The Concurrence of Offences in the Criminal Law of Ukraine

Abstract

When assessing the state of studies on the institution of concurrence of offences it needs to be
stressed that generally there have been discussions concerning the qualification of concurrence of
single offences and only a small part of them refers to the theoretical arguments in the discussed field
(especially the problem of the qualification of the concurrence of offences, the distinguishing of types
of concurrence as “ideal – real” etc.). Although the terms “repeated offence”, “concurrence”, “recidivism”
have long been used in the criminal law jurisprudence and have attracted sufficient level of
scholarly attention, their representation in the binding Criminal Code of Ukraine is far from perfect.
The lack of compatibility between the norms defining the above mentioned terms results in
many questions which cannot be unequivocally answered, mostly referring to the criminal law evaluation
of a few acts committed by one person, when each of these acts has the features of a separate
type of offence. The analysis of court practice demonstrates that individual courts make mistakes in
the application of the Criminal Code of Ukraine as far as the concurrence of offences is concerned.
Some of the most prevalent of these are: improper correlation of norms referring to different types
of concurrence; accepting multiplicity of offences in cases where one of the acts has lost its criminal
relevance; improper qualification of repeated offences. At the same time it seems that the institution
of the concurrence of offences can be improved in the future due to the use of the provisions
which refer to: the futility of taking into account the punishment for offences committed by a person
under the age of 18, no matter when (before or after that person turned 18) the conviction for these
offences took place; the problem of recognising the type of concurrence of offences which results
in combining punishments; the problem of taking into account the fact the on offence was repeated
or committed in the conditions for recidivism, when a person had been convicted by the court of
a foreign country.