Children and adolescents are one of the most helpless categories of citizens, against whom various types of crimes are most often used. That is why penalties for crimes against minor victims are more severe.
Young children are easily susceptible to violence from adults. But if we are not talking about the fact of rape, but there is a sexual connotation of the actions, we can talk about the seduction of teenagers.
Corruption of minors (Article 134, 135 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) is voluntary sexual contact or other actions of a sexual nature committed against a person who is not fully capable.
Such actions can seriously affect the child’s future life, causing incurable psychological trauma and physical pathologies to his fragile body.
What is the difference between rape and sexual intercourse? And what indecent acts against a teenager are subject to criminal prosecution?
Child seduction: concept and features
Categories of childhood in the legal plane have their own gradation. But in a general sense, persons under 18 years of age are considered children or minors.
They do not have full legal capacity, therefore they cannot be fully responsible for their actions.
The main question is, what is child abuse? There is no concept of “seduction” in the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. But it is implied in two articles regulating such actions.
This is Art. 134 “Sexual intercourse and other sexual acts with a person under 16 years of age” and Art. 135 "Depraved acts."
So, the age gradation of minors in Russian law is as follows:
- Under 12 years of age - a minor, completely not responsible for his actions, requiring maximum protection from the state;
- From 12 to 14 years - a minor who is not responsible for his actions, sexual contact with whom is strictly punishable under the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation;
- From 12 to 16 years - a minor who is partially not responsible for his behavior, sexual contact with whom is punishable in all cases with a punishment slightly more lenient than for the first age category;
- From 16 to 18 years old - a minor, almost fully responsible for his actions, sexual contact with whom by consent is permissible by law, but in some cases can also be punished under the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.
In order for actions of a sexual nature to be qualified under Article 134 or Article 135, consent to sexual contact or other indecent acts on the part of the minor is required.
Features of the crime
The following can be considered objective signs of child molestation:
- bodily touching of a sexual nature;
- words that encourage sexual intercourse;
- sexual positions;
- distribution of literature containing sexually explicit information.
If in order to qualify such a crime as seduction of a minor, the perpetrator must be 16 years old at the time of committing the crime, then in case of molestation the age limits increase. In this case, the offender must be at least 18 years old, since molestation is a crime that can only be committed by an adult.
It is also important that when molesting, the offender must have direct intent to commit unlawful acts. There will be no crime in the actions of the perpetrator if he did not realize that he was entering into a sexual relationship with a person under 16 years of age.
Art. 134 – Sexual contact with a minor
The article provides for punishment for sexual contacts with minors and minors . In order for a crime to be classified in this way, an unambiguous composition of the criminal act is needed.
So, the following signs must be present:
- The crime was committed by an adult citizen;
- The offender must know the age of the victim and have direct intent to commit a criminal act;
- The sexual experience of the victim does not matter;
- Actions of a sexual nature were committed by mutual consent;
- Once sexual acts begin, the crime will be considered completed.
The article regulates not only opposite-sex sexual contacts, but also same-sex ones.
Punishment under Art. 134 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation
Even though the actions are not classified as violent, the punishment for them is quite severe. It is possible to get a real prison term for this. So, let's look at how many years they give for seducing minors.
Sexual contact with a teenager under 16 years of age is punishable by one of the following options:
- Mandatory work up to 480 hours;
- Restriction of freedom up to 4 years;
- Forced labor for up to 4 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or perform certain activities for up to 3 years;
- Imprisonment for up to 4 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or perform certain actions for up to 10 years.
Same-sex contact with a teenager under 16 years of age is punishable by:
- Forced labor for up to 5 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or perform certain activities for up to 3 years;
- Imprisonment for up to 6 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or perform certain actions for up to 10 years.
Same-sex or opposite-sex contact with a teenager from 12 to 14 years old is punishable by:
- Imprisonment from 3 to 10 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for up to 15 years and with or without restriction of freedom for up to 2 years.
Crimes committed against two or more victims:
- Imprisonment from 6 to 15 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for up to 20 years.
Crimes committed by conspiracy by a group of persons:
- Imprisonment from 12 to 20 years with or without the right to engage in certain activities or be in a certain position for up to 20 years with or without restriction of freedom for up to 2 years.
If a crime is committed by a person previously convicted specifically for such acts, he may be imprisoned for a term of 15 to 20 years.
If the defendant and the victim, who have reached the age of 16, enter into a legal marriage, the defendant will be released from punishment.
The legislator provides for the impossibility of applying punishment in the form of imprisonment in relation to a person whose age does not exceed 4 years over the age of the injured party.
That is, it is impossible to unequivocally answer the question of how old child seduction is considered to be . Even though the legislator sets the limit at 16 years, criminal liability can be brought before the age of 18.
Age of consent
It is important to understand that, as it is popularly called, the article for seduction of minors also provides for such a concept as the age of sexual consent.
It is defined as the age limit at which a person (even a minor) can decide whether to engage in sexual intercourse or abstain from it.
Under the criminal article in Russian legislation, criminal punishment is provided mainly for communication with a person who has not reached the age of 16.
The age from 16 to 18 is protected at the legislative level only in a situation where intimate services were provided for money - and it does not matter whether promised or real.
