Criminal legal basis for an expedited trial procedure provided by the chapter 40 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code

The subject of study is the criminal-legal basis for an expedited procedure for adopting a court ruling when the accused person agrees with the charge. These issues are relevant, since in July 2020 the substantive legal basis of the expedited procedure in Russia was changed and now this procedure can only be applied in criminal cases of small and medium gravity.

The aim of this work is to study the substantive legal basis of an expedited procedure of litigation from the point of view of the changes were made to it. The author expresses the thesis that the legislators did not quite reasonably link criminal-legal grounds of the expedited procedure with the system of categories of crimes.

The methodology. The author used general scientific methods (dialectical, historical, methods of formal logic, system analysis) as well as method of formal legal interpretation of Russian Criminal Code and judicial decisions of Russian courts.

The main results, scope of application. The criminal and legal basis of certain criminal procedure is a package of criminal law standards, for the implementation of which a certain criminal and procedural form is intended. The parameters of the substantive basis of criminal proceedings are set with the signs that shall be indicated in the Code of Criminal Procedure and may change. It directly refers to the expedited procedure for adopting a court ruling, by Chapter 40 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code. Initially, it was assumed that the application of this procedure is permissible in criminal cases concerning crimes the punishment for which does not exceed 5 years imprisonment in accordance with the Russian Criminal Code. The expedited court proceedings began to be applied in criminal cases concerning crimes, the punishment for which does not exceed 10 years imprisonment in accordance with the Russian Criminal Code, since 2003. The Russian Supreme Court made an attempt to reduce the application of court proceedings provided by Chapter 40 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code in 2019. It turned out to be successful. Legislators have changed the basic criterion that determines the substantive basis for an expedited procedure for adopting a court ruling. Now the system of categories of crimes is this basis. The system of categories of crimes presented in Article 15 of the Russian Criminal Code is not stable enough and is based on a set of provisions of this Code, but the sanctions for many crimes are not scientifically and practically grounded in this Code. In addition, the classification of crimes enshrined in Article 15 of the Russian Criminal Code is based on such a criterion as the nature and degree of public danger of the crime. These categories are among the most complex in the science of criminal law.

Conclusions. The use of categories of crimes as a criterion for determining the criminal legal basis of the expedited procedure for making a court decision significantly complicates the application of the expedited procedure.

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