Distinction Between the Form of Intentional and Fictitious Bankruptcy

Unscrupulous business entities (legal entities and individuals) use the bankruptcy procedure to get rid of accounts payable, liquidate a problematic legal entity, and for other illegal purposes. The structures of intentional (196 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) and fictitious (197 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation) bankruptcy establish criminal liability for these acts, however, the changing socio-economic situation, new trends in judicial practice cause the complexity and lack of demand for the application of special rules on criminal liability in the field of bankruptcy, which leads to qualification errors and the need to distinguish the compositions of intentional and fictitious bankruptcy. The problem of distinguishing these structures is an organic continuation of the discussion about the place of criminal bankruptcies in the system of criminal law regulation in principle and the differentiation of criminal bankruptcies from other economic crimes, which leads to the mutual complementation of research results of both a general nature (the place of criminal bankruptcies and their difference from other economic crimes) and a special nature (direct differentiation of structures criminal bankruptcies).