Criminal liability for illegal transplantation: past, present, future

Abstract

Transplantation of human anatomical materials is an important method of treatment aimed at restoring human health, so improving the criminal law regulation of combating illegal transplantation is certainly important.

This article provides a comprehensive scientific and practical analysis of the formation, development and reform of legislation that provides transplantation of anatomical materials to humans. To do this, the author systematically studied the regulatory legislation in the field of transplantation and the changes that have taken place in it, identified all the changes made to Art. 143 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine during its validity, the impact of these changes on the practice of application of Art. 143 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine.

The study of the legal support of transplantation was conducted through three main stages of transformation of legislation during the independence of Ukraine. This allowed us to draw the following conclusions: 1) the subject of the crimes under Art. 143 today is human anatomical materials. This means that, in addition to human organs or tissues, it covers anatomical formations, human cells and human fetal materials; 2) the systematic change of regulatory legislation in the field of transplantation complicates the establishment of the current procedure and conditions of transplantation of human anatomical materials, and, as a consequence, complicates the detection of signs of illegal transplantation; 3) the current corpus delicti provided in Part 1 of Art. 143 of the Criminal Code, is material, which requires the establishment, in addition to the act, socially dangerous consequences (significant harm to the victim) and the causal link between the act and the consequence; 4) the subjective side of the crime provided by part 1 of Art. 143 of the Criminal Code, from the moment of adoption of the Criminal Code of Ukraine until December 28, 2019, both intentional and negligent violation of the statutory procedure for transplantation of human anatomical materials was criminally punished, and from December 29, 2019, the act can only be intentional and the attitude to consequences only negligent; 5) since the adoption of the Criminal Code of Ukraine and until now, the legislator has twice increased the penalties for crimes under Art. 143 of the Criminal Code. In the final case, the penalty was increased for all sanctions under Art. 143 of the Criminal Code without exception.