This paper aims at research of crime trends in Ukraine in the period from 2013 to 2023 where the focus is made on the impact of the 2022 Russian military aggression against Ukraine (the War) on human trafficking and ‘satellite’ crimes, as well as on prevention of human trafficking and ‘satellite’ crimes. In addition to the previously developed and published authors’ research, the paper is focused on the issues of the personal characteristics of offenders and victims of trafficking of human beings (THB) crimes and ‘satellite’ crimes.

The authors’ conclusions reflect a decrease in registered crimes due to reduce of statistical indicators. It is obvious that the police and the court statistics were impacted by the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2014 when they “lost” data from occupied territories.

In this paper, we also show that Ukrainian criminology and crime statistics are mostly based on stories in the media about “an ideal victim” of human trafficking.

In this paper, we describe the current crime trends in Ukraine based on two main indicators of the Ukrainian criminal justice system: 1) the general number of criminal proceedings (criminal cases) opened and registered by the Ukrainian law enforcement agencies; 2) the number of criminal proceedings (criminal cases) where concrete suspects were given the notifications (notes) of suspicion. In corresponding tables and diagrams, we use the term ‘notifications’, which reflects numbers of criminal proceedings with suspects (numbers of notifications of suspicion).

We would also like to make a stress on ‘satellite’ crimes, which in our terminological context mean crimes which could be seen as a hidden form of human trafficking or a basis for further THB crimes.

For the period of twelve months of 2022, the Ukrainian law enforcement agencies registered 362636 crimes with corresponding criminal proceedings, where the above-mentioned numbers reflect both criminal proceedings with suspects and so-called ‘factual’ criminal proceedings (without suspects). The number of registered crimes even for the period of ten months of 2022 almost reached the level of 2021 (a whole year). Consequently, the number of crimes committed in Ukraine for the whole period of 2022 exceeded the number of crimes committed in 2021 (321443 crimes) and in 2020 (360662 crimes). The above-mentioned numbers seem to be of big importance due to the general presumption that numerous negative social and economic consequences of the War would lead to increasing crime trends in Ukraine.

It is difficult to define precisely how human trafficking was affected by the War. On the one hand, the number of registered THB crimes decreased to zero point immediately after the Russian military forces crossed the Ukrainian border. On the other one, serious concerns arise because THB cases continue to be registered in the light of supposedly totally closed borders, police checks, curfews and hundreds of military and police roadblocks. At the same time, 133 registered THB crimes in 2022 are more than insufficient in light of millions Ukrainian refugees, which could lead to the conclusion that something is wrong with the police intelligence in the sphere of THB prevention as well as with supervision of the Ukrainian border service.

Crime trends in Ukraine for the last ten years are a good example to prove the common social nature of THB crimes, ‘satellite’ crimes and smuggling (especially since 2017); trends of all the mentioned crimes have been changing almost the same way.

The absence of public-funded compensations schemes stimulates secondary victimization of victims of human trafficking.

A broad use of Article 69 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine (Imposition of a lesser penalty than provided by law) by Ukrainian courts harms the crime prevention policy relating to THB crimes.

An increase in crimes of pimping or engaging a person in prostitution is additional evidence to which extent this type of criminality is under the direct control of the police. In the paper, we show that the mentioned above is not a presumption; it is a part of everyday police routine in Ukraine.

In contrast to the assumed nature of human trafficking, for the period of the last 15 years, there were no THB crimes committed by criminal organisations. As the court statistics show, all THB crimes were committed by individuals, criminal groups or organised criminal groups.

If we summarise the crimes committed by criminal groups and organised criminal groups in one general indicator (67%), 33% of THB crimes are committed by individuals. In our opinion, such concussion contradicts the nature of THB crimes, which demand at least both suppliers and recipients (not even talking about ‘middlepersons’ or ‘brokers’).

Considering transnational difficulties crossing the state borders and the necessity to organise the logistics and to corrupt officials of at least two national States, the police and court statistics can only reveal a small section of the phenomenon but cannot reflect the reality of human trafficking.

The court statistics are further away from the police statistics which are the nearest to the offence and also far away from reality due to the assumed huge dark figure. Therefore, police statistics incorporate the highest numbers of offences, which lessens during the whole criminal proceedings. Both police and court statistics show the workload of the institutions, and their data serve as an indicator to get at least some officially registered information.

Source

Picture - United Nations