The regional prosecutor's office has initiated a criminal case under Part 1 of Article 211 of the Criminal Code against a resident of Vitebsk city for the embezzlement of property entrusted to him – a bicycle

Yevgeny (names changed - author), registered in the city of Vitebsk as an individual entrepreneur, has been engaged in the repair and rental of bicycles for several years.

On one of the warm days in August 2018, a previously unknown man named Leonid came to his pavilion. After studying the rental (lease) terms and signing an agreement, he took a "SHADOW 24" mountain bike from the individual entrepreneur for a day. The cost of the used bicycle, according to the entrepreneur, was about 600 Belarusian rubles.

After the time specified in the agreement had passed, Leonid called the individual entrepreneur and informed him not to worry about the bicycle, and that he would return it when he sobered up, and also pay for the service. However, subsequently, the so-called tenant stopped answering phone calls and turned off his mobile phone altogether.

The concerned individual entrepreneur, not having received the bicycle back from Leonid, applied to the police with a request for assistance in returning his property.

As it turned out, Leonid, not having a steady income in the Republic of Belarus, decided to earn some money in a simple way – after renting a bicycle, he found a person through advertisements who buys, including bicycles, and disposed of it as he saw fit, i.e., sold it. When a police officer located him and interviewed him, Leonid did not deny that, since he had no money, he sold it through an advertisement.

Considering that a rental (lease) agreement was concluded between the entrepreneur and Leonid, which stipulated obligations for its performance and liability for non-performance, regulated by the norms of the Civil Code of the Republic of Belarus, the police officers came to the conclusion that Leonid's actions lacked the elements of a crime provided for by Article 211 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Belarus, since civil legal relations were established between them, disputes over which are resolved by the court.

However, during a thorough investigation by the regional prosecutor's office, it was taken into account that after

Leonid received a bicycle without having any funds in his pocket, including for alcohol, with the intent of intentionally unlawful gratuitous appropriation of another's property through embezzlement. For selfish motives, he embezzled the entrusted property – the bicycle – by alienation (sale) to an unidentified person, thereby causing property damage to the entrepreneur in the specified amount, and spent the proceeds from the sale on alcoholic beverages.

In this regard, a criminal case has been initiated against the "unfortunate tenant" by the regional prosecutor's office under Part 1 of Article 211 of the Criminal Code for the embezzlement of entrusted property, for which the penalty is up to four years of imprisonment with or without a fine.

Currently, the criminal case is under consideration by the court.

Prosecutor of the Department for Supervision of Inquiry and Operational-Investigative Activities
A. Lysakov