Sit at home!

The taxes suspects have a chance not to get into a pre -trial detention center

Tax anti -terror. President Medvedev took up the liberalization of the fiscal sphere: from January 1, 2010, the rules for the criminal prosecution of malicious non -payers were softened and a ban on the premises of the accused of tax crimes in the investigative isolator was imposed. What will come of it - I found out The New Times
According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, tax crimes are up to 40% of all criminal cases initiated in Russia. In 2009, there were about 3 million such cases, 1.2 million reached the court. Moreover, in half the cases, the sentence appointed by the court was equal to the time actually carried out by the pre -trials in jail.
Before the New Year, the president signed the Federal Law on amendments to the tax, criminal and criminal procedure codes, the purpose of which, according to the authors of the law, “in the termination of the“ tax terror ”of Russian business. * * Explanatory note to project No. 383-FZ. The changes are aimed at facilitating the fate of those who are caught on tax failure or are suspected of this.

Swift changes

Less than a month has passed since the bill in the Duma, November 26, 2009, before its signing by the president, December 29. With such efficiency of economic laws, only the “anti-crisis package” was adopted faster at the end of 2008. The activity of the authorities was not at all connected with the desire to make a business a gift for the New Year. The inadequacy of a tax crime and punishment for him in Russia after the death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky manifested itself with glaring obviousness.
Vladimir Putin had to answer uncomfortable questions at a meeting with foreign investors held on November 24. The Russian authorities clearly did not take into account the installation of Western businessmen who clearly divide the usual criminal and economic crimes and, moreover, are very reverent to human life. Perhaps that is why the corresponding bill entered the Duma two days later: in the conditions of the crisis, the authorities were unlikely to ignore the fact that in 2009 the volume of foreign direct investment in Russia decreased by 48.1% compared to 2008.

Pay, don't sit

From now on, law enforcement agencies can be put in the investigative insulator of a businessman only in four cases: if an entrepreneur does not have a permanent residence in the Russian Federation, if his personality is not established, if he was violated by a previously chosen preventive measure and if he disappeared from preliminary investigation or court bodies. * * Code of Criminal Procedure, Art. 108, p. 1.
Instead of the favorite of the pre -trial advance of the pre -trial detention center, the “soft” form of isolation awaits the pre -trial detention center - house arrest, a ban on departure from the city, a ban on changing their place of residence. Moreover, since 2011, representatives of the Investigative Committee at the prosecutor's office will be engaged in tax crimes.
“The state realized that the good half of the Russian business is under the Damoklov sword of criminal prosecution for tax crimes,” says Nikolai Averchenko, senior lawyer of the Egorov, Puginsky, Afanasyev and partners. - In the Russian tax legislation, many conflicting and confusing norms are laid down, which even from law -abiding taxpayers make potential criminals. To take custody of an entrepreneur who did not commit crimes against the personality and did not engage in anti -state activities, not only inhuman, but also inappropriate. ”
Another innovation applies to those businessmen and individuals whom the state caught on evasion for the first time: they can completely avoid criminal liability, paying arrears, fines and penalties in full.
At the same time, the amount of tax arrears has changed since the New Year, for which criminal liability follows: for individuals it increased six times - from 100 thousand rubles to 600 thousand, for legal - four times, from 0.5 million to 2 million rubles. True, for the middle -sized businessmen, not to mention large companies, this indexation does not change much: “The tax legislation in our Fatherland is so slyly arranged that my enterprise has a stable tax arrears for 2 million rubles,” explains the entrepreneur Mikhail from Chelyabinsk, whose annual turnover of the company is 100 million rubles. - This innovation makes sense for firms operating on a simplified tax scheme. So barbecue, dumplings and hairdressers can breathe more freely, but not companies engaged in industrial production. ”

A step forward

How much will these measures help Russian entrepreneurs to confront the “collision” by competitors and corrupt authorities, including the police? “If there is an order for a businessman, then he will stole him in a pre-trial detention center, where he becomes more accommodating, is still simple: it is enough to add any criminal to an economic article,” explained The New Times Yana Yakovlev, chairman of the non-profit partnership “Business Solder”. “Law enforcement agencies only need to find the informer or the victim from the actions of the entrepreneur - and now he is already sitting under house arrest, but in the investigative insulator.”

Sergey, an entrepreneur from Vladimir, was convicted of 9 years. He left 5, according to parole, was released in December 2009: “In 2004, a partner and I organized a cargo transportation company. Faced with the problem: the cargo was transported, but the money is not paid to us. One entrepreneur owed us more than 800 thousand rubles. We came to his office, talked in high colors. Then he called, the meeting schedule: they say, I want to transfer money. And he came to the meeting with new hours with the functions of sound and video, as it turned out later. I gave us half the money. Before we had time to drive away - cops, handcuffs ... Then this record was presented to us: extortion. " According to Sergey, the police offered to pay off for 300 thousand rubles “from the nose”. The partner did just that - he was released on a recognizance not to leave, and he escaped from Russia: “I had nothing to swim. Then the cops came across, began to dig, found the taxes not yet paid. And I am a general director, with me and demand. Well, he thundered in combination for nine, ”says Sergey.
It is impossible to stop such forms of pressure on business with adopted amendments, according to Yakovlev, the judicial and law enforcement system needs structural reforms: “The new law is a small step forward, under the previous president there wasn’t, but if everything is limited, the situation will not change dramatically. And you need to change it. "
“The issue of initiating a criminal case against the taxpayer is not so simple,” says one of the regions of Russia on the condition of anonymity of the deputy head of the Federal Tax Service of the Federal Tax Service. - It often happens that an unscrupulous businessman, not wanting to pay taxes in full, do not mind using his connections with corrupt officials and policemen for this. Criminal prosecution disciplines entrepreneurs. Do not represent all businessmen honest and law -abiding, but demonize all law enforcement officers. ”
“Tax amendments should be welcomed, they will make life easier for those who fell into the hands of law enforcement officers, since they narrow the field for official abuse,” said Mikhail Gorsta, an expert on tax law from the Higher School of Economics. “But the state needs to clearly understand what law enforcement agencies do: protect the rights of citizens or are engaged in extorting and the realization of the interests of various groups of influence.”