Holiday Amnesty and Everyday Problems

September 1 saw the end of the initial stage in the amnesty timed to coincide with the tenth anniversary of Ukrainian independence. Although the second stage of adapting the former convicts to society has only begun, the amnesty has given rise to controversy. Thus, in early September, Lviv Oblast State Administration Staff Director Mykola Lazurkevych said that the amnesty has led to problems as pardoned former convicts tend to produce a negative effect on the criminal world. Law enforcement officials attribute the 15% increase in the Lviv oblast crime rate during the last week of August directly to the amnesty. Meanwhile, not a single one of those recently freed from prisons have been detained by police, State Penal Department Assistant Director Mykhailo Verbensky states. He considers such a situation is typical: only 0.9% of those freed during the last amnesty have been sentenced to new prison terms. Mr. Verbensky said that in the course of the amnesty over 61,000 cases were reviewed and 28,818 prisoners released. Of these, 15,349 prisoners were conditionally released on three years probation, meaning that they will be supervised by corrections labor inspection officials and the police. In addition, another 28,000 of those sentenced conditionally or with deferred sentences have been amnestied. These people, Verbensky told The Day, were found guilty of petty crimes and, as such, were entitled to an amnesty under the Ukrainian law On Amnesty. Incidentally, such a large number of petty criminals is evidence of the fact that Ukrainian courts are too zealous sentencing people to prison terms, Chairman of the Board of the non- governmental Donetsk Memorial civil rights protection organization maintains.

On average 7000 people receive prison sentences every month, he says. “In past years, an amnesty would take up to three months to complete and there were cases when more prisoners were sent to penitentiaries than were released during the period. Amnesties made it possible to cut on the prison population. This year, I think, places vacated by amnestied offenders will be filled fairly soon, in three to four months. And the major reason for this is that Ukrainian courts continue to operate in the same way, dispatching to prisons every 37 of those 100 sentenced for criminal offenses. In civilized countries this rate is substantially lower, 5-10%, rarely reaching 20%.” Simultaneously, Mr. Bukalov notes, by declaring the amnesty the state merely cuts costs wasted by its ineffectual and ill-considered judicial policy. According to him, quite often the material damage inflicted by the crime is many times smaller than what the state spends on the maintenance of convicts for one, two, or three years. Of the 7000 sentenced to prison terms every month (or 84,000 a year), about 4000 (or 50,000 a year) receive prison sentences of up to three years. In other words, they are punished for petty crimes for which the offender need not necessarily go to prison, with public money spent for their upkeep. There are kinds of punishment other than terms in prison, such as conditional sentences, fines, with more non-prison kinds of punishment envisioned as of September 1 by the new Criminal Code — restricted freedom, public service, etc. These kinds of punishment can well turn out to be a major means of saving government and public money.

According to Verbensky, however, the purpose of the amnesty was not to deal with prison overcrowding. Its purpose was to humanize the treatment of individuals, on condition, of course, prisoners were sentenced for minor crimes and mend their ways. Amnesty, Bukalov stressed, is different from pardon or conditional early release in that a convict is released not due to his own efforts like repentance, expiation of guilt, compensation of damages inflicted, or good behavior. Under amnesty, a convict is released on a formal pretext, that the Criminal Code article under which he was sentenced is subject to amnesty and his/her conduct in prison was good. Still, Bukalov believes that amnesty is an obsolete and ineffective means of making society safe. He maintains that the benefits from amnesty today are all short-lived. It has no positive or significant effects either on the crime rate or public safety. An all important truth remains, it is not enough to release a person from prison: the state has to create conditions for this person’s normal functioning in society. It should be noted that those amnestied have it easier than those released after a full sentence, as the former, doing shorter terms, can better preserve their social links. Still, the problem of finding jobs for them is quite acute. Although local employment agencies are supposed to take care of ex-convicts under the law on amnesty, they do not have any real leverage over employers to help the bulk of those released. This is evidenced by the fact that a mere 3000 of those amnestied have found employment. Moreover, given our high unemployment levels, there is a danger that for both objective and subjective considerations, employers will be in no hurry to offer available jobs to former prisoners. Thus, by declaring a war on crime the state simultaneously stimulates crime by its inertia in solving some vital issues. It is this very inertia that breads recidivism. Based on these arguments, Bukalov said, introducing new kinds of punishment in place of incarceration is an urgent necessity.