New edition of Art. 306 Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation
1. The operative part of the acquittal must contain:
1) last name, first name and patronymic of the defendant;
2) the decision to find the defendant innocent and the grounds for his acquittal;
3) the decision to cancel the preventive measure, if it was chosen;
4) a decision to cancel measures to ensure confiscation of property, as well as measures to ensure compensation for harm, if such measures were taken;
5) an explanation of the procedure for compensation for damage associated with criminal prosecution.
2. When rendering an acquittal, issuing a resolution or ruling to terminate a criminal case on the grounds provided for in paragraph 1 of part one of Article 24 and paragraph 1 of part one of Article 27 of this Code, the court shall refuse to satisfy the civil claim. In other cases, the court leaves the civil claim without consideration. Leaving a civil claim without consideration by the court does not prevent its subsequent filing and consideration in civil proceedings.
3. In the event of an acquittal, decision or ruling to terminate criminal prosecution on the basis provided for in paragraph 1 of part one of Article 27 of this Code, as well as in other cases when the person to be brought as an accused has not been identified, the court decides the issue of forwarding to the head of the investigative body or the head of the body of inquiry of the criminal case to conduct a preliminary investigation and identify the person to be brought in as an accused.
Another comment on Art. 306 Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation
1. The main components of this part of the acquittal are: the court decision to acquit the defendant, the basis for this decision, as well as the decision to cancel the preventive measure, measures to ensure compensation for harm, etc.
2. If the court does not establish the event of a crime or the defendant is not involved in the commission of a crime, the court decides to refuse to satisfy the civil claim. If the defendant is acquitted on other grounds (clauses 3 and 4 of Part 2 of Article 302), the court leaves the civil claim without consideration. The corresponding decisions are also recorded in the operative part of the acquittal.
3. In the case when the court establishes the fact of a crime and, at the same time, the non-involvement of the defendant in its commission, as well as in other cases when the person to be brought as an accused is not identified in the court proceedings, it, as a public authority, simultaneously with the acquittal of the defendant or by terminating his criminal prosecution, decides to send a criminal case to the head of the investigative body or the head of the inquiry body for investigation in order to identify the person subject to criminal liability.
The prosecutor explains criminal liability for false denunciation
Publication date: 18/08/2020 09:34
Article 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation establishes criminal liability for knowingly false denunciation of the commission of a crime. The main object of a deliberately false denunciation is the interests of justice. The interests of the individual may act as an additional direct object of this encroachment, i.e. those citizens who are unreasonably suspected of committing a crime.
The social danger of a crime is that it disrupts the normal work of law enforcement agencies involved in verifying a knowingly false report of a crime, and may lead to the unjustified initiation of a criminal case, prosecution and conviction of an innocent person. Incorrect information diverts the efforts and attention of investigative and inquiry authorities from the fight against actual crimes.
The objective side of the crime is characterized by active actions, which consist in knowingly false reporting of the commission of a crime - both about the event of the crime and about the persons who committed it.
A knowingly false denunciation can be oral, written, made over the telephone, through other persons and in other ways. It does not matter whether the informer gave his real name, deliberately changed it, or made an anonymous denunciation.
According to Part 7 of Article 141 of the Code of Criminal Procedure of the Russian Federation, anonymous statements cannot serve as a reason for initiating a criminal case. However, this rule does not mean that anonymous statements are not taken into account by law enforcement agencies at all.
Anonymous statements containing information about a crime being prepared or committed can and should be verified by the body authorized to conduct operational investigative measures, primarily by conducting appropriate public or covert operational investigative measures, based on the results of which the issue of initiating a criminal case is decided.
Thus, anonymous reports of crimes are verified; false information diverts the efforts and attention of law enforcement agencies from the fight against actual crimes, thereby violating the interests of justice. Consequently, anonymous denunciations fall under Article 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
A knowingly false denunciation is a completed crime from the moment the message (statement) is received by the above-mentioned bodies or their officials. The subjective side of the crime is characterized only by direct intent. The culprit is aware that he is providing law enforcement or other authorities responsible for responding to this message with false information that does not correspond to reality about the commission of a crime, and wants to commit these actions, i.e. mislead the relevant government authorities.
