In the first reading, the Parliament of Georgia supported the draft law prepared by the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which tighten the regulations related to cold weapons.
According to legislative changes sanctions related to carrying of cold weapons are tightened. According to the amendment to the Code of Administrative Offenses, carrying a cold weapon will result in 500 GEL fine instead of 200 GEL. The confiscation of cold weapons will also be considered as part of new sanctions.
According to the draft law, repeated carrying of cold weapons will result in criminal responsibility of the person. Within the framework of the current legislation, criminal liability is considered only in case of committing the mentioned offense for the third time within one year.
In addition, the Criminal Code increases the penalty for carrying a cold weapon. In particular, for the Article 238(1) firsts part of the Criminal Code, imprisonment for a term of up to 2 years is provided as a sanction, instead of imprisonment for up to 6 months. The legal responsibility for the illegal carrying of a cold weapon by a person with criminal record becomes stricter - in this case, up to 4 years of imprisonment will be imposed.
According to the initiated draft law, the change is included in the definition of carrying cold weapons. In particular when a person possesses a cold weapon in such a way that it is possible to use it immediately, will be considered as carrying a cold weapon.
The above-mentioned change was initiated as a result of analyzing the practice of the last period. In particular, in January-September 2022, it was ascertained that in vast majority of murder cases, attempted murder and health damage, the weapon of crime was a cold weapon. The highest rate of knife crime - 53% - is recorded in cases of murder/attempted murder.
It should be noted that in January-September 2022, the police exposed the largest number of administrative offenses with carrying cold weapons (3289), and investigation was started on 417 cases related to illegal carrying of cold weapons.
