Principle nullum crimen sine lege in the history of Russian criminal law

Introduction: the principle um crimen sine lege was applied by the courts of the Russian Empire and of the USSR in the light of the competition of two interests. The first one, which this principle aims to safeguard, is ensuring of personal freedom - an opportunity to do everything which is not prohibited by the law. The second one is the need to prevent harmful acts which the legislature failed to foresee and criminalize in advance. Purpose: to conduct historical and theoretical research into the application of the principle um crimen sine lege in Russian criminal law; based on the research, to draw conclusions which would be beneficial and important for the contemporary legal practice. Methods: the methodological framework of the research is based on general scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, deduction, induction, comparison, system approach, historical and statistical methods) and specific scientific methods (legal dogmatic, legal comparative, legal historical). Results: both interests - ensuring of personal freedom and the need to prevent harmful acts which the legislature failed to foresee and criminalize in advance - should find their implementation in judicial practice. It is argued that exactly this approach secures the survival and progress of the body politic. The article provides a method to determine lawful but nevertheless harmful acts which should be prevented by judges by means of reaching guilty verdicts, notwithstanding the legally binding principle um crimen sine lege. Conclusions: the findings of the paper suggest that due to the need to prevent harmful acts which the legislature failed to foresee and criminalize in advance, the principle um crimen sine would not be followed by judges on all occasions.