The crime of smuggling refers to the act of intentionally violating the Customs Law and other relevant laws and administrative regulations, evading customs supervision, illegally transporting, carrying, and mailing goods and articles prohibited from entering or leaving the country and other goods and articles that are subject to customs duties and taxes collected by the customs at the import stage, as well as selling bonded goods and specific tax-exempt goods in the country for profit without the permission of the customs and without paying the taxes payable, with a large quantity and serious circumstances. Its constituent elements are as follows.
① The object of the crime of smuggling is the supervision and management system of the state’s foreign trade. In order to safeguard the sovereignty and economic interests of the state, my country has formulated a series of laws and administrative regulations such as the Customs Law and the Foreign Trade Law of the People’s Republic of China, forming a unified foreign trade supervision and management system. In order to make illegal profits, the perpetrator violates the laws of my country and illegally transports, carries, and mails goods and articles that are prohibited or restricted from import or export by the state or that are subject to customs duties and taxes collected by the customs at the import stage, undermining my country’s foreign trade system and impacting and affecting the healthy development of my country’s economy. This is the essential feature of smuggling crimes that distinguishes them from other crimes that undermine the socialist market economic order.
The objects of smuggling crime, that is, the smuggled goods and articles, are mainly divided into the following four categories:
The first category, taxable goods and articles, refers to goods and articles that should pay tariffs and other import customs collections in accordance with the provisions of the Customs Law.
The second category, goods and articles that are prohibited or restricted from entering or leaving the country. The so-called “goods and articles prohibited from entering or leaving the country” refers to goods and articles that the country explicitly prohibits from entering or leaving the country through laws and administrative regulations. For example, weapons, ammunition, obscene articles, drugs, and animals and plants and their products from overseas epidemic areas that are prohibited from import by the state. The so-called “goods and articles restricted from entering and leaving the country” refers to goods and articles that need to be approved and issued by the relevant competent departments of the state in advance according to the provisions of national laws and administrative regulations, and are imported and exported on the basis of relevant licenses. For example, refined oil, automobiles, grain, hazardous chemicals, etc.
The third category, bonded goods, refers to goods that are approved by the customs to enter the country without going through tax procedures, and are stored, processed, and assembled in the country before being re-exported.
The fourth category, specific tax-exempt goods and articles, refers to goods and articles that are tax-exempt or tax-free and are used in specific areas, specific enterprises, and specific purposes according to law.
②The objective aspect of the crime of smuggling is the behavior of the perpetrator violating the Customs Law and other relevant laws and administrative regulations, evading customs supervision, and with serious circumstances. Specifically, the first is violation of the Customs Law and relevant national laws and administrative regulations, the second is evading customs supervision, and the third is serious circumstances. The three aspects are inseparable and indispensable.
③The subject of the crime of smuggling is a general subject, which can be a natural person or a unit.
According to the relevant provisions of my country’s Criminal Law, a natural person who has reached the age of 16, as long as he has criminal responsibility, whether he is a citizen of the country, a foreign citizen, or a stateless person, whether he is an ordinary citizen or a state agency staff member, may become the subject of the crime of smuggling. The subject of the smuggling crime unit refers to a company, enterprise, institution, agency, and group that is established in accordance with the law, commits smuggling crimes, and bears criminal responsibility in accordance with the law.
④ The subjective intention of the crime of smuggling is intentional, including direct intention and indirect intention. That is, when the perpetrator transports, carries, or mails goods or articles in or out of the country, he knows that his behavior will result in harm to society, but he hopes or allows such a result to happen. Negligent behavior does not constitute a smuggling crime.