Law/5. Criminal law and criminology
Zhadan V.N.
PhD in Law,
Associate Professor
Kazan Federal
University, Elabuga Institute,
On the criminological characteristics of ecological
crime in Russia
Abstract. The article discusses criminological
characteristics of ecological crime in
Key words: criminological characteristics of
ecological crime,
In the XXI century "one
of the most pressing overarching issues facing the international community is
the protection of the natural environment. The impact of man and his activities
in different fields on the environment has increased so much and continues to
grow that the world community as a crucial component of international
(universal) and the national security of each state assigns to environmental
safety" [1, p. 515]. Is no exception in this regard and the Russian
Federation (further Russian, Russian Federation), and therefore the necessary
regulatory, institutional and technical conditions allow to prevent possible
threats to health and human life, pollution of air, earth, bowels, soils,
superficial and underground waters, and also the further existence of flora and
fauna in Russia.
As you know, the incident in
The analysis of criminological
and criminal-legal characteristics of environmental crime subject of many
scientific works in the domestic legal literature [4-8]. This interest is not
accidental, as the environmental protection, preventing and combating
environmental violations and crimes are important tasks of state bodies and
organizations in Russia, as evidenced by, for example, decrees of the President
of the Russian Federation on carrying out in 2013 the Year of environmental
protection in 2017 the year of the environment.
The subject of this review
will have some questions about the criminological characteristics of ecological
crime in Russia, and is a continuation of previously published materials,
"Current issues of criminological characteristics of ecological
crime", "On the development of legislation on environmental
crimes", "Criminal-legal analysis of environmental crime in
Russia" and others. In the course of consideration of criminological
analysis of environmental crime authors will be partially used previously
published materials.
On the basis of the specified
subject of interest the following questions: what socially dangerous acts are
defined as environmental crime; what is the current state, the proportion and
dynamics of ecological crimes in Russia; what are the causes and conditions
that lead to environmental crimes; some criminological features characterize
the personality of offenders; measures taken to prevent crimes in this
category?
In accordance with article 42
of the Constitution of the Russian Federation [9] every citizen has the right
to favourable environment, reliable information about
its condition and on compensation of the damage caused to his health or
property by ecological offence. Consequently, the protection of this right is
one of the priorities of the state.
A wide range of offences in
the sphere of the environment, as well as a high degree of importance of
environmental activities determined the need for independent allocation of the
category of environmental crimes in a separate Chapter of the Criminal code of
the Russian Federation [10] (hereinafter CC RF). In Chapter 26 of the
criminal code of
V. D. Ermakov
notes that the violation of environmental criminal law is one of the most
socially dangerous and common types of wrongful acts [12].
In combination with other
environmental violations by severity of negative consequences in the field of
demography, ecology and society they are currently a real threat to national
security. In this regard, there is a need for the adoption at the Federal,
regional and municipal levels of consistent and effective measures for the
prevention, combating and reduction of environmental crime in
As is well known
criminological characteristics of certain types of crime, including
environmental crime, includes the following elements:
1) the status, dynamics,
proportion, structure, level of latency, etc. [13, p. 63];
2) the causes and conditions
conducive to the Commission of crimes;
3) criminological
characteristics of offender;
4) prevention and prevention
of crimes ... [14, p. 17].
These elements of
criminological characteristics of ecological crime will be the subject of this
study.
In
It is widely recognized that
corruption crimes are characterized by a high latency [17, p. 1809]. This is
sufficiently applies to environmental crimes, and therefore in the official
statistics does not reflect all crimes committed by this category.
The author in previously
published material, wrote that environmental crimes in
It is also worth noting a
special danger of ecological crimes, as they carry long-term consequences for
the natural environment, and, consequently, affect human health, reduced life
expectancy of the population, harmful genetic changes.
