Delineation of an attempted murder from crimes with related corpus delicti in cases of domestic violence

Introduction. A team of scientists from St. Petersburg State University, with the support of the Russian Science Foundation, carries out a set of studies within the framework of the project “Legal regulation of countering domestic violence in the Russian Federation”. A separate block monitors studies of the practice of applying criminal legislation in cases of domestic violence. One of the monitoring studies is devoted to the analysis of the application of Art. 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. Research methods. According to a random sample, 69 judicial acts on murder cases issued by the first instance courts of the Russian Federation during the period 2020-2023 and posted in the public domain, were studied. Results. In the course of the study, it was found that the greatest difficulties in qualifying domestic murders is the question of delineation of an attempted murder from crimes with related modus operandi, and the main problem is the assessment of the direction of the perpetrator's intent. According to the results of the study, the authors concluded that additional clarifications of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation are necessary: 1) it should be pointed out that positive behaviour at the stage of the completed attempted murder should be regarded as post-criminal behaviour; 2) it is advisable to emphasise the situation of the completed attempted murder in the case when there is a commission of actions in which the perpetrator foresees the inevitability of death. It makes sense to give examples of such actions: striking with the help of weapons or objects replacing them, blows to the area of vital organs (head, neck, heart area), etc.; 3) it is also required to indicate that the very fact of committing such actions, if death has not occurred, is qualified as an attempted murder, regardless of the subsequent behaviour of the perpetrator (including the termination of actions aimed at depriving life, providing assistance to the victim).