Jealousy and revenge as accompanying elements of the motivation of a murder committed in a state of passion

Murder committed in a state of passion is one of the privileged components of a particularly dangerous crime against life. At the same time, the affective state, at the moment of which the realization of the intent to deprive the victim of life begins, is provoked by his illegal or immoral actions, as a result of which the public danger of the deed is significantly reduced (with the identical nature of the public danger of murder, its degree varies significantly in the compositions provided for in Articles 105 and 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation). In the context of ensuring the security of the individual from violent socially dangerous encroachments, the question of the formation of motivation for murders based on feelings of jealousy and revenge is of absolute relevance, since the value of human life is absolute, and its loss is irreplaceable. The prospect of a fair punishment is also essential, since the version of committing murder in a state of passion has sufficient demand in practice and should be refuted in all cases when signs of passion are not established.

Being a "measure of moral and social injustice" expressed in a specific act, a crime can never go unpunished, – V. D. Filimonov rightly notes ^{[1, pp. 138-139]}. Nevertheless, the privileged role of signs immanently characterizing the state of affect is stated by a number of researchers ^{[2, pp. 72-79; 3, p. 79; 4, p. 74]}. In defining the concept of affect, researchers maintain relative unity, distinguishing between physiological and pathological conditions ^{[5, p. 304]}, comparing the influence of affect on the ability to realize the nature and degree of social danger of the actions performed and to direct them ^{[6, p. 24]} or based on the illegality or immorality of the behavior of the future victim of a crime in a pre-criminal situation ^{[7, p. 66]}. Well-known Russian jurists (Yu. M. Antonyan, S. V. Borodin, E. F. Pobegailo) paid the necessary attention to the process of forming an affective state, including the role of jealousy in a pre-criminal situation ^{[8, p. 158; 9, p. 165]}, and specialists in the field of psychology (R. Kraft-Ebing, S. L. Rubinstein, A. N. Leontiev) – the process of determining the affective state by forensic examination ^{[10, pp. 8-10, 26-41]}.

Nevertheless, despite the fairly good scientific elaboration of the problems of affective states and the qualification of crimes committed in their presence, there are certain gaps that need additional scientific analysis. Firstly, the generally accepted doctrinal stereotype about provocation by victims of murder or injury to health in a state of passion does not contain characteristics of the motivational component. Secondly, in the context of the connection of this motivation with feelings of jealousy and revenge, certain essential characteristics of the sudden strong emotional excitement have not received scientific understanding. In support of these theses, the materials of judicial practice will be presented below, and the available scientific results will receive additional updating. According to judicial statistics, the number of murders committed in a state of passion is significant (about 100 times) it is inferior to the number of murders qualified under Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation ^[11], however, the convict's version of the presence of such a condition is very common (based on the study of the materials of 200 criminal cases considered by the courts of various regions of the Russian Federation, it can be stated that up to 60% of persons brought to criminal responsibility claimed provocative actions on the part of the victims or about the possible commission of a crime in a state of passion, and more than half of them characterized the deed with a mention of feelings of jealousy or revenge in the structure of the motivational component). In connection with the above, it can be concluded that the study of jealousy and revenge as concomitant elements of the motivation for murder, the responsibility for which is provided for in Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, has sufficient relevance, and the conducted research has signs of scientific novelty. Modern researchers talk about the polymotivation of crimes committed in a state of passion ^{[12, p. 8]}, however, it can be stated that jealousy and revenge occupy a significant place in the process of forming criminal motivation. It is necessary to support the position of A. A. Chugunov, who reasonably believes that the dominant motive of affected murders is revenge ^{[13, p. 9]}. In turn, the judgment of N. V. Lysak should be considered quite controversial, which focuses exclusively on the "excusable" causes of affect, in isolation from the base nature of both jealousy and revenge ^{[14, p. 7]}. Other researchers rightly distinguish between physiological affect and reduced sanity, recognizing its criminal nature, this means that, in general, low motivation ^{[15, pp. 125-128]}.

When writing the article, a methodology based on dialectical cognition techniques was used, expressed in a combination of general scientific (analysis and synthesis, abstraction and generalization, deduction and induction) and private scientific (legal modeling, legal forecasting) methods. Their application ensured the reliability of the results obtained, as well as the widespread use of empirical methods (observation, description, experiment). Based on a representative empirical base, it seems possible to determine the role of the emotional components of jealousy and revenge in the structure of intent inherent in the composition of a murder committed in a state of passion.

