On the Tactical and Forensic Potential of Investigative Examination in the System of Crime Counteraction Measures in the Sphere of Land Relations

Abstract

The authors analyze the influence that the liberalization of land relations had on the rise of new trends in the structure of crime, on the emergence of a specific «criminal market» of land that was seized though seemingly legal actions regulated by the dacha amnesty legislation with a simplified procedure for registering the right of ownership of land plots allocated for gardening, growing vegetables and personal farming before the Land Code of the Russian Federation came into force in 2001. Based on the study of representative empirical sources, the authors analyze different criminalistically relevant features of crime in this sphere that make it possible to implement the criminal intent of transferring (sometimes, serial transferring) of the right of ownership of land plots. Although the cornerstone of these actions lies in obtaining the state registration certificate of the ownership of the land plot in the name of interested persons, which determines the necessity of the criminalistic research of the corresponding title and title confirmation documents (primarily, through their thorough examination with the elements of criminalistic analysis), a no less significant role in determining the aggregate of circumstances of these actions is played by the inspection of the scene. Unfortunately, in practice there is not enough attention paid to this investigative action: the examination of the scene either does not happen at all or is of nominal and declarative character, its high tactical potential is not fully utilized, which weakens the body of evidence for the criminal cases. This situation motivated the authors to present their criminalistic recommendations on improving the effectiveness of the inspection of the crime scene as a valuable source of evidentiary information in criminal cases in the sphere of land relations.