Influence of the object of theft on the definition of the moment of crime termination

This article deals with the issues of the definition of the moment of theft termination the object of which is various types of property. Variety of property types that are the object of theft leads to peculiarities of property seizure, its treatment in favor of the perpetrator and therefore to the differences in the definition of the moment of theft termination. Most often the object of theft is personal estate (things) that can be moved in space. Seizure of such property is characterized by its physical withdrawal from the possession of the owner or another holder. Any special conditions for the treatment of this property do not exist, i.e. the offender can sell, transfer it without any difficulties to the third party or consume otherwise. So, the moment of this crime termination is the moment when the property is seized and the offender has a real opportunity to use or dispose it at his/her own discretion. If the object is non-cash money on the current account that other people transferred with forged payment orders, the final point of fraud is determined by the moment of money transfer to the bank account of the perpetrator (or another account the perpetrator can control), because from this moment the offender gets a real opportunity to dispose the received funds at his/her own discretion. Bearer securities which actually replace the money and represent independent property (bills, bonds, etc.) can unconditionally be the object of finished theft. Their seizure causes property damage of the owner or the lawful holder because at any moment these securities can be freely presented for payment or sold, etc. As for documentary bearer securities the moment of crime termination is reasonably associated not with the moment of acquisition of property with use of these papers, but with the moment of taking possession of the papers themselves. Acquisition of real property by fraud or abuse of trust is considered ended at the time of registration of the property ownership because at that point the perpetrator has a legal opportunity to take possession or dispose another's property as his/her own. Consequently, the actions of the guilty directly aimed to register ownership of a particular object but not leading to such a registration should only be considered as an attempted crime.

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