Based on the materials of judicial practice, it can be concluded that jealousy as a destructive emotional state often accompanies the formation of intent to commit murder, responsibility for which is provided for in Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. For example, in criminal case No. 1-144/2020, considered by the Oktyabrsky District Court of St. Petersburg, it was found that the defendant had a strong feeling of jealousy towards his cohabitant, they often clashed, and during one of the quarrels he committed her murder. The reason for jealousy was a significant age difference (almost twofold) and a relatively free lifestyle of a girl who had no intention of starting a family with the defendant, but did not object to living together. However, the cold-blooded manner of the convict's actions (he shot the victim with a gun, hid the body, subsequently dismembered him and tried to drown him in the river), as well as the serial nature of conflicts with both the victim and several other women he met before meeting her, did not convince the court of the plausibility of committing murder in a state of passion. Arguments about treason or other behavior of the victim, capable of provoking a state of affect, were also not confirmed.

On the contrary, in criminal case No. 22-438/2021, considered by the Yaroslavl Regional Court, it was established that the defendant, cohabiting with the victim, repeatedly found herself under the influence of his immoral behavior, expressed in repeated and undisguised infidelities, and this led to a stressful state. The court pointed out that she acted in a state of emotional arousal, which had a significant impact on her consciousness and behavior and, according to the degree of severity, reached a state of affect, that is, according to the degree of disordering influence on consciousness and behavior in a legally significant period of time, this state can be equated to affect. At the same time, the role of jealousy in the formation of affected intent seems obvious (infidelities on the part of the roommate were repeated, he did not consider it necessary to hide these facts, and in addition, in a certain way used informing the defendant about it to destabilize her emotional background).

Similarly, the court of the Industrial District of Samara reasoned, reclassifying the actions of the defendant from Part 1 of Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation to Part 1 of Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The defendant, having divorced her husband, continued to live together with him, but he maintained a relationship with another woman. Finding them sleeping in bed at their place of residence, the defendant, guided by a feeling of jealousy, inflicted several stab wounds on this woman, which led to death. In the verdict, the court noted the immoral behavior of the victim, who maintained intimate relations with the defendant's ex-husband and repeatedly blackmailed her that he would leave the family. Obviously, in this case, the feeling of jealousy was generated by the open nature of the man's infidelity, and also fully formed the intent to commit murder.

Summing up the intermediate result, we can conclude that jealousy as a circumstance accompanying the emergence of a state of affect, primarily has no manifestation in acts of aggression, but seriously produces conflicts between the future criminal and the victim. At the same time, the behavior of the future victim is characterized by such parameters that indicate the creation of a traumatic situation (for example, he supports marital and family relations, but ignores their inherent moral standards, not hiding the facts of intimate communication with other people, openly conflicting and humiliating the future (future) killer). Such behavior has no legal qualification, however, it is immoral and generates the formation of intent to deprive of life. The privileged nature of murder in such cases seems indisputable, and the accumulation of negative experiences related to the situation in the family – entailing a degree of emotional excitement identical to the state of affect.

Otherwise, judicial practice develops in criminal cases in which revenge plays a decisive role in motivating criminal behavior. Unlike jealousy, revenge as a way of resolving conflict situations arises on the basis of resentment, insult, humiliation ^{[16, pp. 296-301]}. A subject acting out of revenge has a tolerant attitude towards possible violence against the "offender", considering it a means of restoring justice. At the same time, he is guided by a premeditated, and not a spontaneous intention, as a result of which it is not possible to raise the question of the presence of an affective state. Affect – even cumulative – is not inherent in the planning of a crime, the preparation of its commission, other characteristics that indicate a rational assessment of the criminal consequences. Therefore, even in conditions when it is established that a violent crime was preceded by an aggressive conflict between the perpetrator and the victim, and their previous relationships give reason to believe that there may be a motive for revenge, the qualification of the deed under Article 107 or Article 113 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation is not made.

Accordingly, planned crimes motivated by a sense of revenge are qualified under the relevant part of Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. For example, in criminal case No. 2-10/2022, considered by the Sverdlovsk Regional Court, according to paragraphs "a", "g" of Part 2 of Article 105 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, the actions of convicts were qualified, one of whom, feeling a sense of revenge for their mutual acquaintance, invited the second to take part in clarifying the relationship. However, this citizen was not at home, and the defendants killed two people instead of him – his father and a friend they had not even known before. The events in connection with which the feeling of revenge arose took place several years before the events described. In criminal case No. 2-6/2022, reviewed by the Novosibirsk Regional Court, it was found that in the summer of 2020, the defendant committed the murder of two persons during a quarrel that arose due to the fact that in 2013 they gave evidence that allowed him to be convicted of committing robbery. The double murder was committed by him a week after his release from prison. In this case, obviously, the motive of revenge did not arise spontaneously, but although the court noted in the verdict the existence of previously formed hostile relations, the assessment of revenge in relation to paragraph "b" of Part 2 of Article 105 of the Criminal Code was not carried out. In this case, the question of a hypothetical affective state was not raised as expected.    

