MOSCOW, December 20 (RAPSI) – The Supreme Court of Russia has filed a bill introducing a new term, criminal misdemeanor, to the Criminal Code and Criminal Procedure Code, with the State Duma, the database of the lower house of parliament reads.

According to the bill, a criminal offense of a low gravity, which can’t result in a prison term, is to be considered as a criminal misdemeanor.

The chairman of the court’s board on criminal cases Vladimir Davydov said that introduction of this term would affect 80 crimes listed in the Criminal Code. Data accumulated by the court shows that in 2016 over 40,000 people were found guilty of crimes that may be recognized as criminal misdemeanors.

Authors of the bill note that assigning these crimes to criminal misdemeanors may enforce the necessary conditions for exempting persons who committed such acts for the first time from criminal liability.

At the same time, the Supreme Court indicates that if such a person does not realize how humane the treatment shown to him or her was and will evade execution of the court’s decision, he or she may incur criminal liability for this act in full.

A person freed from criminal responsibility on the basis should not be subjected to a legal fine only, because that does not allow a court to fully take into account his or her personality. The Supreme Court offers, along with a fine, to apply measures similar to certain types of punishments not related to the isolation of a convicted person from society like compulsory work and correctional work.

Also, the Supreme Court indicates that the termination of a criminal case or criminal prosecution of a person who has committed a criminal offense will not exclude a victim’s right to compensation for harm caused to him or her as a result of the commission of this act.