Law Enforcement Intelligence Counteraction to Organized

Criminality in the Economy Field

Peter Ivanovich Ivanov

and Artem Sergeevich Shitov

State Federal-Funded Educational Institution of Higher Professional Training “MVD Administration Academy of Russia”

(Ministry of Internal Affairs), Moscow, Russian Federation

Keywords: Law enforcement intelligence operations, criminal police intelligence unit, law enforcement intelligence

counteraction, organized economic criminality, digital transformation.

Abstract: The implementation of the global peace strategy is accompanied by a significant transformation of economic

relations (the economic integration of national states into the markets for goods, services, production), which

in turn entails, along with positive consequences, the emergence of informal economy, its transnationalisation.

The emerging digital (information) environment partly has a positive impact on the further transformation of

crime into the macro-level problem, the resolution of which is impossible without an in-depth study of it in

order to create prerequisites for the development of scientifically based proposals and recommendations for

improving the law enforcement intelligence counteraction to organized criminality in the economy field. To

achieve this goal, we set and solved the following tasks: analyzed the current state of the specified type of

activity; the concept is developed and its essence is determined; the factors influencing this type of

counteraction are identified and considered; the system of measures taken within its framework is defined and

considered. The methodology of the investigation is based on the method of dialectical cognition, which

allowed to analyze organized criminality in the economy field and countermeasures in static and dynamic

interaction (Tarbagaev A.N., 2013; Yakusheva T.V., 2020). In addition, a complex of general scientific and

private methods was used. Systemically functional and systemically structural methods have allowed a

comprehensive study of the patterns of the law enforcement intelligence counteraction to organized

criminality in the economy field. The author also used historical, comparatively legal, statistical methods, as

well as sociological methods (polling, questionnaire, study of some materials of archival criminal cases and

cases of criminal records). Thanks to the conducted investigation the categorically conceptual apparatus of

law enforcement intelligence science has been expanded, a system of measures that make up the content of

the law enforcement intelligence counteraction has been developed, its regularities are defined taking into

account modern realities.

1 INTRODUCTION

The problem of the law enforcement intelligence

counteraction support to the organized economic

criminality, despite its relevance, until recently

investigated by experts of the theory of law

enforcement intelligence operations (hereinafter

referred to as the LEIO) is not entirely. Digital

transformation forces to turn to it, as all fields of

society, including law enforcement, have actively

begun to introduce modern information technologies

(Maximov S. V., Vasin Yu. G., Utarov K. A., 2018;

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2367-3369

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0097-488X

Pyrchev S. V., 2020). In addition, active criminals

have started to use information telecommunications

networks, including the Internet, for criminal

purposes.

The theoretical basis of this work is the scientific

works of scientists in the field of LEIO theory of

internal affairs bodies (hereinafter referred to as the

IAB) V. M. Atmazhitova, V. G. Bobrova, K. K.

Goriainova, V. P. Kuvaldina, V. D. Laricheva

(Larichev V. D., 2020) and others. These authors, due

to circumstances beyond their control, were unable to

take into account the socioeconomic transformations

Ivanov, P. and Shitov, A.

Law Enforcement Intelligence Counteraction to Organized Criminality in the Economy Field.

DOI: 10.5220/0010627400003152

In Proceedings of the VII International Scientiﬁc-Practical Conference “Criminal Law and Operative Search Activities: Problems of Legislation, Science and Practice” (CLOSA 2021), pages

27-32

ISBN: 978-989-758-532-6; ISSN: 2184-9854

common to the post-Soviet period. Moreover, until

recently, investigators, studying issues related to the

organization of the fight against organized

criminality, paid little attention to the patterns,

features of its display in the implementation of its

control. We have made an attempt not only to dig in

already known patterns, but also to identify them

under new conditions and to propose them to the

scientific community.

This article has been prepared on the basis of an

investigation and analysis of legislation and

regulations, monograph works and law enforcement

practices. It formulates certain conceptual provisions

related to the optimization of law enforcement

intelligence counteraction to organized economic

criminality under the conditions of the development

of digital technologies, since the named activity does

not yet fully meet the requirements of the Ministry of

Internal Affairs of Russia, and the results of our

investigation can make a significant contribution,

both in the solution of these problematic issues, and

in the development of law enforcement intelligence

science.

In the context of the criminal environment

globalization, the need to integrate different branches

of law through an in-depth comprehensive study of

inter-industry relations and relationships is increasing

immeasurably. This requirement is dictated, first of

all, by the need to identify the patterns of these

connections and relationships as an integral part of

the methodological foundations of any branch of

science. By using patterns, it is necessary to try to

create a model for practical application in the fight

against economic criminality in the economy field.

