Chair of Criminal Law

The YSU Criminal Law Chair was founded in 1937. From 1938-1984 the Chair was led by Doctor of legal science, Professor A. T. Tovmasyan, from 1984-1989 by Associate Professor V. M. Sahakyan, from 1989-1991 by Associate Professor M. V. Grigoryan, and from 1991-2000 by academician of RA NAS, Doctor of legal science, Professor G. S. Ghazinyan.

The Chair of Criminal Law is the leading institution in RA that conducts basic research in the field of criminal, penal law, and criminology, which has a significant contribution to the development of criminal and penal policy, as well as legislation.

During the last decades, significant work has been carried out in the Chair both in the direction of improving the educational process and increasing the level and efficiency of scientific research works. The Chair has always aimed at publishing textbooks and educational manuals in Armenian, in particular, the university textbooks "Criminal Law of the Republic of Armenia (General Part)" and "Criminal Law of the Republic of Armenia (Special Part)" were published and republished, "Criminal Law of the Republic of Armenia (General Part) Reference Book", "Methodology of Criminological Research", "Criminological Theories", "Legal Statistics", "Criminal Law" teaching manuals were published, as well as lecture texts of a number of other courses taught at the chair were prepared.

Active work is carried out in the Chair in the direction of researching current problems of criminal and penitentiary rights, criminology, and other areas. The main directions of the scientific research activity of the Chair are trends in the development of criminality in the transitional period, the characteristics of criminality and deviant behavior of minors and youth, the problems of motivation of criminal behavior, imprisonment, and alternative punishments, sentencing, corruption crimes, and victimization.

The following works were published in the Chair: M. Khachikyan’s "Criminological and penitentiary problems of Imprisonment", A. H. Gabuzyan’s "Problems of Crime in RA during the transition period", S. V. Arakelyan's "Criminal Violence", T. V. Simonyan's "Youth crime in RA", A. R. Margaryan’s "Problems of juvenile delinquency and deviant behavior in RA", H. M. Khachikyan’s "Theoretical, methodological and organizational aspects of the legal regulation of imprisonment in the Republic of Armenia", Zh. A. Stepanyan's "Problems of sentencing in case of recidivism of crimes" monographs. As well as, in cooperation with the Chair of Criminal Procedure and Criminology, based on the results of the research on the scientific topic the monograph "Problems of juvenile delinquency prevention in RA" was published in 2020.

The Chair has always been involved in the ongoing legal reforms in the Republic of Armenia. Thus, after the adoption of the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia (1995) until now, the staff of the Chair actively participated in the development of various codes and drafts of laws, in particular, the "Criminal Code of the Republic of Armenia", "Penal Code of the Republic of Armenia" and a number of other legislative acts. In addition, the Chair developed the concepts of the new RA criminal and penitentiary codes, based on them, prepared the drafts of the new RA criminal and penitentiary codes, which the RA National Assembly adopted as law, respectively, on May 5, 2021, and on June 15, 2022. Work is being carried out in the chair in the direction of preparation of textbooks of RA Criminal Law (general and special parts) and penal enforcement law.

Well-recognized lawyers-scientists from RA and foreign countries, specialists holding high positions in RA law enforcement and judicial bodies teach the YSU Criminal Law Chair.

The Chair implements the "Criminal Justice and Advocacy" Master's educational program.