Crimes Against Human Life and Health: Quantitative and Qualitative Indicators for 2013-2019

Abstract

The article deals with the issue of the criminological characterization of crimes against life and health of a person. In the focus of the study are quantitative and qualitative indicators of this crime type in the period 2013-2019. Quantitative and qualitative measurements of crime serve as one of the main guidelines both for the correction of the introduced prevention measures and for the search for new and more effective ways of counteraction, and therefore should be a constant object of systematic criminological surveillance. 2013-2014 were marked by an escalation of quantitative and qualitative measurements of crimes against life and health, and 2015-2019 were marked by further stabilization of slightly reduced indicators. Crimes against the life and health, and especially their violent segment, which has reached 96% in the last seven years, are characterized by a high degree of public danger. The article provides the data on the level of crimes and persons who committed them, the coefficients that characterize the criminal activity of the population, and the intensity of crimes of this type in Ukraine. The author analyzes the structure of crimes, including the structure of the relevant groups of crimes. The study has revealed the stability of the key structural indicators of crimes against human life and health (84 % are crimes against health, 14.3 % – crimes against life, 1.96 % – crimes that endanger the life and health of a person. The most common among them are: premeditated minor bodily injuries (63.7 %), premeditated murders without aggravating and mitigating circumstances (12 %), premeditated moderate bodily injuries (7.2 %), intentional grievous bodily harm (4.9 %), beatings and tortures (3.2 %). The rapid growth of crimes against life and health of a person in 2013-2014 and the increase in the share of their violent segment to almost 100 % indicate not only their home or situational nature but also manifest the importance of the social-political component in their emergence.