Street racers want to make life difficult

18 December 2017

We discussed the introduction of a million of fines and criminal terms

Not the first year with an enviable regularity on the first lines of the Russian media appeared the news about the latest antics of the worst offenders of traffic rules. They often deliberately cross the line and deal with rude inspectors of traffic police. Journalists often call such irresponsible drivers "street racers". The government considered that the current penalties are not afraid of them: even if the offender gets caught, the punishment for him will seem insignificant. Now the deputies have prepared a bill toughening punishment for organizing street races and participate in them.

According to the newspaper "news" in the state Duma want to make to the administrative offences code and the criminal code a new article: "Illegal car or motorcycle competitions" (section 12.38 of the administrative code and 264.2 of the criminal code). The initiators of the project propose the following wording: "competition cars or motorcycles for their speed or other technical capabilities (qualities or properties) in places not intended for such a competition, if this competition was fraught with disturbing public order or endangering the safety of the road".

Lawmakers propose to relate the degree of punishment with two factors: the number of similar violations committed by the driver previously, and the degree of damages caused by him. In this case we can talk about the real criminal terms: by street racers could face a disqualification of up to a year in prison, and the organizers of the illegal competitions on a million-dollar fine and up to two years behind bars.

Also, the deputies intend to discuss tougher penalties for other violations. For example, for driving after the revocation of the driving license of the driver will have to pay up to 50,000 rubles, and riding on sidewalks will equate to disorderly conduct (article 20.1 of the administrative code), increasing the penalty from one to two thousand rubles.

"Punishment for the same crime, including imprisonment, exist in many countries of the world. Rather drastic measures are applied in England, Canada, France and Germany. And we see that the Institute of inevitability of punishment works effectively and driving culture in General, there is much higher," — said the Deputy head of the Duma Committee on security Anatoly Vyborny.

While the new initiative still have a long way to the top: first, the authors of the bill should await feedback from the government and the Supreme court, after which they will be able to submit it for the consideration of the lower house.