The achievements of the knowledge branches under

consideration should cover the results of an in-depth

study of the problems for implementing the

provisions of law enforcement intelligence and

criminal law legislation under the conditions of

digitalization of society, LEIO forms through the

prism of considering modern information

technologies as one of their elements. In addition, in

our opinion, they should include issues related to

overcoming counteraction at the stage of pre-

investigative verification using law enforcement

intelligent measures, using information on electronic

media in documenting criminal actions, as well as

determining the real possibilities of information and

telecommunication technologies in production for

criminal records under the conditions of pandemic.

The problem is exacerbated against the

background of the Commonwealth of Independent

States economy integration into the markets of goods,

services and industries, as the informal economy,

which acts as a breeding ground for the organized

criminality is being transformed. We do not aim to

address this issue in detail, as investigators often stop

at it (Agildin V. V., 2013; Belotserkovsky S. D.,

2018; Bogdanov A. V., I.A., Zavialov I. A., Khazov

E. N., 2020; Burlakov V. N., Shchepelkov V. F.,

2019; Voronin Yu. A., Beliaeva I. M., Kukhtina T.

V., 2018; Matskevich I. M., 2016; Merkuriev V. V.,

2013; Nomokonov V. A., 2017).

At the present stage of the development of

organized criminality in the economy field, no one

doubts that this type of crime and its display goes not

only to the interstate, but also to the international

level, changing the directions and methods of illegal

activity. Considering the above mentioned, we would

like to note that, by and large, the problem of law

enforcement intelligence counteraction of the

considered type of organized criminality lies in

resolving the existing contradictions between the

requirement to increase the effectiveness of

prevention and disclosure of its display, and the

incompleteness of modern scientifically grounded

ideas about their law enforcement intelligence

counteraction.

The Russian Federation's Economic Security

Strategy for the period up to 2030 considers this type

of criminality to the number of sources that threaten

the economic security. At the same time, it orients law

enforcement agencies on the requirement to take

effective measures to neutralize them, thus preventing

the infliction of material harm.

Speaking about it, it is impossible not to

remember the words of the President of the Russian

Federation V.V. Putin, who was having the floor at an

extended meeting of the Russian Federal Security

Service, said the following: “In general, the

importance and responsibility of your work to ensure

Russia’s economic security is growing. In 2020, 87

criminal gangs in this area were stopped. I ask you to

continue, as promptly, together with other specialized

structures, to contribute to ensuring the stability of the

economy and financial system of the country, within

the framework of your authority, to continue to

support and protect Russian business, our companies

from criminal encroachments, from unscrupulous

competition in global markets. The fight against

corruption in the economic environment and at all

levels of government should be the same consistent. I

pay special attention to the suppression of

embezzlement and misuse of budget funds, primarily

allocated for the construction of strategic facilities,

state programs and state defense orders, to struggle

against coronavirus infection. All these funds should

be used rationally, in strict accordance with the goals

CLOSA 2021 - VII INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC-PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “CRIMINAL LAW AND OPERATIVE SEARCH

ACTIVITIES: PROBLEMS OF LEGISLATION, SCIENCE AND PRACTICE”

for which they are allocated, and should be used for

the benefit of Russian citizens.”

The President’s statements derive from at least

four groups of interconnected demands addressed,

first of all, to the heads of the criminal intelligence

units of the LEIO bodies, including the police,

namely:

concerning the definition of priority areas of

activity, including, first of all, issues of timely

detection and suppression of theft and misuse of

budget funds allocated for the construction of

strategic facilities, for state programs and state

defense orders, as well as for struggle against

coronavirus infection. Successful solutions to these

tasks involve further decriminalization of the

economy, which will allow at the same time to fast

respond to attempts for creating informal schemes

and illegal withdrawal of capital abroad;

related in terms of ensuring the economic security

of Russia by combining the efforts of the criminal

intelligence units of all departments (Ivanov P.I.,

Kustov A.M., 2020), thereby contributing to the

achievement of the country’s economy stability and

financial system and ensuring reliable protection of

Russian business from criminal encroachments;

based on legislation and other regulatory

legislation to strengthen the struggle against

corruption in the economic environment (Ivanov P.I.,

Shitov A.S., 2020) and at all levels of authority.

Unfortunately, as the investigation and analysis of

law enforcement practice shows, corruption-related

crimes are often committed through administrative

pressure from officials in the form of restricting

competition in the field of state and municipal

contracts allocation, obstructing legitimate business

activities, and patronizing the “shadow” economy;

finally, with the strengthening of procedural and

departmental control over the validity and legality of

the initiation and investigation of criminal cases for

business crimes. To do this, on the one hand, it is

necessary to respond to such abuses, on the other

hand - to maintain open contact with the business

community.

