Sports crimes: issues of systematic approach, criminalization and qualifications

¹ Omsk Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia, Research Department, Omsk, Russia
² North-West Branch of the Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Education “Russian State University of Justice”, Department of State and Legal Disciplines, St. Petersburg, Russia
³ St. Petersburg Law Institute (branch) of the University of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Russian Federation, Department of Criminal Law, Criminology and Criminal Executive Law, St. Petersburg, Russia
⁴ North-West Branch of the Federal State Budgetary Educational Institution of Higher Education “Russian State University of Justice”, Department of Criminal Law, St. Petersburg, Russia
⁵ Leningrad State University named after A.S. Pushkin, Department of Criminal Law and Procedure, St. Petersburg, Russia

^* Corresponding author: dizer77@mail.ru

Abstract

The study prerequisites are the fragmentation in the current criminal legislation of criminal law standards protecting the field of sports, as well as the issues of criminalization of acts in sports and the qualification of sports crimes. The study aims to solve the issues of systematization of regulatory provisions, the object of which is social relations in sports, taking into account the characteristics of the generic and specific objects, the degree of encroachment danger. The methods included the dialectical method, abstraction, analysis, synthesis, deduction, formal legal method, method of comparative jurisprudence. The results and novelty of the study reside in the conclusions about the advisability of identifying a separate specific object of criminal law protection (social relations in sports), which would systematize related and close acts not only in professional sports but also at all levels of official sports competitions. In this context, the issues of criminalization and qualifications of causing harm to life and health of an individual in violation of the sport rules, exerting unlawful influence on the result of an official sports competition, actions provided for in Art. 230.1 and 230.2 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, as well as the synchronization of the subject of the latter with the subject of Art. 234 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Based on the foregoing, the recommendation of isolating a separate chapter in the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and issuing a separate Resolution of the Plenum of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation on crimes in sports is substantiated. Such measures will be able to optimize the criminal law protection of such an important sphere of public life as sports. In addition, this will make it possible to bring the quality of domestic criminal legislation and sports legislation to the international level and significantly increase the prestige of the Russian Federation.