How to write a statement regarding fraud to the police, the actions of the victim during the commission of a crime under Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation + example of filling out an application from an individual

There are thousands of fraud schemes in different areas of life in the world. Meanwhile, such actions are a crime (Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). And if a person has become a victim, then you should write a statement to the police regarding fraud; the form can be downloaded below.

At all times, there are people who, under any pretext, lure money from gullible citizens. They are called scammers. An unpleasant situation can happen in the life of any citizen when his human rights are violated and he needs their protection.

Where to file a fraud report and get justice? This is why law enforcement agencies have been created, such as the police, the Department of Economic Crimes and the Investigative Committee.

What to do if you were deceived on the Internet

Internet fraud is the scourge of modern society. With the development of technology, criminals have gone online, where it is much easier to deceive gullible citizens. Popular deception schemes:

• listing goods for sale on online advertising platforms. After prepayment, the seller disappears;
• luring a citizen out of his bank card data and passwords for transactions using various methods. The most common option is a call from an imaginary bank security service;
• sending SMS messages about an allegedly erroneous transfer with a request to return the money back;
• purchasing a product on a duplicate site that pretends to be a major seller;
• purchasing various information services and courses on the Internet. After payment, the buyer receives nothing.

In fact, there are many more ways to deceive, but these are the most popular ones, which thousands of citizens fall for every day. Even to that same imaginary bank security service, which everyone seems to know about. In an unusual situation, when a person is told that they want to steal his money, he acts unpredictably and often unreasonably.

Complaint about committing a crime: the essence of the document

There are no requirements for the content of the statement in the Criminal Code. It is drawn up by the victim or his representative in any form. Regardless of the wording of the application, its structure, it will be registered and a check will begin on it in accordance with Art. 144, 145 Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation.

However, the basic rules for completing applications should be considered in more detail:

• The application must contain the date of signature and passport details of the person submitting it. You must include your full name and registered address in the application;
• The statement includes a description of the crime that occurred. The place, time and method of committing fraudulent activities should be indicated. The description should be detailed but concise;
• The application must include information about the damage caused. You need to reflect a specific amount. In addition, the document must indicate whether the damage is significant or not. This is important for qualifying the crime, since if it is significant, the crime will be more serious. In this case, significant damage cannot be less than 5,000 rubles.

The application must contain a request to conduct an investigation and initiate a criminal case.

If you voluntarily transferred money

What does voluntary mean? That is, you yourself made the transfer to the fraudster, you yourself gave him your card details and gave him the verification code to complete the operation, you yourself gave the fraudster access to your online account. This is all voluntary data transfer. No one forced you, holding a gun to your temple.

Even if money protection insurance was connected to your bank card, it will not work. You yourself transferred the data to third parties, the bank has nothing to do with it.

If you run to the bank asking to return the funds sent to the scammers, you will leave the branch with nothing. According to Bank of Russia regulation No. 383-P, Chapter 1, Article 24, banks do not interfere in the contractual relations of their clients; only the payer and the recipient resolve matters between themselves. The bank gets involved only if it is partially at fault. But this is not the case.

Types of punishment for the guilty

Fraud, qualified by Part 1 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, is punishable by a fine of up to 120,000 rubles. or imprisonment for up to 2 years. A crime committed by a group of persons falls under Part 2 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, which provides for punishment in the form of a fine of up to 300,000 rubles. or imprisonment for up to 5 years. A similar punishment is imposed on someone who, by deception, stole funds from the victim in the amount of 5,000 rubles or more.

If one's official position was used for fraudulent purposes or the crime resulted in major damage, the court will be guided by Part 3 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and impose a penalty in the form of a fine from 100,000 to 500,000 rubles. or imprisonment for up to 6 years.

Fraud committed by a group of persons or resulting in damage on an especially large scale is punishable by up to 10 years in prison (Part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation).

Parts 5-7 art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation are devoted to fraud in the economic sphere and are used to qualify such acts as failure to fulfill obligations under contracts or agreements. The parties to such proceedings are legal entities. Punishment here ranges from a fine (from 100,000 rubles) to imprisonment for up to 10 years.

What to do if you have been scammed for money on the Internet

If you yourself gave your data to scammers, it is better not to immediately hope that you will be able to return the money. This happens extremely rarely, and only in case of large losses. In practice, maybe one out of a thousand victims still manages to bring the scammers to justice and get their money back.

1. Log into your online banking as soon as possible. Good luck if the payment has not yet gone through. Then you can cancel the transaction. This is relevant if we are talking about fraud in which you transferred money to someone’s card or e-wallet.
2. Call your bank's hotline and report the fraud. Ask what you should do. In fact, banks are not obliged to do anything, but some still conduct some kind of investigation, give advice, check the fraudster, and can block his card for suspicious transactions.
3. Call the bank or electronic payment system to which you sent the money. They won’t help you get your funds back, but they can block the scammer’s details. This way you will save other people from loss.
4. Get a statement from your bank showing the criminal transaction and go to the police to file a statement.