In general, we can conclude that the successful

implementation of criminal law in the economy field

is unthinkable without the use of tools from the

arsenal of the criminal intelligence units. The

President of the Russian Federation is making a bet

on their high potential. Hidden from unauthorized

persons facts of organized economic crime appeared,

become clear, thanks to the verified, in a strictly legal

manner, law enforcement intelligence operations

(measures).

Unfortunately, it should not go unspoken that

today there is no legislative definition of the concept

of “law enforcement intelligence operations”. Thus,

in our opinion, such a vacuum was formed. We have

decided to submit to scientific community approval

the author's version of this definition. It seems to us

that the “law enforcement intelligence counteraction”

is the implementation of the Internal Affairs Bodies

and their units of economic security and corruption

counteraction (hereinafter referred to as the ES&CC)

in accordance with the federal laws “Concerning the

Police” and “Concerning the law enforcement

intelligence operations” in cooperation with other law

enforcement agencies, control and supervisory bodies

and LEIO bodies, a set of mostly covert law

enforcement intelligence measures aimed at

identifying, preventing, suppressing and solving

economy criminals committed in an organized

manner, in the economy field. In strategic documents,

one of the most important tasks today continues to be

the provision of economic security. The main

emphasis is placed on the law enforcement

intelligence provision, which allows to keep the

criminal situation in the economy field under close

attention even under the conditions of digital

transformation.

These conditions before the law enforcement

intelligence science unexpectedly set three

completely new tasks: 1) the development of

scientific foundations of the law enforcement

intelligence counteraction, corresponding to modern

realities; 2) finding new ways and means of

counteraction; 3) improving its law enforcement

intelligence action. It seems to us that under the

conditions of community digitalization, economic

security can be achieved through these challenges.

Meanwhile, the problem of undermining the

economic and financial foundations of organized

crime, which we believe implies that the economic

and financial foundations of organized criminality are

more urgent than ever, and the timely resolution of

which, in our view, implies:

coordination of law enforcement and control and

supervisory bodies to detect, prevent, suppress and

solve economic and tax crimes committed in an

organized form;

establishing controlled groups and criminal

communities operating in the economy field, objects

of legal and informal economic activity;

creating the necessary conditions for the

implementation of punishment inevitability principle

for these types of crimes;

conducting a set of organizational and practical

measures for the crime counteraction under the

Law Enforcement Intelligence Counteraction to Organized Criminality in the Economy Field

clauses 193, 1931 of the Criminal Code of the

Russian Federation, primarily aimed at de-

offshorization of the national economy;

implementation of measures in relation to

criminal groups that ensure the transit of criminal

funds through the accounts of fictitious organizations

created by them;

preventing the involvement of criminal proceeds

in profitable sectors of the economy, including

strategic ones;

identify and eliminate sources of financial support

for organized criminal groups and communities

operating in the economy.

2 MATERIALS AND METHODS

The investigation objectives were solved by attracting

a wide range of theoretical and empirical material,

which predetermined the use of diverse scientific

tools.

The formal-logical method was used to identify

and systematize the features for the organization of

the law enforcement intelligence counteraction to

organized criminality in the economy field; statistical

method - when collecting and analyzing information

about the results of this activity and the state

(dynamics, structure) of the specified type of crime;

comparative legal - in the investigation of legislative

and other normative legal, administrative acts on the

organization of the law enforcement intelligence

counteraction.

The investigation results of the positive

experience of the police’s criminal intelligence units

for counteraction of organized economy criminality

formed the basis of empirical material. We

investigated the problems on the basis of dialectic-

the universal cognition method, which allowed us to

investigate deeper the essence of the phenomenon, to

trace its causes and consequences, their interrelation.

We have identified the qualitative sustainable aspects

of organized economy criminality by using a

systematic method. In addition to the general

cognition method, general scientific (analysis and

synthesis, induction and deduction, generalization,

abstraction, hypothesis) and private (observation,

questionnaire, interviewing, analysis of documents)

methods were used.

We used comparative analysis to assess the

different approaches of scientists and practitioners to

the problem of the law enforcement intelligence

counteraction for organized criminality in the

economy field. In this work, the systematic method

was the most important, which made it possible to

establish the various interrelations arising in the

implementation process for a system of measures

using covert forces, means, methods and measures

aimed at identifying, preventing, suppressing and

solving economic crimes committed in an organized

form.

The following methods were used as special ones:

a statistical method that includes the collection

and analysis of data about the state, dynamics and

structure of organized economy criminality;

methods of expert assessment, questionnaires

used in the survey of operational employees of

ES&CC units directly related in their professional

activities to the detection, prevention, suppression

and disclosure of crimes of the economy field that

occur in organized manner.

method for investigating the documents and

content analysis - when investigating archival

criminal cases, criminal records and other materials,

regulations of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of

Russia, other bodies.

