In the course of the research, the author discovered 31 criminal cases considered by Russian courts resulting in a non-rehabilitating decision due to causing death when providing first aid. At the same time, this phenomenon is mostly unknown to domestic researchers. The purpose of the paper is the criminal law assessment of the first aid provision by non-professional subjects. To achieve this goal, the following tasks were set: to establish the possibility of the presence of an extreme necessity in the provision of first aid; to establish conditions under which causing harm in the provision of such assistance does not entail criminal liability; to make proposals for eliminating defects in law enforcement and improving Russian legislation. To achieve these tasks, the author applied formal legal, formal dogmatic and statistical methods, as well as a set of general philosophical methods, including analysis, synthesis, deduction and induction. As a result of the study, cases of inconsistency of judicial practice with the norms of the domestic criminal law on extreme necessity were identified. Contrary to the arguments of some courts, when harm is caused during first aid, there may be some extreme necessity, exceeding which does not entail criminal liability for causing harm. The conclusions of the study are that the Russian criminal law on extreme necessity corresponds to the tasks facing the legislator; the problem lies in the insufficient understanding of its provisions by the judges. The author made proposals for reforming related provisions of the criminal law on the basis of the legislation of Canada and the United States.

The paper examines some problems of criminal law qualification of first aid — providing help in lifethreatening and health-threatening conditions before the provision of medical care by the individuals whose duties include providing such care. The author notes a significant imbalance in the coverage of this problem in comparison with studies on the topic of iatrogenic crime. The purpose of the paper is to identify the main problems of qualification of non-providing first aid by an individual obligated to provide such aid, as well as ways to solve them. Having studied a few scientific papers on this topic, having conducted a comprehensive analysis of domestic legislation, its historical, logical and linguistic interpretation, the author identified three main problems. The first problem is connected with the inclusion of the individuals who may and are obliged to provide first aid in the subject composition of Article 124 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation by many scholars (in addition to doctors): analysis of the logic of the development of domestic criminal and other legislation indicates the depravity of such a point of view. The second problem is related to the terminological disparity in the Russian law: to designate the duties of individuals who may and are obliged to provide first aid, various terms are used (“provide”, “ensure”, “take measures”). All these terms contain different scope of such obligations, which directly affects the criminal law qualification. To demonstrate this fact, an analysis of judicial practice for the period from 2010 to the 2020s was carried out, which made it possible to identify a third problem: unjustified imputation by the courts of failure to provide first aid. As their solution, in addition to organizational measures aimed at improving the skills of first aid subjects, courts and investigative bodies, the author proposes amendments to Article 124 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and the universalization of the norms of Russian law concerning first aid.