If you were defrauded of money on the Internet, and you yourself gave the data to the scammers, the bank will not return anything to you. Only a statement to the police and initiation of a criminal case will help.

Procedure and terms for consideration of the application

Received materials are signed by the responsible employee of the prosecutor's office. He checks the correctness of the application and the presence of all required information in it.

Then there is a certain procedure for checking the information contained in the appeal. Depending on the specific case, the period for processing the application is from 3 to 10 days.

After this, the prosecutor's office issues a decision based on the results of consideration of the application. If the complaint of the victim of fraud is satisfied, then the resolution specifies a list of those actions (with deadlines) that must be carried out by the police.

Statement to the police

In practice, few of the victims reach the police, since the amount of damage in the vast majority of cases is not critical. There are not many people who want to run around police departments for a couple of thousand rubles. And the police themselves do not favor such cases, since they are not easy to investigate and the detection rate is low.

What to do if you are deceived for money on the Internet:

1. Collect evidence: bank account statements, screenshots of correspondence with scammers, call printouts, ideally a recording of a telephone conversation with a scammer.
2. Submit an application to the Ministry of Internal Affairs at your place of residence. You can call the government agency hotline number 8 . After receiving the application, you will be given a confirmation coupon.
3. Expect a call and investigation.

A police report will be accepted for any amount of damage, even if it is less than 1,000 rubles.

In practice, criminal cases for petty fraud are very rarely initiated. And if they do get excited, they are investigated at a snail’s pace—the investigative committee doesn’t like them. If more than a month has passed and there is no movement, contact the prosecutor's office. If they refused to initiate a criminal case, then also to the prosecutor’s office.

How to apply

There is no established form that the appeal must comply with in criminal procedure legislation. At the same time, practice and norms regulating the procedure for considering reports of crimes have developed approximate criteria that statements of this nature must meet:

1. The name of the police department, indicating its chief. In the duty room of any public office there is a stand on which there are sample statements intended for use by citizens as examples. If, however, there is no such stand, you can ask the police officer on duty for the name and surname of the head of the department.
2. Applicant details – full name, place of residence (actual), telephone number.
3. The essence of the appeal. Here are all the important circumstances that you regard as fraud. That is, the so-called objective side of the crime must be indicated - who (if known), what they did, what damage, where and when the events occurred.
4. Evidence – information from witnesses, written or other information media that can be used to confirm what you have written.
5. Indication of a warning about liability for knowingly false denunciation under Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
6. Signature, number.
7. List of attached documents.

How to find out where the scammer is from and what bank card he is using

If you have been deceived on the Internet, you can try to get some information about the scammer. This is possible if we are talking about transferring to a card. Card number is a set of some information.

The first 6 digits of the card are its BIN. On the Internet you can find services through which you can instantly “break through” plastic. For example, if you enter BIN 553691, the following information appears:

You receive information that the fraudster’s card is being serviced by Tinkoff. And if you have been scammed on the Internet for money, you can call the hotline of this bank and get advice on further actions, as well as inform the bank about its suspicious client. Some banks pay close attention to this information and can check a fraudulent card and even block it.

You won't get any more information. By the card number you will only recognize the bank that serves it. You will not recognize the city of issue, much less the name of the holder. And the bank will not disclose this information to you.

Most often, scammers use Qiwi or Yumani cards, which are issued even without personal identification. Afterwards, it is almost impossible to find such a criminal.

What can be evidence of a crime?

The following are accepted as evidence:

1. Testimony of the suspect, accused.
2. Testimony of the victim, witness.
3. Expert opinion and testimony.
4. Conclusion and testimony of a specialist (clause 3.1 introduced by Federal Law of July 4, 2003 N 92-FZ).
5. Protocols of investigative and judicial actions.
6. Other documents.

You can view tips and tricks on how to prove 100% fraud here.

What to do if you were deceived with a parcel

I think everyone is familiar with the footage when a person opens a package with a smartphone purchased via the Internet, and there turns out to be a brick. And of course, the goods were pre-paid.

In this case, there is also fraud. Parcels with expensive contents should be opened directly at the Post Office. For the investigation, it is extremely important to obtain witnesses, who will be post office employees.

And here you also need to contact the police, write a statement and wait for a criminal case to be initiated. In such cases, fraud is often widespread; cases from different parts of Russia can be generalized.

How to get money back from a scam online store

Another situation is that you made a purchase in an online store that did not raise any doubts. You paid for the product, but never received it. This is also a common type of fraud. Scammers work similarly on Instagram and other social networks, selling any goods and services.

