The Significance of the Provisions on the Crime of Property Extortion in Vietnamese Criminal Law

Since property with a specific owner (can be an organization, legal entity or individual) is the subject of property crimes, ownerless property is not the subject of property crimes.

Third, the property must be capable of being transformed between owners. Without this ability, the property is not subject to property crimes in general and property extortion in particular.

For example: The author of a musical or literary or artistic work is the owner of those works but cannot transfer them, so when there is an act of infringement of copyright, it does not constitute a crime of infringement of ownership but constitutes a crime of infringement of copyright and related rights according to Article 170a of the Penal Code.

Fourth, property that is the subject of property crimes is ordinary property that can be legally bought, sold, and exchanged. Property of special nature or property that the State prohibits private individuals from buying, selling, and exchanging will be the subject of other crimes specified in the Penal Code.

For example, the act of appropriating military weapons and military technical means does not constitute a crime of infringement of ownership but constitutes the crime of appropriating military weapons and military technical means according to Article 230 of the Penal Code.

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1.1.2. Concept of property extortion

To better understand the act of property extortion, it is also necessary to study, analyze and clarify a number of related concepts such as the concept of "property"; the concept of "appropriation"; the concept of "threatening to use force or other means"; the concept of "mental intimidation"; on that basis, to present characteristics belonging to the connotation of the crime of property extortion.

"Assets", in the Sino-Vietnamese sense, is a concept used to "generally refer to money and wealth"  17, p. 622  ; or "money and wealth in general"  9, p. 734  ,  19, p. 602  ; and is "material wealth used for production or consumption"  49, p. 1483  .

"Occupy", in Sino-Vietnamese, "occupy" means "to take as one's own"; "occupy" means "to use force or influence to take as one's own"  9, p. 142  ,  17, p. 140  ;

to seize is: "to keep as one's own", to snatch is to rob, to seize is "to seize by force or power"  9, p. 142  ,  19, p. 108  ; to seize is also understood as "to occupy someone else's property by relying on power, force"  49, p. 1483  .

From the perspective of criminal law, "property appropriation" is the act of intentionally illegally converting property under the management of the property owner into one's own property  40, p. 366  or "the act of intentionally illegally converting another person's property into one's own property or that of a group of people or for another person in whom one is interested"  1, p. 230  . Here, the concept of "management" can be understood as "looking after, preserving and monitoring something"  49, p. 1363  , "property owner" is understood to include the owner of the property or the person assigned to manage that property (through a civil transaction or according to the provisions of law, assigned the task of managing the property).

The act of appropriating property has the following characteristics:

Firstly , objectively, the act of appropriation is the act of making the property owner (the person who owns the property or the person who has the right to manage the property) completely lose the ability to exercise the right to possess, use, and dispose of his/her property and create for the appropriator the ability to illegally possess, use, and dispose of that property. Thus, appropriation in practice is the process of both making the property owner lose the property and creating for the appropriator the property. This process, legally speaking, does not make the owner lose his/her ownership but only makes him/her lose the ability to actually exercise the specific rights of ownership. The act of appropriation is expressed in different specific forms of behavior depending on the specific relationship between the appropriator and the appropriated property as well as on the specific form of appropriation.

Second , the property that is the subject of the act of appropriation must have the characteristic of still being in the possession, management and control of the property owner. If the property has escaped from the possession, management and control of

The owner of the property (which is lost) is no longer the subject of the act of appropriation. Only when the property is still in the possession of the owner can we speak of an act of appropriation, of an act that deprives the owner of the ability to possess the property.

Third , subjectively, appropriation is an act committed by the offender with intention, so the fault of the person committing the act of appropriation is direct intentional fault. The person committing the act of appropriation knows that the property appropriated is property under the management of someone but still wants to turn that property into his own property. Cases of mistakenly thinking that the property is his own property or that the property is not under the management of someone are not cases of appropriation.

Thus, the act of appropriation of property is considered to begin when the offender begins to take action to deprive the owner of the property of its ability to possess, in order to create that ability for himself. When the offender has mastered the appropriated property, then the act of appropriation is considered to be completed, the offender is considered to have appropriated the property. The sign of appropriation can be the purpose of appropriation, the act of appropriation or the appropriation.

