Ukraine is living through hard times. The difficulties
of the socioeconomic transformation also impact on the system of criminal
code punishments. It has become fashionable to speak about the absence
of true reforms both in the economy and many other spheres of societal
life, including the one in question. The situation looks even clearer and
hence more depressing if we look at the figures.
Donetsk Memorial has recently received the latest statistics
how courts in various regions of Ukraine performed last year. As shown
by the table, which also includes data for the previous two years, this
information makes it possible to draw conclusions about the trends existing
(or absent) in Ukraine’s criminal justice system.
The data given (1998 and 1999 data from the Ministry of
Justice and for 1997 from the State Penitentiary Department) show a tendency
toward reduction of the overall number of convicts by 5-9% annually. Nevertheless,
imprisonment remains the main type of criminal punishment, with its share
still rising. This tendency has been prevalent over the past decade. We
can also say for the sake of comparison that, according to the State Penitentiary
Department data, custodial punishment was meted out to 38,740 people (33.7%
of all those convicted) in 1992 and to 29,372 people (32%) in 1988, while
83,399 were incarcerated in 1999, still an almost threefold increase despite
the declining trend of recent years. The new Criminal Code, which could
allow courts to sentence offenders to punishments other than incarceration,
has not yet been adopted. Nevertheless, the existing criminal code does
make such alternatives possible. Unfortunately, the courts do not strive
to take advantage of even such limited opportunities as they possess. And
while deferred or suspended sentences have slightly increased as a whole,
this still cannot compensate a huge reduction in two years in the imposition
of fines.
The number of convicted teenagers has remained practically
unchanged, the only exception being that slightly fewer minors did time
in 1999 than in previous years. Simultaneously, the absolute number, over
9,000 juvenile delinquents in the past two years, arouses considerable
concern: no one knows how many of them, after serving their term, will
again embark on a life of crime instead of resolutely sticking to the straight
and narrow. And can we, citizens of Ukraine, be sure that our life will
be safer after tens of thousands of youngsters have finished their university
for criminals and return to society?
The number of convicted women, although down slightly in
1999, still remains high: over 67,000 in the past two years.
Perhaps the most alarming of the listed figures is the
number of those sentenced to up to three years, 57- 59%, over the past
few years. This means about 50,000 people annually are incarcerated actually
for minor crimes. Many experts, including those who work in penitentiaries
and have become hostage in a way to the such short-sighted judicial practice,
believe that most of these convicts could do with alternative punishment.
This could have kept intact thousands of families and averted many thousands
of tragedies caused by somebody’s husband, son, father, or mother winding
up behind bars for two or three years. I wish somebody had calculated the
huge losses inflicted on our already poor society by such “justice.” For
quite often the loss these people inflicted is many times less than the
funds required to maintain them in a prison camp for two or three years.
Moreover, there is currently virtually no work in such camps. This means
these people will be practically unable to make up for the loss they caused.
And maintenance of this army of almost 100,000 weighs on the weak shoulders
of the Ukrainian economy and, in the long run, society. It goes without
saying that quite often the offenses these people committed, petty theft,
were caused not by their being hardened criminals but by the absence of
livelihood, desperate existence, and sometimes even the attempt to avoid
starving to death.
The obsolescence of the Ukrainian criminal justice system
and its alienation from people is further characterized by two indicators
listed in the table. First is the abnormally low number of acquittals,
under a thousand a year. This means that if somebody comes under suspicion
and is brought to trial, he is virtually certain to be convicted one way
or another. There is practically no chance of acquittal.
The second sad indicator is the number of death sentences.
Despite this country’s commitment to stay executions as long ago as 1995,
despite the heated public debates over the abolition of capital punishment,
despite the repeated complaints of the Council of Europe about the absence
of progress in Ukraine in this matter, and, finally, despite the suspension
of the execution of death sentences in March 1997, our judges continue,
as if nothing has happened, to sentence 120- 130 people annually to death.
The 1999 data Donetsk Memorial has about some regional
justice departments allow us to compare the work of courts and the severity
of sentences passed by the judges in Ukraine’s three regions: West (Lviv
oblast), East (Donetsk oblast), and also in Chernihiv oblast.
What immediately draws attention is the number of people
sentenced to imprisonment per 100,000 population. Donetsk oblast’s per
capita imprisonment rate is 1.7 times as high as that of Lviv oblast, 1.5
times that of Chernihiv oblast, and 1.25 times that of the national average.
This inexplicable harshness of Donbas judges is also reflected in another
indicator: the proportion of prison sentences out of the total number of
convictions: 42% in Donbas vs. 33-34% in the center and Galicia. Donetsk
oblast also sends more juveniles behind the barbed wire. On the other hand,
offenders in the west and center of Ukraine more often get off with fines.
The probability of actual acquittal is also slightly higher. And the absence
of death sentences in central and western Ukraine in 1999 perhaps testifies
to a greater receptivity of these regions’ judges to its long-overdue and
humane abolition. There are ample grounds to believe that the overwhelming
majority of our 120 death sentences were passed by courts in the eastern
part of this country.
However, by all accounts, all these small differences do
not change the overall pattern of the criminal punishment system in this
country. This system still remains extremely cruel to the individual. It
is not conducive to the reduction of the crime rate in Ukraine. It continues
to be a completely heartless system based on revenge instead of being transformed
into a system whose main function is to provide security for the citizenry.
Thus further delay in the radical reform of this system and in the adoption
of standards prevailing in the Council of Europe states are fraught with
great losses of both a material and moral character for our society.
Table
1997 1998 1999
Total number of criminal convictions 257790 232598 222239
Number of prison sentences 85396 86437 83399
As percentage of total number
of convictions 33.13 37.16 37.53
Deferred sentences as percentage
of total number of convictions 19.4 21.63 22.07
Suspended sentences as percentage
of total number of convictions — 18.72 21.16
Fine as percentage of total number
of convictions 9.04 5.96 3.95
Total juvenile convictions — 18165 17652
As percentage of the total number
of convictions 7.81 7.94
Including those sentenced
to imprisonment — 4945 4444
As percentage of total number
of convictions 5.72 5.33
As percentage of total number
of juvenile convictions 27.2 25.2
Total number of women convicted — 35140 32175
As percentage of total number
of convictions 15.11 14.48
Total prison sentences
of up under one year 13920 12704
From one to two years 15836 15786
from two to three years 19389 20542
Total sentences of up to three years 49145 51061 49032
Sentences of up to three years as
percentage of total convictions 57.5 59.07 58.79
Total acquittals — 884 774
As percentage of total number
of criminal cases 0.343 0.348
Total death sentences 128 131 120
№7 February 29 2000 «The
Day»
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