PROTECTION OF THE RIGHTS AND LEGITIMATE INTERESTS OF LEGAL PERSONS IN CRIMINAL PROCEEDINGS: A CORRELATION OF CRIMINAL LAW, CRIMINAL PROCEDURE AND FORENSIC ASPECTS

The transformation of the status and role of legal persons in modern civil society as one of the consequences of global social and economic reforms of the post-Soviet period brought about a need for strengthening the guarantees of protecting the rights and legitimate interests of legal persons. The guarantees of protecting legal persons against criminal infringements are very important in this case. The lawmakers have done an enormous amount of work in this sphere: the norms of the Special Part of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation contain a considerate number of crimes whose characteristic features are infringements on the rights and legitimate interests of legal persons, while the norms of the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation make it possible to recognize not only a physical, but also a legal person as a victim. The authors describe some criminal-istically relevant features of subjects who are likely to commit crimes against the property or business reputation of legal persons, depending, among other things, on the existence or absence of official legal relations (civil law, labor) between legal persons and the subjects of crime. As for the extensive scientific discussion on the introduction of the institute of criminal liability of legal persons into Russian criminal legislation, the authors side with the opponents (at least, at the present stage) of such an innovation. At the same time, they stress that it is absolutely necessary to look for the ways to improve the effectiveness of counteracting criminal infringements against legal persons. The authors believe that an effective way to resolve this problem could be the development of a complex methodology of investigating crimes against legal persons. The theoretical and methodological basis of this scientific sphere, its main ideas (its concept) make it possible to identify and systematize general regularities of the mechanism of criminal actions in this sphere; a good understanding of these regularities will help develop a complex of methodical and criminalistic recommendations that meet the requirements of the legal science and the investigation and court practice.