"Coercion", according to the Vietnamese dictionary, "coercion" is "to force someone to do something they don't want to do"; "coercion" is "to seize by force"; "coercion" is "to use force or tricks to force someone into a position where they are forced to do something, even if they don't want to"  9, p.142  , [17, p.140  .

Threatening to use force is an act (by words or actions) that makes the threatened person fear that if he does not hand over his property to the offender, he will be attacked with physical force.

Other psychological intimidation methods are methods that the offender uses in addition to threatening to use force, and these methods will mentally intimidate the person with the property or the person responsible for the property, such as threatening to tell the victim's wife or husband about their spouse's adultery, threatening to denounce the crime or moral violation of the person with the property or the person responsible for the property...

In Vietnamese criminal law science, although there are many different ways of expressing it, basically all viewpoints agree on determining the content of the act of extortion of property.

In the Vietnamese Criminal Law Textbook - Crimes, published by Can Tho Publishing House in 2008, Dr. Pham Van Beo stated: "Extortion of property is the act of threatening to use force or other means to intimidate another person's spirit in order to appropriate property" [1, p. 159].

In the Vietnamese Criminal Law textbook of Hanoi Law University published by the People's Police Publishing House in 2002, the crime of Extortion is defined as follows: "The crime of extortion is the act of threatening to use force or other means to mentally intimidate another person in order to appropriate property" [40, p. 378].

However, there is a view that:

Extortion is the act of trying to make the owner of the property or the person responsible for the property afraid to hand over the property to the offender. Thus, the act of threatening to use force or other means to intimidate the spirit of another person that the offender commits is to appropriate property.

If the act of threatening to use force or other means to intimidate another person mentally but not with the aim of appropriating property, it is not a crime of extortion. Depending on the specific case, the person committing the act commits crimes such as: Forced suicide as prescribed in Article 100 of the Penal Code; Rape or child molestation as prescribed in Articles 113 and 114 of the Penal Code; forced marriage as prescribed in Article 146 of the Penal Code [27, p. 121].

Another point of view is that: "Extortion of property is when a person commits a crime with the purpose of appropriating another person's property by means of threatening to

using force or psychological intimidation against the owner, property manager or other relevant person" [6, p. 248]

It can be seen that, although there are many different ways of expressing it, the act of extortion is often understood as the act of threatening to use force or other means to mentally intimidate others in order to appropriate property.

From a criminal law perspective, extortion is essentially the act of threatening to use force or other means to intimidate another person in order to appropriate property. The act of threatening to use force or other means with the purpose of making the owner of the property afraid and forcing him to voluntarily transfer the property to the extortionist.

The basic characteristic of the crime of extortion is that the offender has intimidated the person responsible for the property by threatening to use force or other means to make the person responsible for the property afraid and reluctantly hand over the property to the offender.

The difference between the crime of extortion and other crimes of appropriation is that after the owner of the property is threatened with violence and other means of mental intimidation, the owner of the property, out of fear of affecting his life, health, honor, and dignity, will voluntarily transfer the property to the extortionist. Most of the transferred properties will be carried out through a civil transaction, so the transferred property will be considered legal if there is no denunciation from the extorted persons.

From the above analysis, on the basis of selectively absorbing reasonable points in the concepts of property extortion and issues that have been tested by practical application of the law, the crime of property extortion can be understood by the following concept: The crime of property extortion is a crime prescribed in the Penal Code, committed by a person with criminal responsibility capacity and reaching the legal age with the fault of intentionally directly infringing on the right to own property of others by acts of threatening to use force or

The act of mentally intimidating the owner, property manager or other relevant person in order to appropriate property.

1.1.3. The significance of the provision of the crime of extortion in Vietnamese criminal law

In recent years, along with the development of the market economy, the crime situation has also become very complicated, especially for groups of crimes that violate property with the nature of appropriation. Therefore, the criminal law policy of our country has also changed to suit the reality of social life. Violations and handling of violations of criminal law are two different categories but have a close relationship and affect each other. Only on the basis of handling violations of the law strictly, correctly, accurately, objectively, and in accordance with the law can we ensure social justice. If the handling of violations is not strict, not in accordance with the nature and level of danger to society of the violation, it will create a mentality of contempt for sanctions, indifference to the law or pessimism, discouragement, and loss of faith in justice, then the purpose of punishment will not only not be achieved but also be counterproductive.

