Defects of the Criminal Law and a Search for Its Optimal Model

Introduction: the article is devoted to the study of the main shortcomings of current criminal legislation and a search for measures to optimize it. Purpose: to identify the main defects of the criminal law that give law enforcement activities of the state the characteristics of irrationality and inefficiency; to propose a concept of the structure of Special part of the criminal law and an effective system of criminal penalties. Methods: axiological, dialectical, and systematic methods of cognizing socio-legal phenomena, the legal-dogmatic method. Results: the severity of criminal law repression aimed at protecting universal (absolute) values relating to the human personality is not sufficient today; fundamental social values interpreted in a rule-of-law democratic state through the concept of human and civil rights and freedoms, first of all human life and health, freedom and security, are currently not the key object of protection by means of criminal law. Conclusions: the repressiveness of the criminal law in the field of personal protection should be increased; the excessive repressiveness of the criminal law itself or of the practice of its application when protecting other values, the harm to which is not irreversible, is counterproductive, irrational, and must be eliminated. The paper proposes a conceptual model of the structure of Special part of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation based on: a) the recognition of the individual as the main object of protection, b) the differentiation of the types of the subjective aspect of corpus delicti. The punishment system proposed is not burdened with unused, irrational, and ineffective punishments, it is based on the application of humane measures that do not involve isolation of a person from society. The paper also presents the author's view on a rational approach to the isolation of criminals who are dangerous because of the acts against the person they have committed.