Review

The article provides a forensic characteristic of official negligence based on an analysis of the legislation of Ukraine regulating official activities, as well as considering the current amendments to Art. 367 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, a study of scientific literature on forensics and criminal procedure.

The purpose of the article is to study the forensic characteristics of official negligence, to identify the forensically significant signs and properties of each element of the forensic characteristics.

The forensic characteristics of official negligence allow us to distinguish this crime from other crimes that can be committed due to a negligent attitude towards one’s official duties. The forensic characteristics of official negligence include such elements as: the identity of the criminal, the subject of the direct criminal offense, the method of committing the criminal offense, the typical trace pattern, the identity of the victim. These elements are interconnected by correlations that reflect the dynamic, «phase» nature, due to the sequential placement of elements in accordance with the sequence of the development of criminal activity.

The identity of the criminal is always an official, mainly a man. The subject of the direct criminal offense of official negligence can be quite diverse, since it is not chosen by the criminal in advance, because the crime is committed out of carelessness. The ways of committing official negligence are combined into two forms: failure to perform official duties due to a dishonest attitude towards them; improper performance of official duties due to a dishonest attitude towards them. Failure to perform official duties is the so-called «pure» inaction, the establishment of which does not cause difficulties, since there is a clear document that provides that a person was obliged to perform certain actions, but he did not perform them. Improper performance of official duties consists in performing actions within the scope of official duties, but not in a way that is required by the goals and objectives of his position. Here it should be established that the duty of an official was not simply to perform certain actions, but namely to enshrine in regulatory documents (law, decree, resolution, order, instruction, etc.) the duty to act in a certain appropriate manner, and the person acted in a different way.

A typical trace picture of official negligence is formed by a set of material and ideal traces. The main source of material traces are documents that reflect information about the duties of the official, as well as the scene of the incident. The main source of ideal traces is work colleagues and random witnesses to the incident.

The identity of the victim is not chosen by the criminal in advance, but must be established during the pre-trial investigation, since official negligence is a crime with a material component and entails certain consequences in the form of damage that can be calculated or the death of a person.

Keywords: official negligence, forensic characteristics, investigation methods, elements of forensic characteristics.