The lawyer warned about fines for taking out a large number of packages from the supermarket

Unauthorized removal of a large number of free packages from a store may qualify as petty theft and entail administrative or criminal liability. Ilya Rusyaev, a lawyer and founder of the Rusyaev Club business community, told Izvestia about this on April 22.

"The packages in the sales area remain the property of the store until the buyer has used them strictly for packaging his current purchase. If a person tears off a roll or takes a pack off the counter, the further fate of this property goes under the rules of theft," he said.

According to the expert, if a person takes packages in excess of the amount required for packaging goods, such actions can be considered as the gratuitous seizure of someone else's property. In this case, the qualification of petty theft applies.

The expert stressed that the responsibility depends on the total cost of the packages taken out. If the amount is up to 1,000 rubles, a fine, administrative arrest, or compulsory labor are possible. If the cost exceeds 2.5 thousand rubles, the actions may qualify as theft under a criminal article.

He added that the law does not specify a specific number of packages for which liability occurs. The key factors are cost, the lack of consent of the store and the presence of intent to seize property.

According to Rusyaev, in order to be held accountable, it is necessary to record the fact that the packages belong to the outlet and the possibility of disposing of them without payment.

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Sofya Lukinova, head of the Legal department at VMT Consult, said on April 9 that peeling onions in a store without buying a product could be considered damage to the onion and result in administrative liability. If the visitor decides to take out the cleaned product without paying for it in full, this may qualify as petty theft.