Speaking about the reasons of
crimes in the sphere of the environment, is a major factor of environmental
crime, which will help to characterize this type of crime. First of all, the
gaps in public environmental consciousness, which is expressed in the
indifferent and even negligent attitude of the population towards the state of
nature and the consumer attitude towards it. This attitude increases the crime
situation in the sphere of environmental crimes and their relatively high
latency.
Thus, according to A. I. Debt,
the reasons of the damage of the environment most often are: 1) inadequate
legislation, methods of use, storage, transport of biological, chemical,
radioactive substances and decomposition products which contaminate the
atmosphere, soil and water; 2) the discharge of toxic substances to the natural
environment; 3) violation of the production technology of any works; 4)
unauthorized by law fishing, hunting and felling of trees; 5) carelessness or
negligence in the handling of fire, in consequence, caused a forest fire; 6)
inadequate legislation, use of lands, which has led them to exhaustion and
erosion of fertile soils; 7) functioning of the enterprises and vehicles with
faulty treatment devices; 8) improper performance of regulatory functions by
the management of the enterprises, and state and departmental inspectorates and
other regulatory authorities [18].
Another reason can be
considered as deficiencies in the activities of the bodies responsible for the
fight against crime [19, p. 231], both in General and with environmental violations
and crimes.
In addition to these reasons
and conditions of relevant types of crime environmental crime applies "the
scientific approach of causality in which a causes of crime is understood as
the interaction of the environment and man, highlighting the internal and
external causes and conditions of crime ..." [20, p. 5], which require
additional independent research.
Criminological characteristics
of perpetrators of environmental crimes and especially of those related to
violation of rules of protection of the environment when carrying out various
industrial activities, protection of water and atmospheric environment,
fisheries, land use, subsoil use and handling of environmentally hazardous
substances and wastes, mostly of the same type. Their uniformity is the
similarity of the most important, from the standpoint of the science of
criminology, the features and characteristics that enable one to identify
similarities in the characteristics of criminal behaviour,
offenders, circumstances, motives, and mechanisms for the implementation of
environmental crimes, typological peculiarities of the personality of
offenders, the nature and severity of the damage to the environment.
S. A. Ruzmetov
in the criminological characteristics of the perpetrators of environmental
crime proposes to consider the following typical elements of criminogenic
situations that determine criminal behavior: 1) the tendency of a person to
violations of environmental regulations (the regulations change, MIS-reporting
etc); 2) as natural factors (adverse effects of temperature, humidity,
radiation); 3) adverse working conditions, inadequacy of the instruments of
production, etc.; 4) lack of training of certain categories of persons for
activities in these natural conditions (inadequate qualification, inability to
make decisions in difficult conditions); 5) the weakening of social control
(inadequate assessment of the importance of environmental measures, etc.); 6)
improper management of economic activities (lack of control, mismanagement,
etc.) [21, p. 42-43].
V. I. Tarika
proposes the following classification of the individual ecological criminal:
1) citizens as individuals who
commit environmental crimes intentionally or recklessly, including in the
group;
2) persons performing managerial
functions in commercial or other organizations, as well as in non-profit
organizations non-state bodies, local self-government bodies, state or
municipal authorities, permanently, temporarily or on special authority
performing organizational and administrative duties or administrative
functions;
3) persons occupying state
posts of the Russian Federation, of constituent entities of the Russian
Federation, civil servants and employees of local governments and officials
constantly, temporarily or on special authority exercising the functions of a
representative of authority or performing organizational-administrative,
administrative functions in state bodies, local government, state and municipal
institutions, as well as in the Armed Forces, other troops and military
formations of the Russian Federation (official) [22].
