Atonement of harm as an indicator of changes in the legal consciousness of the person who committed a credit fraud

Volgograd State University, Department of Criminal Law, Institute of Law, Volgograd, Russia

¹ Corresponding author: s.mkrtchian1992@volsu.

Abstract

The idea of this study is based on the assumption that the reason for the unjustified application of the criminal law provisions on accounting by law enforcement agencies when punishing various variants of positive post-criminal behaviour, which are varieties of atonement of the harm caused by a crime, is a lack of attention to the nature of atonement as one of the indicators of positive changes in the legal consciousness of a person who has committed a crime, that is, an insufficiently thorough assessment of the characteristics of the personality of the perpetrators, the degree of rooting of antisocial attitudes in their minds, as well as the level of assimilation of legal values and ideals of law-abiding behaviour. The purpose of the study is to identify and study the aspects of the content of the term “atonement of harm” in the meaning provided for in clause “k” part 1 of Art. 61 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, taking into account the interpretation of the corresponding varieties of positive post-criminal behavior as an indicator of a change in the legal consciousness of a person who has committed a credit fraud. The study is based on the widespread use of the formal legal research method in conjunction with the philological, systemic and logical methods of interpreting regulations. A comprehensive analysis of the content of various types of atonement of the harm caused by a crime as the indicators of positive changes in the legal consciousness of a person who committed credit fraud was carried out for the first time. The results of this study can be used to improve the practice of application of criminal-legal means of accounting for positive post-criminal behavior in the form of atonement when imposing punishment not only on credit fraudsters, but also on persons who have committed other crimes. The author’s concept of the criteria that form the content of the varieties of making amends is presented herein.