Everything is the same: the money can only be returned within the framework of a criminal case, that is, you need to write a statement to the police. Proof of payment required. The fraudulent site itself may already be closed, so it is advisable to take screenshots of it.

Article for fraud

Article 159 for fraud of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation provides for the following types of illegal actions:

1. Deception for the purpose of obtaining financial or other type of benefit (consists in providing false information);
2. Financial manipulations that led to the unlawful enrichment of the fraudster;
3. Illegal actions with property, seizure of valuables (movable and immovable property);
4. Applying for a loan, not returning funds;
5. Refusal to fulfill assumed obligations (violation of the terms of the contract, receipts and other documentary evidence of illegal actions).

How realistic is it to get your money back?

If you have been scammed out of money on the Internet, a completely normal desire is to get your money back and punish the scammers. But in practice everything is very bad. Even if you were deceived for a lot of money, the likelihood of getting it back is extremely low. Sometimes people lose millions of rubles and cannot do anything.

Fraud on ad sites in 2022 led to citizens losing 1 billion rubles. And this is only on message boards and what became known to law enforcement agencies. Most citizens simply wave their hand and don’t turn anywhere - it’s useless.

In 2022, the number of Internet crimes increased by 73.4% compared to 2022. In the first six months of 2022, more than 315,000 crimes of this type were recorded.

According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, only every tenth case of fraud on the Internet or by telephone is solved. And the most disappointing thing is that disclosure does not guarantee a refund. The criminal will be brought to justice, but the victim still needs to somehow recover funds from him. And most often the collection is unsuccessful.

5 / 5 ( 2 voices)

Sample statement regarding fraud

Let's create an example of a fraud complaint that you can use when writing it yourself (without the help of a lawyer). Comments that can be taken into account in one or another version of events are highlighted in blue.

To the head of police department No. 1 of the Kaluga Regional Ministry of Internal Affairs, police colonel V.N. Petrov.

(if for some reason you cannot write the title or surname of the chief of the OP (for example, you do not know this), the application must still be accepted; the absence of this data is not a basis for refusal to accept)

Nikolaeva P.R., born in 1975, living at the address: Kaluga, st. Derevenskaya, 1, apt. 7. tel. 892600077

(if fraud is committed against a minor, the details of both the legal representative and the child are indicated here)

STATEMENT

I ask that a man unknown to me, who introduced himself as Krasnov A.Yu., be brought to criminal responsibility, who in the period from October 10, 2016. to October 15, 2016, while in the office of the company I own, at the address Kaluga, st. Derevenskaya, 2, letter A, by deception he stole money from me in the amount of 250,000 rubles, which is significant damage for me.

(In general, such a brief statement states enough for the police to see the prospect of initiating a criminal case and begin to actively work on it. However, such an appeal has little content, so we recommend revealing the essence of your problem in more detail)

I am an individual entrepreneur, I own a company for the production of accessories, located at the address: Kaluga, st. Derevenskaya, 2, letter A. In this office, I made an appointment with the representative of the Uyut real estate agency, Alexander Yuryevich Krasnov (other details are unknown to me), who was supposed to find me a premises in Kaluga for me to purchase in order to expand my business .

10.10.2016 Krasnov A. appeared at 10:00 at the office at the above address, where he offered to conclude a preliminary agreement with him for the purchase of premises with an area of ​​87 sq.m., located at the address - Kaluga, st. Turgeneva, 10, letter B. After inspecting this premises (in the absence of the owner, A.Yu. Krasnov had the keys to it), I agreed to buy it. At the same time, Krasnov A.Yu. assured me that the owner of the premises, M.T. Morozov. is abroad undergoing treatment for cancer, that Krasnov has a power of attorney for sale. Krasnov also explained that he has two buyers and in order to complete the deal with me, he needs to make a deposit of 250,000 rubles, handing it over to him personally. In response to my question, provide me with a power of attorney Krasnov A.Yu. showed me a photocopy, saying that he never carries the original with him and will provide it on the day of concluding the main contract.

Believing Krasnov A.Yu., 10.15.2016 I gave him 250,000 rubles while in the office at Kaluga, st. Derevenskaya, 2, letter A, we entered into a preliminary agreement with him, where he confirmed receipt of the money with his signature.

After this, on the agreed date for completion of the transaction, October 21, 2016. Krasnov A.Yu. did not show up to my office, citing poor health, and the final contract was not drawn up.

When I tried to enter the premises at the address Kaluga, st. Turgeneva, 10, letter B, then I discovered an operating cafe there, where the director informed me that at the beginning of October 2016 the premises were purchased by I.Z. Ogurtsov, who as of October 10, 2016. was already the full owner and does not intend to sell it. In a conversation with Ogurtsov I.Z. I found out that he bought the premises from M.T. Morozov. personally, without intermediaries even before my meeting with Krasnov, and also the fact that Morozov M.T. He does not suffer from any disease and has never been abroad.

