MOSCOW, July 16 (RIA Novosti) A group of Russian lawmakers hope to cut the use of the criminal justice system to pressure businesses by requiring that a complaint be filed before investigators can open criminal cases for economic crimes, a Russian business daily reported on Friday.
Vedomosti said the deputies from the pro-Kremlin United Russia party believe the amendments to the Criminal Code would help to prevent corporate raids.
Although they admit the changes have little chance of becoming law, they say the bill could be submitted to the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, as early as next week.
The amendments are intended for the article 20 of the code, which stipulates that a prosecution may be public, private-public and private. In a public prosecution, a criminal case can be opened based on the results of an investigation or a police report following a raid on a business.
The State Duma committee on legislation Deputy Chairman Vladimir Gruzdev said that new bill stipulates that a complainant is needed in cases of fraud, embezzlement, obstruction of business activities, falsification of unified state register of legal entities, money laundering and evasion and some other economic crimes.
Some experts believe the draft law is unlikely to get to a first reading, while its supporters admit it has little chance of being adopted as it would contradict a law on investigative activities entitling police to initiate criminal cases without a complainant.
The Russian government has moved to limit official abuse of legislation covering economic crimes. A law banning confinement for suspected tax dodgers came into force in January 2010. Suspects who face tax evasion charges for the first time or paid their arrears can now avoid prosecution.
In April, President Dmitry Medvedev signed into law amendments to legislation on economic crimes that are intended to increase the use of bail for suspects awaiting trial and cut abuse of the system whereby officials attempted to pressure suspects by keeping them in pretrial detention for extended periods.
He has also proposed updating the law on money laundering, a vaguely formulated article in the criminal code that has allowed law-enforcers to arbitrarily interpret offences committed by businessmen.
Medvedev, who portrays himself as a young and technologically savvy leader, is seeking to improve the economic environment in the country and create incentives for domestic businesses to switch to a knowledge-based and innovative economy.
He has repeatedly urged law-enforcers to abandon the practice of numerous checks and inspections on companies, especially small and medium business, widely seen as an instrument to extort money from entrepreneurs or remove competitors in an unfair way.
Russia was ranked 146th of 180 in the Transparency International Corruption Perceptions Index 2009, below countries like Nigeria and Ecuador. It moved up one place from 2008, when it was ranked 147th.
