Some problems of making a procedural decision to close criminal proceedings in connection with the release of a person from criminal liability

In judicial practice, there are situations when, as of the day of the decision of the appellate court, the statute of limitations for bringing the accused to criminal responsibility has expired, and the defense does not take the initiative to release the person from criminal liability. Accordingly, the court in no way responds to the existence of this circumstance and does not decide on the application (non-application) of the grounds contained in paragraph 1 of Part 2 of Article. 284 of the CPC, or another, to make a procedural decision to close the criminal proceedings. Therefore, the aim is to try to answer the question of which of the procedural decisions, under the described conditions and circumstances, should be made by the court: to close the criminal proceedings in connection with the release of a person from criminal liability or a person should be released in the court of cassation from punishment? Due to the applied formal-logical method and systematic analysis, it was found that Part 2 of Art. 284 of the CPC concerns cases of closing criminal proceedings exclusively by the court. It was stated that in paragraph 1 of this part of the article, among the grounds for closing the criminal proceedings, the legislator provides and “...in connection with the release of a person from criminal liability.” At the same time, it has been proven that the right of a person to be released from criminal liability, if there are grounds for it, judges often do not depend on their own duty to explain to a person such a right so that he can use it. It is established that the responsibilities enshrined in Art. 285 of the CPC apply not only to courts of first instance, but also to appellate instances. Research methods such as sampling, system-structure, induction and deduction have been used to argue that in circumstances where a court conviction has entered into force, a person should be exempt from the court of cassation, this is stated in Part 5 of Art. 74 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, on the grounds provided for in Art. 49 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. At the same time, it is proved that the court has hindered the adoption of such a procedural decision by the approach that the legislator laid down in the construction of paragraph 1, part 2 of Art. 284, art. 440 of the CCP

Organized crime: current Ukrainian realities and steps to prevent

Purpose. The purpose of this research is to review extreme approaches to understanding organized crime, its components and signs, as well as to highlight those of them that are modern and inherent to it under the conditions of a large-scale Russian invasion of Ukrainian territory. Method. Induction and deduction are applied when forming author's own conclusions; analysis and synthesis of scientific achievements of a number of researchers, the state of regulatory and legal support. System-structural and functional methods were used in the process of conducting this scientific research.The results. The author is convinced that, as of today, in our country, all illegal activity in the conglomerate of organized crime is not properly accounted for, and this fact is in a cause-and-effect relationship with the established fact that a single legislative and/or doctrinal definition of the concept of "organized "crime" does not exist, as well as its exhaustive components and signs. Their list was expanded and modernized through analysis and synthesis.It has been proven that with the beginning of the full-scale invasion of the Russian aggressor on Ukrainian territory, the problems of organized crime changed somewhat and some of its components became more acute, in particular, despite the fact that as of February 2022 there was a certain "slowing down" of its spread and influence, it was established that on today its new networks "bloomed". The "merger" of transnational criminal organizations with international terrorist organizations has been tracked, especially with regard to the activities of Russian organized crime in the war with Ukraine. Scientific novelty. A significant amount of research has been devoted to this problem, but the full-scale invasion of the aggressor country has brought approaches to understanding the declared problem to a new level, when organized crime should be considered through the prism of its institutionalization, fusion with terrorist activities for the benefit of and with the participation of the aggressor country, its spread in the digital spaces for conducting "active military operations" there, etc.Practical significance. It is believed that the results of the research will help to understand not only the scale of modern organized crime, but also individual author's generalizations and conclusions can shed light on how to counteract it