Since Krasnov A.Yu. took possession of my money through deception, I ask him to be held accountable.

(You can clarify what measures you took to repay the debt in order to eliminate doubts that this is not just a violation of an obligation in the civil legal sense, but a criminal offense.)

Before writing this statement, I tried daily and repeatedly to contact A.Yu. Krasnov. at 8926777888, but his phone was always turned off. I also visited the address indicated in the preliminary agreement as the location of the Uyut real estate agency and found out that there is a residential building at this address and there are no organizations there.

(Be sure to clarify why the damage to you is significant.)

250,000 rubles is a significant loss for me, since I have three young children dependent on me, I pay a mortgage and my wife’s salary is 15,000 rubles. My monthly income from business activities averages 70,000 rubles.

(It would be useful to indicate who can be interviewed as witnesses already at the stage of the procedural check.)

I would also like to inform you that I transferred the funds in the presence of my employees - Lebedeva M.Yu., Doronina G.K., who are ready to give explanations and confirm the circumstances stated by me in the application. I also ask you to question the current owner of the premises, Ogurtsov I.Z., as well as the previous owner, Morozov M.T., regarding the circumstances.

(Be sure to reflect your understanding of the consequences associated with falsely reporting a crime.)

On criminal liability for knowingly false denunciation under Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation warned.

October 23, 2016 Nikolaev P.R.

FAQ

What to do if you were cheated out of money?

Contact the police. Only within the framework of a criminal case can the fraudster be brought to justice and try to return the stolen property.

What to do if you come across phone scammers?

If you have suffered from their actions, provided them with card details and passwords, or if funds have been stolen, immediately contact law enforcement agencies. The faster you do this, the greater the chances of bringing scammers to justice and stopping their activities. If you have not suffered financially, immediately block the card whose data has been disclosed.

They scammed me for money on the Internet, but the police didn’t open a case. What should I do?

Contact the prosecutor's office, they may help initiate a criminal case.

I was scammed by scammers, how can I get my money back?

Only by contacting the police and initiating a criminal case. If the criminals are found and brought to justice, you will be able to recover damages from them through the courts. But in practice, only a few victims out of a thousand manage to get their money back.

How to punish scammers?

You can only write a statement about them. In addition, we recommend posting on the Internet the details of the criminal known to you, the same card or e-wallet number. By doing this, you will save other people from losing money.

Sources:

1. ConsultantPlus: Regulation of the Bank of Russia dated June 19, 2012 N 383-P.
2. Forbes: Virtual damage: why most cybercrimes go unpunished.

about the author

Irina Rusanova - higher education at the International East European University in the direction of "Banking". Graduated with honors from the Russian Economic Institute named after G.V. Plekhanov with a major in Finance and Credit. Ten years of experience in leading Russian banks: Alfa-Bank, Renaissance Credit, Home Credit Bank, Delta Credit, ATB, Svyaznoy (closed). He is an analyst and expert of the Brobank service on banking and financial stability. [email protected]

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Electronic

Submitting an application to the prosecutor's office via the Internet is considered more convenient. Since you do not need to adapt to the operating hours of the institution, the application can be sent at any time of the day. In addition, some senders have doubts about the reliability of sending letters by mail. Moreover, when submitting an application through the official website of the Prosecutor General's Office, you receive a notification that the application has been processed. The application must indicate the citizen’s personal data and the email address to which the response will be sent.

If during the prosecutor's investigation it is established that the applicant provided false information, while he knew that the information was unreliable, such a person will be held accountable for false denunciation. For this purpose, when receiving statements about crimes, a receipt is immediately taken from citizens. It explains that the applicant is aware of the consequences of a false denunciation.

In 2022, the format of electronic applications to the prosecutor’s office will be simplified. A super service will be introduced on the government services portal, allowing you to submit a single statement about criminal offenses to the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the prosecutor's office. Consequently, there will be no need to duplicate appeals or wait for response measures from the prosecutor’s office specialists.

Comments: 10

Your comment (question) If you have questions about this article, you can tell us. Our team consists of only experienced experts and specialists with specialized education. We will try to help you in this topic:

Author of the article Irina Rusanova

Consultant, author Popovich Anna

Financial author Olga Pikhotskaya

1. Bogdan
   03/03/2022 at 06:54 Where to find out what to do if an online store deceived a buyer
   Reply ↓ Anna Popovich
   03/03/2022 at 11:51

   Dear Bogdan, you can call the Rospotrebnadzor hotline at: 8-800-555-49-43.

   Reply ↓