Termination of criminal prosecution under Part 4 of Art. 210 of the Criminal Code

Situation

The manager of the company was detained on suspicion of committing a crime (theft) under Part 4 of Art. 210 of the Criminal Code. The sanction of the article provides for criminal punishment from 5 to 12 years of imprisonment.

Work process

The attorney has advised the client, has helped to develop tactics for defense against criminal prosecution and accompanied the client during investigative actions at the Investigative Committee of the Republic of Belarus.

Result

The client’s actions were first reclassified from Part 4 of Article 210 of the Criminal Code to a softer standard – Part 3 of Article 211 of the Criminal Code. And then they were once again reclassified to Part 2 of Article 211 of the Criminal Code. A more lenient article has been made it possible to apply the procedure of exemption from criminal liability with administrative liability to the client.

The court's decision

Refusal to initiate criminal proceedings on fraud against an entrepreneur

Situation

A verbal agreement was concluded between the client and his acquaintance, according to which the client promised to organize construction work in a country house. The client has received more than 2 million Russian rubles. The acquaintance considered that the work had not been completed, and turned to the police with a statement about fraud.
The audit has been lasting 8 months. Construction and technical expertise was appointed.
According to the conclusion of the construction and technical expertise, the cost of the work was significantly less than the amount of money transferred. The client was threatened with the initiation of a criminal case under Art. 209 of the Criminal Code “Fraud”.

Work process

Attorney actions:
1. Studying the expert’s opinion. After studying the estimate of construction work attached to the expert’s opinion, it was revealed that when determining the cost of construction work, the expert did not take into account part of the work performed on behalf of the customer. When taken into account, the total cost of construction work approximately coincided with the amount of cash transferred to the client.
2. A petition has been filed to request additional evidence confirming the fact that the work was performed by the client, which was disputed by the customer.
3. Preparation, instructing the client and his support when giving explanations. During the survey, the attention of police officers was drawn to the fact that the cost of work performed between a client and his acquaintance is regulated by their verbal agreement, and not by price standards in construction. Under the contract, the price of the work was determined significantly higher than the price according to the standards used by the expert when calculating the cost of construction work.

The regional department of internal affairs was agreed with the arguments of the attorney and his client and issued a decision to refuse to initiate a criminal case against the client.

Result

The check in relation to the client was terminated, the initiation of a criminal case was denied.

The court's decision