For criminological
characteristics of perpetrators of environmental crimes, played by such
characteristics as social status, age, gender, level of education and other
psychological, social and ethical performance. Because environmental crime does
not have any affiliation to a particular social class in
For circumstances, of
committing environmental crimes are most often characterized by agricultural,
industrial, construction or production of a closed technological cycle with the
presence of chemical and biological hazardous substances, with low technical
equipment, lack of professional managerial level of organization of these
works, in particular in the sphere of functioning of special treatment
facilities not strong organizational discipline in the absence of the necessary
demands of production managers and following all environmental requirements for
technological and operational processes. The disclosure of the specific
features of the situation provides the ability to quickly determine at what
points you should pay attention during familiarization with the production
processes, in which the contamination occurred, when the inspection of the
contamination and special facilities designed for purification, study of
technical equipment and documentation. Also allows you to answer the question
of what officers and what facts should be questioning as witnesses, and which
records should be deleted in order to more detailed study and soD. Understanding of the characteristics of the
circumstances and the situation allows you to quickly determine the source of
pollution and the responsible officials.
Motives for environmental
crime is a nihilistic attitude to environmental requirements, the vested
interests, but most often the unwillingness to burden themselves with the
complexities and cost in order to ensure environmental safety of production and
implementation of relevant works. Characteristics of offenders based on their
similar motifs and typical subjects of crimes in criminal cases on violation of
labour safety rules.
Criminological characteristics
of ecological crime includes an element of prevention of crimes of this
category.
On the basis of paragraph
"d" of article 72 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation,
joint jurisdiction is determined by "nature management; environmental
protection and ensuring environmental safety" [9] possible adoption of the
Environmental code, both at the Federal and at the level of constituent
entities of the Russian Federation, which will contribute to the decision of the
legislative gaps and conflicts in the sphere of environmental protection and
ecological safety, and will also allow for state control over observance of
environmental norms, including mining, which in many cases are produced of
potentially environmentally hazardous ways.
The right to prevention of
environmental crimes also include:
1) measures of socio-economic
nature that are associated with the improvement of industrial production (in
oil and gas, mining, steel and other industries) intense impact on the environment,
improvement of agricultural production, development of the optimal technologies
aimed at the economical relation to the earth, species of farm animals,
preservation of wildlife habitat, etc. the intensive development and
exploitation of modern transport on the basis of resource saving, reducing
harmful impact on the atmosphere, soil, water, and other biological and
physical parameters, etc;
2) measures of political and
legal nature aimed at implementation of legal environmental policy, environmental
security, further improvement of normative-legal regulation at the Federal and
regional levels in terms of environmental protection;
3) measures moral-cultural and
psychological nature, related to the constant improvement of the ecological and
legal consciousness (thinking) as at the public level and at the individual
level not only state and municipal employees and the entire population of
Russia, and, accordingly, overcoming of inertia, departmental divisions,
stereotypes and beliefs demagogy, incompetence, focus on the wrong decisions,
lack of control, protectionism, careerist aspirations, sovereignty, etc [23].
We should pay particular
attention to the improvement of environmental-legal education, which can lead
to:
1) to ensure internal and
external consent of the citizens of
2) active promotion and
information security restrictions, setting administrative, civil and criminal
responsibility for ecological offenses and crimes;
3) the formation of
citizenship on ecological safety and environmental protection, increase of
social activity of citizens, their intolerance and combating environmental
offences and crimes, etc.
To special measures for the
prevention of environmental crimes include:
1) an effective system of prosecutorial
supervision over the enforcement of environmental legislation,
2) permanent and effective
system of departmental control of environmental authorities for the relevant
areas and areas in economic activities;
3) efficient operation of the
permit system in part of the rules, issuance of weapons, explosives, etc.;
4) establishment of the
special regime and reorganisation of technology and
management functions and processes;
5) the normative prohibition
of the implementation of certain environmentally harmful actions, etc. [23].
According to the author, the
prevention of environmental crime require a more detailed and independent
research in order to develop a consistent and more effective measures for the
protection of the environment, which will allow you to use the most optimal
methods and forms of prevention of environmental crime in Russia.
Thus, this study may be
understood as an analysis of the existing norms of the Constitution and the
criminal code of the
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