If various sexual harassments were carried out against children 12 years old, then this fact is considered an aggravating circumstance, which, in turn, leads to a more stringent and severe sentence in court.
The age difference between people also matters . If it is less than 4 years, then imprisonment will not be imposed if:
- Sex was with a minor under 14 years of age.
- The actions were lewd, but not violent.
Art. 135 – Depraved acts
Depraved acts do not involve direct sexual contact with the victim, but have a clear sexual connotation.
Just like a crime under Art. 134, indecent acts as a crime must be committed by a person who has reached the age of 18, with direct intent to commit a crime.
The object of the crime is the sexual integrity of the victim; his desire and previous sexual life do not matter.
Depraved acts may include the following:
- Demonstration of genital organs;
- Exposing the victim at his request;
- Showing pornography;
- Correspondence of an obscene nature on the Internet;
- Indecent touching;
- Sexual conversations in the presence of children, etc.
Punishment under Art. 135 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation
Depraved acts against a teenager under 16 years of age are punishable by:
- Mandatory work up to 440 hours;
- Restriction of freedom up to 3 years;
- Forced labor for up to 5 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or engage in certain activities for up to 3 years;
- Imprisonment for up to 3 years with or without the right to engage in a specific field of activity or hold specific positions for up to 10 years.
Indecent acts against a minor from 12 to 14 years of age:
- Imprisonment from 3 to 8 years with or without the right to engage in certain activities or hold a specific position for up to 15 years with or without restriction of freedom for up to 2 years.
Depraved acts against several victims:
- Imprisonment from 5 to 12 years with or without the right to hold positions and engage in specific activities for up to 20 years.
The commission of this type of act by a group of persons entails liability:
- Imprisonment from 7 to 15 years with or without the right to hold certain positions or conduct certain activities for up to 20 years with or without restriction of freedom for up to 2 years.
A person previously convicted of crimes against sexual integrity may be punished for a new episode with imprisonment from 10 to 15 years.
Confrontations and examinations
Confrontations with the victim (victim) or with their parents can be very important, during which you also have the right to use the help of a defense lawyer (short consultations are allowed) when choosing the necessary wording, questions, etc.
Also, in this type of criminal cases, comprehensive psychological and psychiatric examinations are always carried out on the accused, when familiarizing yourself with the purpose of which, you should always request the presence of your defense attorney during its conduct, since the conclusion of this examination can also be decisive.
This examination is carried out, among other things, to establish whether the accused has deviation in the sexual sphere, to establish a possible anomaly in preferences when choosing a sexual partner, etc.
Arbitrage practice
Problems in applying Art. 134 and art. 135 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation in 2022 lie largely in the plane of the correct classification of the crime.
Sexual integrity also appears as an object of crime in rape. Therefore, law enforcement agencies must accurately determine whether the victim was forced to take such actions, or whether he voluntarily agreed to them.
As a rule, there are no clear witnesses to what happened in such cases . Therefore, only the testimony of the victim is taken into account in the basis for qualifying the fact of pressure.
Situations often occur when a defendant is imprisoned for sexual intercourse, and after serving his sentence, he marries the victim, and they have a family. This is a family tragedy. The legislator, unfortunately, has provided for the possibility of marriage only for persons over 16 years of age.
A large series of legal clarifications on these crimes contains the Resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court under Art. 134, art. 135 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation No. 16.
It contains a ban on the use of conditional punishment in relation to persons who have committed sexual intercourse with a teenager under 14 years of age, as well as the specifics of the application of parole for such criminals.
The courts and law enforcement agencies must necessarily establish the fact of the sanity of such a defendant and whether he has a tendency towards pedophilia.
If certain inclinations are established, medical measures should also be applied to the criminal.
A criminal offense is not always of a violent nature. Today, due to the expansion of personal freedom of adolescents, the availability of the Internet and the development of tolerance towards sexual minorities, many children begin to grow up early.
Unfortunately, not many of them know that even for voluntary sexual acts their partners can be severely punished in accordance with criminal law.
The Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, unlike public life and world trends, did not expand the boundaries of teenage permissiveness.
Extenuating circumstances
As in any other case, there may be mitigating, not just aggravating, circumstances.
So, for example, in addition to the already listed options, when the article can be milder, or even abolished, mitigating situations include situations where the appearance of a minor may not objectively coincide with his passport data.
Modern youth grows and matures quite quickly, due to which it is now not always possible to distinguish a 14-year-old girl from an 18-year-old.
Again, this option can only work if the relationship was voluntary and by mutual consent, and not for some individual material benefits, and certainly not in the form of violence.
If we look at international practice, there are also certain articles that provide for the responsibility of adults for sexual relations with children.
And everywhere, on average, the figure of 14-16 years appears as the age of consent. Everyone who is below the age of 14 is considered a minor.
Legislation everywhere strictly refers to the sexual integrity of children and diligently protects it.
Parents should also communicate with their children to keep their age of consent internally higher. After all, they will still have time to experience all the delights of adult life.
And sex, even by mutual desire at the age of 16, does not bring anything good for health . After all, the body is simply not ready for it yet.
