CONCEPT OF PUNISHMENT IN THE CRIMINAL LEGISLATION OF RUSSIA

This article examines methodological and legal and technical issues of the legislative definition of the concept of punishment in the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. It is proved that the normative concept of this measure of an angular-legal character is complex-structured, branched, and its signs are dispersed in the set of normative prescriptions of the General and Special Parts of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The author substantiates the provision that justice can not be oriented simultaneously to several purposes of punishment without harm to the process of taking a judicial decision, since the goals listed in the criminal law and inadmissibility can not be fully realized simultaneously. It is shown that the content of the general concept of punishment can be filled with different meanings and can not be formulated in the criminal law absolutely and unequivocally. Hence, the legislative definition of the concept of punishment must be formal. Formally define criminal punishment means to indicate in the law its scope (that is, the form of the concept). It is suggested to define the concept of punishment first of all by establishing and formulating in the criminal law a system of principles for applying this measure of state coercion (the principle of legitimacy is no punishment without a crime, the principle of legality is no punishment without law, the principle of publicity – punishment is applied only on behalf of the state on the verdict of the court, the principle of guilty responsibility is punishable only by a person convicted of a crime, the principle of proportionate liability is that it is not possible to be punished twice for the same thing, the principle of humanity – penalty may not be designed to cause physical suffering or degradation; etc.), and the general principles of its use. The legislative definition of punishment should also be reflected in the General and Special Parts of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation by designating specific types of criminal punishment and determining the measure of each of them with the establishment of clear limits to its application. Attention is drawn to the fact that the procedure and conditions for execution and serving of sentences are regulated by the criminal-executive legislation of the Russian Federation; this circumstance means that the essential properties and relations of the notion of punishment are displayed in the adjacent (criminal) legislation.