A new stage of humanization of the criminal-legal impact regarding the application of punishment in the type of life imprisonment: the problem of correspondence.

Abstract

The scientific article explores a new stage of humanization of the criminal-legal influence on the application of punishment in the form of life imprisonment. It has been established that a number of decisions of the European Court of Human Rights served as a prerequisite for this process, which generally stated the absence of a mechanism for early release of convicts from serving a sentence of life imprisonment in Ukraine, which would allow the educational purpose of this punishment to be realized. Attention is focused on the fact that the European Court of Human Rights does not oblige the state to provide specific forms of early release from serving a sentence of life imprisonment. At the same time, it is emphasized that this process should be legally defined, transparent and provide the person sentenced to life imprisonment with the "right to hope". An inconsistency was established in the text of the motivational and operative parts of the decision of the Constitutional Court of Ukraine dated September 16, 2021 No. 6-р (II)/2021 (case on review of the sentence of a person sentenced to life imprisonment) in the part of determining the types of early release from serving a sentence in life imprisonment. In the decisive part of the decision, the Constitutional Court of Ukraine obliged the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine to introduce two independent, independent measures of a criminal law nature - the replacement of the punishment in the form of life imprisonment with a milder punishment and conditional early release from serving the punishment in the form of life imprisonment will. The article focuses attention on the need to observe the reasonableness and justice of criminal law influence in the process of humanizing life imprisonment. It is argued that excessive humanization of life imprisonment may lead to a decrease in the protective function of criminal legislation and the ability to prevent new criminal offenses. It was concluded that in the conditions of martial law there is an increase in the number of crimes punishable by life imprisonment. The position is expressed that it should be recognized as socially determined to introduce the replacement of punishment in the form of life imprisonment with a milder one and subsequent conditional early release from serving the prescribed sentence, if the convicted person corrects himself and shows his readiness for further resocialization.