The motives for false denunciation in most cases are personal in nature (revenge, envy, jealousy, hostile relationships, the desire to hide the true criminal, etc.). Usually this crime is committed for the special purpose of initiating a criminal case and bringing a specific innocent person to criminal responsibility.
The subject of a false denunciation can be any sane person who has reached the age of 16 years. Knowingly false testimony by a suspect about the commission of a crime by another person, committed with the aim of avoiding criminal liability, does not form part of a knowingly false denunciation, since it is a method of defense against accusations.
Witnesses and victims who give false testimony regarding the circumstances of the case must bear criminal liability under Art. 307 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. But if during the testimony they make a false statement about another crime, then their actions will constitute a knowingly false denunciation. For committing a crime under Part 1 of Article 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, punishment may be imposed in the form of a fine in the amount of up to one hundred twenty thousand rubles or in the amount of wages or other income of the convicted person for a period of up to one year, or compulsory labor for a period of up to four hundred eighty hours, or correctional labor for a term of up to two years, or forced labor for a term of up to two years, or arrest for a term of up to six months, as well as imprisonment for a term of up to two years.
In part 2 art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation contains a qualifying feature - denunciation combined with accusing a person of committing a serious or especially serious crime. To impute this characteristic, it is necessary that the denunciation contain an indication of a specific person who allegedly committed this crime.
This crime is punishable by a fine in the amount of one hundred thousand to three hundred thousand rubles or in the amount of wages or other income of the convicted person for a period of one to two years, or by forced labor for a term of up to three years, or by imprisonment for the same term.
Part 3 Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation provides for criminal liability for denunciation combined with the artificial creation of evidence of the accusation, i.e. for falsification, imitation of evidentiary facts that actually do not exist (for example, providing false witnesses, producing false material or written evidence), which entails punishment in the form of forced labor for up to five years or imprisonment for up to six years.
Assistant Interdistrict Prosecutor A. Miroshkin
#Prosecutor's Office informs
Can they always be accused of deliberately false denunciation?
Based on investigative and judicial practice and my experience of defense in criminal cases initiated under Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (deliberately false denunciation), I can give an unequivocal answer - no, not always. Not every false report about the commission of a crime by a specific person or a false report simply about the fact of committing a crime can be qualified as a deliberately false denunciation with all the ensuing negative consequences (initiation of a criminal case, sending it to court, conviction).
The first thing to note is that the information provided by the person must be known to be false. That is, before the fact of the report, the person must clearly believe that he is reporting false information and this report about the crime must not correspond to reality.
Secondly, in case of a deliberately false denunciation, a message about an allegedly committed or impending crime must be addressed to the body empowered to make decisions on initiating a criminal case. Only such a report can be recognized as a knowingly false denunciation, which can directly initiate a pre-investigation check and be a reason for initiating a criminal case. Thus, the purpose of such a false report must be to initiate criminal proceedings or bring the person to criminal liability. If a person, reporting in his statement about allegedly committed illegal actions, does not raise the question of initiating a criminal case, but only asks for an assessment of them, there are not enough grounds to consider such a message a deliberately false denunciation.
Further, in practice one can often encounter a refusal to initiate a criminal case under Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation if during the preliminary inspection it was established that the person who reported false information was not previously warned of criminal liability under Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. This circumstance, of course, is controversial (ignorance of the law does not relieve one from liability) and practice here varies, but in my work I had to build a defense on this circumstance and even managed to achieve the termination of criminal prosecution against my client.
There are other circumstances and nuances that may allow you to avoid criminal liability when making a knowingly false denunciation.
A case from my practice.
A young man turned to me and said that he was being summoned by an investigator of the Investigative Committee on the fact that he had made a knowingly false denunciation against an employee of the criminal investigation department of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Central Administrative District of Moscow, about the extortion of a bribe by him (the operative). After a conversation with this young man, I learned that this false report was preceded by his detention by officers of the Central Administrative District Internal Affairs Directorate on suspicion of committing robbery; they treated him very rudely after the arrest and demanded that he admit guilt, since they had no other solid evidence.
