, penalty and fines”.

The Advocate says that “currently the investigators regard bail and restriction as something almost exotic”. As proof of his words, he gives the official statistics of the Russian courts, work in 2011. According to the statistics, investigators initiated 152028 requests to apply custody as the restraint, 135850 of those requests were upheld. The court chose bail in 447 cases and restriction – in 1345 cases. I.Pastukhov believes: “Fixing the bail amounts in the legislation would undoubtedly be useful, but we currently should not expect its wide application without changing the attitude of the investigation authorities”.

Lawyers of the Ministry of Justice and of the Ministry of Economic Development will have to, under D.Medvedev’s instruction, decide within two months if the definition of fraud in the CCRF should be made more precise. Remarkably, the Supreme Court of Russia has already decided on the necessity of such changes. As early as last February, Viacheslav Lebedev, Chairman of the SC of Russia, declared that Article 159 “Fraud” of the CCRF was to be either expanded or separate Articles on insurance and credit fraud, computer fraud and investment fraud introduced into the Code. He said: “It would allow to eliminate mistakes and abuses during initiation of criminal cases under this Article and to distinguish criminal acts from civil law relations”. As a result, last April, the SCRF submitted to the State Duma a draft law fixing the definition of that Article. As of the present moment, the lower house of the Parliament has not deliberated on the draft law nor given any replies to it.

The source of the publication is available here.