In judicial practice, however, the study of the version about the combination of a sense of revenge and a state of passion is quite common. However, the courts, as a rule, come to the conclusion that it is false. For example, in the verdict in criminal case No. 1-424/2021, considered by the Leninsky Court of Novosibirsk, it is indicated that the defendant, who repeatedly quarreled with the victim and inflicted a fatal blow on his head with a microwave oven, was partly guided by a sense of revenge, feeling resentment for the violence previously used on his part, but was not in a state of passion, committed the crime was deliberately committed, she did not attempt to provide medical assistance to the victim. In criminal case No. 1-427/2021, considered by the same court, the version about the state of passion was not confirmed, although the systematic commission of illegal actions by the victim against the defendant was recognized as proven, as well as her own testimony that she killed her husband for beating her. In other words, the motive of revenge in this case is present to a certain extent, although it is difficult to distinguish it from a sudden personal hostility; there is also spontaneous intent. But at the same time, the transient development of the quarrel that preceded the murder did not give grounds for assessing the presence of a hypothetical affective state (the victim, who was drunk, demanded that the defendant go buy vodka, she refused, he struck her several blows with his fists, after which she inflicted a fatal stab wound to his neck with a kitchen knife). Assessing another situation, the Judicial Board for Criminal Cases of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation in its ruling on case No. 67-009-50 indicated that the motive for the murder of two persons committed by the convicted person was not the insulting behavior of the victims towards the mother of the convicted person, but giving incriminating testimony, i.e. revenge for lawful actions. In this case, it seems that a clear legal position has been formed, based on which revenge for lawful actions can in no way provoke the occurrence of a state of affect, whereas for unlawful actions it can.    

Apparently, guided by a similar logic, the Kalininsky District Court of the Saratov region in the verdict in criminal case No. 1-83/2018 qualified the following actions under Part 1 of Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. The defendant's own sister repeatedly told him about conflicts with her roommate, that he often beats and insults her. Accordingly, the defendant had a personal dislike for the victim, had grounds for a sense of revenge. While visiting the victim and becoming an eyewitness to the quarrel, he struck him multiple blows with his fists, as well as with the handle of an electric flashlight. Applying in this case Part 1 of Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, the court was guided by the fact that there was a long-term traumatic situation, expressed in the commission of illegal and immoral actions by the victim, namely, in beating and humiliating the defendant's sister. The crime was committed at the moment when the defendant specifically came to them to settle the existing conflict, but the victim again began to humiliate his sister, thereby provoking further developments.

However, in general, the above method of distinguishing murders, the motivation of which is based on the motive of revenge, is not in full demand. For example, in criminal case No. 1-3/2021, considered by the 2nd Eastern District Military Court, the version about the motive of revenge was confirmed, but not about the state of passion. At the same time, the court found that the defendant was repeatedly subjected to violence, humiliation and bullying by colleagues, and on the day of the murder, threats of sexual violence were made against him, after which he shot ten victims with automatic weapons, eight of whom died. It is noteworthy that one of the defendant's colleagues was convicted under Article 335 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, i.e. the fact of non-statutory relations was confirmed.

Summing up the intermediate result, we can conclude that the motive of revenge is more difficult to establish and has no pronounced connection with the alleged formation of a state of affect. Moreover, it has two features that exclude the qualification of a violent crime as committed in a state of passion: the occurrence in the period significantly preceding the time of the commission of the crime, and the occurrence in connection with the lawful actions of the victim. In relation to the motive of jealousy, these features are less pronounced and are partially correlated with the facts of immoral acts committed by the victim (victim).

Thus, jealousy, as well as revenge, are generally reflected in the structure of motivation for murder committed in a state of passion. Both jealousy and revenge have low characteristics, produce aggression and violence, but, at the same time, can be caused by illegal or immoral actions of the victim. Nevertheless, without taking into account the normatively defined conditions for the occurrence of strong emotional unrest and their establishment in a particular case by the conclusion of a comprehensive psychological and psychiatric examination, the qualification of murder under Part 1 of Article 107 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation is not possible. In this regard, in order to optimize law enforcement activities, it is necessary to conduct a detailed study of the characteristics of the defendant's personality, his relationship with the victim (victim), the role of the victim of the crime in creating a conflict situation and its development. In order to create additional guarantees for the protection of personal security, the study of these circumstances is essential, especially when improving the mechanism for preventing violent crimes.