Andrushko A. Crimes against freedom, honor and dignity of a person (criminal law and criminological research)

The dissertation investigates the current state of research of problems of counteraction to crimes against freedom, honor and dignity of a person, considers the main stages of formation and development of the legislation on criminal liability for the specified encroachments, conducts a comparative legal study of the system of crimes against freedom, honor and dignity of a person under the criminal law of Ukraine and foreign countries; characterizes material and subjective elements of crimes under Section III of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, develops proposals to improve them; reveals problematic aspects of differentiation of criminal responsibility for crimes against freedom, honor and dignity of a person; considers peculiarities of the implementation of criminal responsibility for these crimes and identifes promising directions for improvement of the process; determines the contemporary state and identifies major trends in crimes against freedom, honor and dignity; develops the criminological profiles of the persons who have committed the specified crimes; established the system of scientific knowledge about the general patterns and features of determination of crimes against freedom, honor and dignity of a person; defines perspective directions of prevention of the specified crimes. The dissertation substantiates that the dignity of a person as an object of protection by criminal law should be derived from the category of human dignity – the objective value of an individual as a biosocial being. The dissertation proves that the object of enforced disappearance should be the security of mankind, not the freedom, honor, and dignity of a person, and therefore substantiates the expediency of moving the article on liability for this act to section XX of the Special Part of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. It is substantiated in the dissertation that the abduction of a person presupposes the establishment of control over a person (and not the seizure or withdrawal of a person) and relocation of a person outside the place where he/she stayed on his/her own free will. It is proved that the detention of a person in the event of a person’s abduction begins not after a person’s removal from the place where he/she was, in the place where he/she does not want to be, but from the moment the control over a person is established and lasts until the release of a person (i.e. all stages of abduction are characterized by a common element – detention of a person). It is argued that there is no reason for the traditional conclusion in the legal literature that abduction poses a greater public danger compared to the “regular” unlawful deprivation of freedom. In this regard, the dissertation justifies the separation of abduction in a separate article of the Criminal Code of Ukraine will not improve law enforcement practice, but on the contrary – will complicate it. The dissertation substantiates that there is a significant shortcoming in art. 151 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, namely the lack of indication on the punishability of illegal placement in a psychiatric institution of persons suffering from a mental disorder but not requiring hospitalization in such an institution. It is argued that the understanding of the illegality of placement (hospitalization) in a psychiatric institution only as placement of an obviously mentally healthy person to such institutions, not only does not fully comply with the provisions of the Law of Ukraine “On Psychiatric Care”, but also seriously complicates the application of this rule in practice, unreasonably narrows limits of its application. The dissertation argues that the best solution for problems of criminal law combating against different forms of exploitation of a person is constructing the general composition of coercion to perform certain actions because that is coercion which is a defining characteristic of exploitation. It has been established that almost every tenth case of trafficking in human beings in Ukraine concerns the trafficking of children by their parents. The criminological features of persons who trade in their children are determined, the determination complex of the specified encroachments is clarified, the system of the measures directed on prevention of such encroachments is developed.