After that, they brought my client to the investigator who was working on this criminal case. The investigator informed him that he would be interrogated as a suspect and began the interrogation. During the interrogation, my client, in order to avoid criminal liability and convey to the investigator information that he was in fact a victim and not a suspect, showed him that an investigator of the Internal Affairs Directorate extorted a bribe from him to drop the criminal case. After interrogation, the principal was released, and after a while he was again called in for questioning. During this time, my client was tormented by doubts and was in complete ordeal, since the operative, in fact, did not demand any money from him. As a result, he decided to tell the investigator about this during the repeated interrogation, and when the investigator asked why he slandered the criminal investigation officer, my client could not give any explanation. The investigator of the Department of Internal Affairs reported that he had already sent material regarding the extortion of a bribe to the investigator of the Investigative Committee for verification. Then he released my client again, since the investigator did not have any significant evidence that he had committed the robbery.
However, after some time, the client received a summons to be summoned for questioning by the Investigative Committee. He immediately understood why he was being called and came to me. The client was extremely upset and after his story asked how many years he would be imprisoned and whether to immediately take things for interrogation to the pre-trial detention center (he had also been previously convicted). But I made him happy by answering unequivocally that he was charged under Part 2 of Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation will not be presented and there is definitely no need to take things with you. After which I asked the client, before his first interrogation, whether the investigator explained that he (the client) is a suspect and has the right to defend himself against the accusation (suspicion) by any available means, as well as to give any testimony or refuse to explain anything. There was an affirmative answer. After which I explained to my client that the motive for the deliberately false report that the operative had committed a crime was a way to protect him in a criminal case from suspicion that had arisen, and this was exactly how it needed to be explained to the investigator of the investigative committee, and this was exactly how it was necessary to show it to the investigator of the Department of Internal Affairs. My client smiled widely and I saw relief on his face.
Yes - if a knowingly false denunciation is a way of defending against the charge brought - the provisions of Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation cannot exist and a person cannot be brought to criminal liability under such circumstances.
Commentary on Article 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation
1. The objective side of the crime consists of a knowingly false denunciation of the commission of a crime.
Denunciation is a message in any form (oral or written), made on one’s own behalf, anonymously or on behalf of another person or through third parties, about the fact of a crime being committed. The message when denounced is false, i.e. not true. This may refer to the event of a crime or be expressed in attributing it to a specific person, in accusing a person not involved in committing an actual crime, or in a more serious crime than the one that was actually committed, etc. Falsity must cover factual circumstances, and not their legal assessment.
The law does not specify the bodies and officials whose false denunciation constitutes the crime in question. First of all, they can be the bodies that fight crime: the police, the prosecutor's office, the investigative and inquiry bodies. They also include state authorities and local government bodies, public organizations, which, according to their functions, are obliged to transmit information about crimes committed to bodies and officials authorized to carry out criminal prosecution.
2. A false denunciation is considered completed from the moment the specified authorities receive a false report about the commission of a crime.
3. The subjective side of the crime is characterized only by direct intent. Conscientious misrepresentation regarding the information provided excludes criminal liability.
4. The subject of the crime is a person who has reached the age of 16 years.
5. A knowingly false denunciation should be distinguished from slander. In case of false denunciation, the act consists of reporting false information about the commission of a crime; in case of slander, the act consists of disseminating false information that discredits the honor and dignity of another person, undermining his reputation. A false denunciation is addressed to the above authorities, and slander involves the dissemination of information among third parties. These crimes serve different purposes:
- false denunciation - criminal prosecution of an innocent person;
- slander - humiliation of the honor and dignity of an individual.
6. A false denunciation becomes qualified if it is connected with an accusation of a person of committing a grave or especially grave crime (Article 15 of the Criminal Code).
7. According to Part 3 of Art. 306, a false denunciation combined with the artificial creation of evidence of the accusation is punishable. It is characterized by the fact that the perpetrator either presents false evidence for the prosecution or falsifies it.
