The Federal Bailiff Service has launched a large-scale operation to identify persistent defaulters of fines for traffic violations. Bailiffs are on duty at stationary traffic police posts, forcing defaulting drivers to pay their debts under the threat of having their car seized. Lawyers point out that the actions of bailiffs to collect unpaid fines may be illegal.

The Federal Bailiff Service (FSSP) has launched a nationwide campaign to identify non-payers of fines for violating traffic rules. The inspection, which began this week, affected the Ryazan, Altai, Yaroslavl, and Moscow regions. In the Leningrad region, raids will be carried out until the end of December. Identification of non-payers of traffic fines occurs right at the traffic police post, where bailiffs are on duty. “The car is stopped to check documents, the driver is invited to the post building,” Alexander Gara, head of the press service of the FSSP department of the Moscow region (where the operation took place on Wednesday), explained to Kommersant. “After this, the driver is checked against the database for unpaid fines. Then the inspector issues a resolution about the need for payment, transfers it to the bailiffs, who order enforcement proceedings, and is asked to pay the fine on the spot. If the driver refuses to pay the fine, the bailiffs have the right to seize property, the value of which is commensurate with the cost of the unpaid fines, for example, a radio or spare tire."

In the Frunzensky district of the Leningrad region, where the inspection took place yesterday, for example, a car was seized for non-payment of a fine. “We offered one of the drivers, against whom 18 traffic violation orders totaling 19 thousand rubles were issued, to pay them, but the driver refused,” said Svetlana Chaika, senior bailiff of the Frunzensky district. “An act of arrest of the car was drawn up, and its owner promised to find the money and pay. As soon as the driver brings the receipt of payment, he is again free to dispose of his property." “The car can be seized only as an interim measure and with proportionate damage if the person does not pay,” Igor Komissarov, head of the FSSP press service, confirmed to Kommersant.

“The only thing that bailiffs can do according to the law is to temporarily prohibit registration of cars,” Viktor Travin, head of the Moscow Collegium for the Legal Protection of Motorists, commented on these actions to Kommersant. “The rest is an abuse of official authority.” Lawyer Natalya Barshchevskaya confirmed that “first of all, cash is subject to confiscation, then bank accounts and only then property, in particular a car, and the interim measure should be determined exclusively by the court.”

“This whole action is doubtful,” says Mr. Travin. “There may not be information about payment of the fine: the receipt may not have reached the traffic police by mail. The driver has a presumption of innocence.” In addition, according to him, bailiffs can demand payment of a fine only if the statute of limitations for the offense has not expired: after a year it ceases to be valid. In this case, a protocol on non-payment of a fine can only be issued by the traffic police department that fined the driver for the first time, and enforcement proceedings must be initiated by bailiffs at the driver’s place of residence.

Let us remind you that this is not the first such operation of the FSSP. Earlier, the head of the St. Petersburg department of the service, Artur Parfenchikov, announced his intention not to release malicious debtors from Russia, including defaulters of alimony and interest on bank loans (Kommersant reported this on December 20). “This is pre-New Year’s banditry,” says the head of the Freedom of Choice motorists’ movement. “Apparently, the FSSP simply needs to achieve the planned indicators by the end of the year, and someone decided that this can be done at the expense of the drivers.”

Ivan Kommersant-Buranov, Ekaterina Kommersant-Savina; Maxim Kommersant-Kirillov, St. Petersburg

The bailiffs took to the road