Criminal offence of robbery in contemporary criminal law

Abstract

Robbery is one of the most serious criminal offences, its more serious forms belonging to the group of the most serious criminal offences in general. Robbery is a complex criminal offence consisting of theft and constraint, while its more serious forms comprise the criminal offence of bodily injury or murder. According to our criminal law this criminal offence occurs when a criminal, caught in the act of theft, in order to retain the stolen thing uses force or threat of force against some person's life or body. In criminal legislation of other countries this criminal offence is defined in a similar way, although there are differences in the way this criminal offence is determined and in specification of its elements. As a consequence, some criminal codes treat this criminal offence as a separate criminal offence, some treat it as a special form of theft, some as a form of robbery, while some speak of it together with the criminal offence of robbery within the same article. In addition, there are differences regarding regulation of the character of the used threat, depending on the fact weather any kind of threat is sufficient for the existence of such criminal offence, or only a threat to attack life or body. There are also differences concerning the objective to be attained by means of force or threat. Usually it is the intention to retain the stolen thing, but some criminal codes speak also of intention of the criminal to escape. It has to be kept in mind that in criminal legislation there also are differences regarding the definition of the concept of theft, the concept used in case of this criminal offence too, according to whether theft is conceived as taking away of someone else's movable thing, or also by intention of its appropriation or by intention to acquire unlawful material benefit for oneself or for others. A certain number of criminal codes prescribe as more serious forms of robbery cases when a person has suffered serious bodily injury or has been murdered.

Krivično delo razbojničke krađe je jedno od najtežih imovinskih krivičnih dela, a njegovi teži oblici spadaju u najteža krivična dela uopšte. Razbojnička krađa je složeno krivično delo koje se sastoji od krivičnog dela krađe i krivičnog dela prinude, a njegovi teži oblici sadrže i krivično delo telesne povrede odnosno krivično delo ubistva. U našem krivičnom pravu ovo krivično delo je određeno tako što ono postoji kada je učinilac krivičnog dela krađe zatečen na delu, pa u nameri da ukradenu stvar zadrži upotrebi protiv nekog lica silu ili pretnju da će neposredno napasti na život ili telo. Na sličan način ovo krivično delo je predviđeno i u krivičnim zakonicima drugih zemalja, s tim da među njima postoje razlike u pogledu načina određivanja ovog krivičnog dela, kao i u pogledu preciziranja njegovih elemenata.