Investigation of criminal offenses in the field of tourism through technical means

Abstract

Tourists are frequent victims of criminal offences, but the investigation of such crimes is usually complicated by several factors, which allow offenders to often stay unpunished. The aim of the research is to study the possibilities of using technical equipment during detection, investigation, and prevention of crimes against tourists. The research employed a doctrinal approach, a statistical method and other methods. The study identified the factors of victimization of tourists and the main scenarios under which crimes are committed. The main areas of application of technical equipment for the detection and investigation of crimes in tourism are established: the use of photo and video recording devices, traceology, weapons examination, handwriting examination, document, examination, identification of a person by appearance, phonoscopy, odourology, research of physical evidence, forensics, forensic profiling, etc. The problems of using technical equipment to detect and investigate crimes in the tourism sector are identified using the example of Ukraine, particularly the impossibility of using interrogation video footage as evidence during a judicial investigation. The obtained conclusions can be useful for optimizing the work of law enforcement agencies by providing a wide range of modern innovations to increase the effectiveness of detection and investigation of crimes in tourism.