Error in Assessment and Qualification: The Cable Theft Case Will Be Reexamined 0 9

The Supreme Court overturned the decision of the Riga Court of Appeal, which had sentenced a man to one year and three months of imprisonment for the committed crime.

The case materials indicate that the man opened two sewer manholes, cut the underground communication cables, then extracted them and carried them to a fence on the opposite side of the street.

The Riga City Court previously acknowledged that these actions constituted the theft of someone else's movable property from its place of permanent storage and found him guilty of theft from a storage facility, imposing a prison sentence.

Upon reviewing the appeal filed by the defense attorney, the Riga Court of Appeal upheld this decision.

Later, the defense attorney filed a cassation appeal, requesting the complete annulment of the appellate court's decision.

The Supreme Court recognized that the appellate court rightly qualified the theft as completed, as the man had gained actual control over the property, and renunciation of the committed crime at this stage was already impossible.

At the same time, the Supreme Court pointed out that the appellate court mistakenly recognized the incident as theft from a storage facility, as the sewer manhole should be considered an engineering structure that is part of a unified infrastructure system along with the cables laid within it. Such cables are not intended for separate operation and therefore cannot be regarded as property located in a storage facility.

The court also noted contradictions in the appellate court's decision regarding the value of the stolen property — it was established that a cable of a certain length was stolen, but its value was determined based on the victim's expense estimate and the testimony of a witness, which mentioned a different length of cable.

Considering these circumstances, the Supreme Court annulled the decision of the appellate court, pointing out the inconsistency of the conclusions with the actual circumstances of the case and the insufficient justification of the valuation of the cables.