Problematic Issues of Liability for Crimes against Justice in the Criminal Law Doctrine

Abstract

The study of problematic issues of responsibility for crimes and misdemeanours against justice becomes particularly relevant, considering the reform of judicial proceedings, and the discussion in the scientific community of the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine. The study applied a dialectical approach and the corresponding method, a systematic approach, methods of system analysis, technical and legal analysis, formal and logical, and sociological approaches. The purpose of this study is to formulate proposals on the structure of the division on responsibility for crimes, misdemeanours that encroach on the established procedure of legal proceedings, execution of court decisions, initial provisions on the regulation of the material basis of criminal liability for certain groups of encroachments on the established procedure of legal proceedings, execution of court decisions, approaches to criminal law protection of professional advocacy in the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine. As a result of the study, it was concluded that the criterion for systematisation of norms within the structural division of the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine on responsibility for encroachment on the established procedure for legal proceedings and enforcement of court decisions should be taken as a specific object of relevant crimes and misdemeanours. It is proposed to provide in the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine responsibility for interference in the activities of special victims – participants in relations on the implementation of legal proceedings and the execution of court decisions with differentiation of forms of such influence on the relevant victims depending on its intensity, which, accordingly, have different degrees of public danger. The expediency of placing in the structural unit of the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine on liability for crimes and misdemeanours against justice, the rules protecting social relations that ensure the activities of the defender, the representative of the person has been substantiated. At the same time, it is proposed to provide for a separate provision in the structural subdivision of the special part of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, where the object is social relations to ensure the socio-economic rights of a person, which would establish liability for intentional obstruction of a lawyer in the exercise of their lawful professional activity, in the absence of signs of criminal offences providing for liability for unlawful influence on a defender or representative. The provisions and proposals formulated by this study may be useful when developing the draft Criminal Code of Ukraine.