It seems to us that the application of these

scientific methods has ensured that the investigation

integrated approach for solving the problem has been

integrated.

3 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

The results of the investigations carried out by the

author of this article are as follows:

scientific justification of modern challenges and

threats to economic security associated with

organized criminality through in-depth study of the

inter-industry links of criminal and law enforcement

intelligence legislation;

defining the use of social networks and the

Internet as a counteraction priority direction by

organized criminal communities, which are exploited

by them as an additional source of uncontrolled

profits from illegal actions;

develop measures to prevent the further splicing

of organized criminality with the informal economy,

corruption and other types of crime;

defining the main directions for finding scientific

approaches to improving international cooperation in

counteraction to the transnational organized

criminality. The harmonization of legislation in the

struggle against these types of crime is one of such

directions.

The listed proposals are based on the results of the

investigation, the requirement to formulate them is

primarily due to the current crime rate in the economy

field, the implementation of the requirement of the

CLOSA 2021 - VII INTERNATIONAL SCIENTIFIC-PRACTICAL CONFERENCE “CRIMINAL LAW AND OPERATIVE SEARCH

ACTIVITIES: PROBLEMS OF LEGISLATION, SCIENCE AND PRACTICE”

Head of the State in terms of crime cleanup, as well

as mobilizing the efforts of the police’s criminal

intelligence units in solving the tasks they face within

the departmental segment of ensuring economic

security. Until recently, the mentioned proposals in

this context in the LEIO theory were not fully

considered by investigators, which would be based on

the current criminal and law enforcement intelligence

legislation and on the investigation results of law

enforcement practice (Gordienko V. V., 2015).

It seems to us that the proposals made to one

degree or another relate to the action for

counteraction of the organized economy criminality,

which is in dire need of modernization under the

conditions of digital technologies development. At

the same time, it is very important, in our opinion, the

activity of the police’s criminal intelligence units to

undermine the economic and financial foundations of

organized criminality, the scientific organization of

which implies an indispensable consideration of the

set of laws occupied by the law enforcement

intelligence science: the action of economy

criminality committed in an organized form, in the

economy field; the emergence of operatively

significant information used in documenting the

criminal actions inspected (suspected), committed

using covert methods in order to extract uncontrolled

profits or seize budget funds allocated to struggle

against coronavirus infection; implementation of pre-

investigation verification of materials using covert

forces, means, methods and law enforcement

intelligence measures carried out for this on a

systematic basis; establishment, maintenance and

termination of criminal record cases provided by the

Criminal Code of the Russian Federation in the

economy field; investigation and analysis of the law

enforcement intelligence characteristics of economic

crimes; the setting out typical law enforcement

intelligence versions within the framework of

operational-tactical situations and the development of

a program for their resolution; development of the

law enforcement intelligence methods for

documenting the criminal actions inspected

(suspected), committed in an organized manner in the

economy field; creation and use of an action model of

the specified type crime; assessment and use of the

LEIO results in the process of proving economy

criminality in criminal cases.

4 CONCLUSIONS

In the previous section “Results and Discussion” we

have already outlined the results of our in-depth study

of the problem under consideration. If they are

detailed in the interests of their implementation, then

the above proposals are as follows. Today, the

development of scientific foundations for the law

enforcement intelligence support providing

counteraction to the organized economy criminality

under the conditions of digital transformation

continues to be in demand. Having had such a basis,

it will be much easier to search for and implement

new methods of law enforcement intelligence

counteraction support to the law enforcement

practice. As you know, this type of activity is a

complex problem. It is difficult to solve it by means

of only one service in the police system, and therefore

the question of improving the interaction of police’s

criminal intelligence units in the process of

identifying and solving crimes of an economic and

corruption nature committed in an organized manner.

Closely related to this issue is the urgent need to bring

the law enforcement intelligence methods for

detection and use of operatively significant

information about the structure of organized groups

and criminal communities, the nature of their criminal

business, methods of preparing, committing and

concealing economic crimes.

It should be emphasized that within the

framework of one scientific article it is not possible

to consider in detail the specified directions of

improving the law enforcement intelligence

counteraction to organized criminality in the

economy field. Only law enforcement intelligence

science, within the framework of its investigation

subject, can along with other issues successfully solve

this problem, the results of which could bring the

theory and practice of the Law Enforcement

Intelligence Operations of the Internal Affairs Bodies

to a new cognition level.

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ACTIVITIES: PROBLEMS OF LEGISLATION, SCIENCE AND PRACTICE”