Abstract

RINCON-ANGARITA, Dubán. Organized crime and corruption: absence of penal liability in the “corruption for fear”. Rev. Crim. [online]. 2019, vol.61, n.1, pp.127-139. ISSN 1794-3108.

Quite frequently, the groups of organized crime intend certain level of capture of the State due to corruption. This phenomenon occurs when a public servant agrees acts contrary to his legal obligations, customarily in exchange for a gift or compensation. But, it can happen that the public servant’s illegal act comes about because he proceeds for dread or fear due to a coercion exerted against him. In these cases, it is referred to “corruption for fear”. Then, it is stated as objective to establish the possibilities of penaljuridical treatment for the public servant who commits a corruption act when coercion, violence or force are involved against him. Methodologically, it is a dogmaticjuridical investigation, based on the methods of the document investigation, with a hermeneutic-analytical approach. The main result of this research is that the declaration proceeds of insurmountable of external coercion as a causal of exoneration of responsibility. Eventually, it is recognized the circumstance of inferior punishability related to intense fear, in accordance with article 55 (3) of the Colombian Criminal Code. The main conclusion is that the fear in the Colombian criminal law has a diverse systematic position that depends on the emotion intensity.

Keywords : Organized crime; officers’ corruption; insurmountable fear; coercion; absence of voluntary act.

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