Therefore, like other crimes, the approach to handling the crime of extortion must ensure the principle that all criminal acts must be detected promptly, handled quickly and fairly according to the law; not only to punish criminals but also to educate them to become useful people for society, conscious of obeying the law and the rules of life, preventing them from committing new crimes; thereby educating others to obey and respect the law; fighting to prevent and combat crimes.

1.2. OVERVIEW OF THE HISTORY OF FORMATION AND DEVELOPMENT OF VIETNAMESE CRIMINAL LAW ON THE CRIME OF EXTORTION OF PROPERTY

Over thousands of years of building and defending the country, our people have achieved many important achievements in building and perfecting a democratic country.

An independent and autonomous country with a creative legal system, suitable to the specific conditions and circumstances of each historical period. Since the establishment of the first Van Lang State, through the feudal dynasties, our country's criminal law has been increasingly consolidated, developed and perfected until today. Due to the limited collection and selection of archival documents, the study of the history of the provisions of Vietnamese criminal law in general, as well as the crime of extortion of property in particular, through the periods is not really complete; therefore, within the scope of the thesis, the author only tries to mention some aspects of the formation and development of the provisions of Vietnamese criminal law on the crime of extortion of property, under the historical periods in which the country's criminal legislation techniques reached the most prominent level of development.

Recognizing the role of criminal law in protecting the ownership regime to consolidate and maintain social order, protect the legitimate rights and interests of the State and other legal entities, our feudal dynasties used criminal law to handle acts of infringement of ownership rights.

During the Early Le Dynasty, the peak of which was the reign of King Le Thanh Tong, the National Dynasty Penal Code (Hong Duc Code) was promulgated, which included nearly 50 articles to establish regulations to protect the feudal ownership regime.

Regarding the act of extortion, Article 436 of the Code stipulates: "Threatening someone to take property is considered theft, reduced by one level. Even if the threat is not scary, but the person who has the property is still afraid and has to give it away, then the person who takes the property must do the same. If the property is not taken, the punishment is 60 strokes of the cane and 24 demotion" [47].

It can be said that, although there is not yet a clear legal concept, these are the first provisions in our country's criminal law in which the signs in the objective behavior of the crime of extortion of property have been mentioned. In particular, the legislators at that time had quite accurate descriptions of the practical conditions of our country at that time. The act of extortion in the case of

This crime is considered less serious than regular theft, the purpose of recording this crime is to protect the property rights of subjects at risk of being violated by criminals.

1.2.1. The period from the success of the August Revolution in 1945 to before the first codification - the 1985 Penal Code

After the success of the August Revolution in 1945, the young worker-peasant state actively carried out legislative work in general and criminal law in particular to strengthen state management by law and protect the achievements of the Revolution. Along with the promulgation of Decrees on combating other types of crimes, for crimes against property, our state issued Decree No. 26/SL dated February 25, 1946 regulating the punishment of the crime of destroying public property; Decree No. 233/SL dated January 17, 1946 on the punishment of the crime of corruption and embezzlement of public funds. The Prime Minister issued Circular No. 442/TTg dated January 19, 1955 guiding the Courts to punish a number of crimes against property such as theft, robbery, fraud, and breach of trust. However, in legal documents of this period, it shows that the crime of extortion has not been mentioned as an independent crime and has not been clearly defined.

On June 15, 1956, the President signed Decree No. 267/SL to punish plots to sabotage State, Cooperative and people's property, hindering the implementation of policies and plans for economic and cultural development. Although the content of this Decree did not define extortion as a specific crime, the objective acts of this crime were mentioned and instructions on how to handle them were similar to the crimes of robbery and snatching.

In order to gradually improve the law, meet the requirements of national management and concretize the work of fighting and preventing crimes against property in the new situation, on October 21, 1970, the Standing Committee of the National Assembly passed the Ordinance on Punishing Crimes Against Socialist Property and

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