The concept of "child" in the categorical apparatus of criminal law regulation: concerns of legislative regulation and improvement

Introduction: the author conducts the analysis of the concepts of “child”, “minor”, “children” developed in the current framework, science and practice from the point of view of criminal status, their correlation. The author highlights the necessity of the adoption of legislative measures on legal regulation of relations involving minors, of the development of the unified approach to the understanding of the terms “child”, “minor”, “children”, specifying their age criteria and improvement of the penal law in this area. Materials and Methods: the methodology of the study were general and specific methods of comprehension, particularly dialectical-materialistic, comparative-legal and logical methods, including syntactical analysis of the legal norm. The materials were international documents, Russian framework and scholarly literature of the subject of the study. Results: the author studied in detail the issue of the polysemy of the concept of “child” in international documents and national laws. The results of the analysis of the certain provisions of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation showed that the lawmaker improperly determined the juvenile age using various terms: “child”, “minor”, and “children”. Basing on this gap the author concretized the essence of the concept of “child” in penal law, studied its interrelations with the concepts of “child”, “minor”, and “children”. Discussion and Conclusions: the author presents the concept of “child”, its legislative wording, formulates proposals to improve the provisions of Art. 153, 157 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and the practice of their application by investigative and judicial authorities of the Russian Federation.