Annotation

This article examines the admissibility of applying pretrial detention as a preventive measure to a suspect or accused of committing a minor crime for which imprisonment is not provided, who has absconded from the investigating authorities, taking into account the legal position of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, formulated in its Ruling No. 44-P of June 30, 2026. A legal mechanism for applying this measure of procedural coercion is formulated that meets the requirements of legal certainty. Given that the decision on the possible imprisonment of a person who has committed a minor crime for the first time depends on the presence of aggravating circumstances in the offense (Part 1 of Article 56 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation), the authors propose amending Article 63 of the Criminal Code. Arguments are presented that an attempt by the person committing the crime to evade the preliminary investigation and the court should be recognized as an aggravating circumstance. This solution, firstly, creates the legislative preconditions for implementing the general principles of sentencing, in terms of taking into account the information about the perpetrator's identity that the court has at its disposal when passing the sentence; secondly, it establishes grounds for the application of coercive measures that are consistent with criminal procedural doctrine and ensure the achievement of the objectives of criminal proceedings.