What Article 142 actually covers
Article 142 of the Administrative Offences Code of Georgia deals with the manufacture and use of radio transmitting devices without a permit. The provision is short, which is precisely why it repays careful reading: the offence is built on two acts — making the device and using it — carried out where the permit the activity requires does not exist. If a report has been drawn up against you under this article, the argument will usually turn on whether the specific device had a lawful basis, and on how your own conduct relates to that basis.
In practice the article reaches very different people. A radio amateur who assembled a transmitter at home, a small business that installed a repeater at its premises, a technician who merely operated somebody else's equipment — all three can find the same article cited against them, although the facts are not alike. That is why the factual description matters more here than the legal label: it decides whether the question of liability arises against you at all.
The sanction the law provides
Article 142 provides for a fine of between 10 and 30 minimum amounts of labour remuneration, together with confiscation of the radio transmitting device. Both limbs matter, and they have to be read together rather than separately.
- the fine is not expressed in lari in the article at all — it is set as a multiple of the minimum amount of labour remuneration, from 10 to 30;
- it is a range and not a fixed figure, so there is room between the lower and the upper limit;
- the fine is accompanied by confiscation of the device, which the article sets out as a consequence attaching to the penalty.
The article names no sum in lari. If someone quotes you a precise figure, that figure does not come from Article 142 — it follows from the conversion rule that sits outside this provision. On this page we state what the article itself states, and nothing beyond it.
Confiscation is often the heavier consequence
Most people who receive a report of this kind think first about the money. In practice the confiscation of the equipment is frequently the more serious outcome, particularly where the device is expensive, purpose-built, or central to how a business operates. Confiscation removes the property itself, and paying the fine does not, of itself, undo that.
Ownership is worth thinking about early. Equipment used at a site is not always owned by the person operating it, and the article does not resolve for you what happens when those are two different people. If the device belongs to someone other than the person named in the report, that has to be raised as a distinct point and supported with documents, rather than assumed to follow automatically from whatever happens to the fine. The same logic applies where the equipment is leased or held for temporary use: locate the contract and the handover record before you commit a position to writing.
How the case unfolds in practice
The text of Article 142 describes conduct and a penalty. It says nothing about which body handles the case, how long you have to respond, or what the decision must contain. Those questions are governed by the general part of the Code and by other provisions, so this page will not invent a deadline or an authority for you — both have to be taken from the document actually served on you and from the procedural rules that apply to it.
The practical conclusion is straightforward. Read the report or the decision closely, note the exact wording of the conduct alleged against you, note what is said about the device itself, and do not let time run while you decide what to do. Administrative offence proceedings move on their own schedule, and a position taken late is worth considerably less than the same position taken on time. It also matters that whatever you say when giving an explanation becomes part of the case material: a remark that sounds harmless in the moment is difficult to correct afterwards.
Where representation changes the outcome
Bringing in a lawyer guarantees nothing, and nobody can promise you that a penalty will fall away. What representation does is narrow the case down to the questions the article actually poses, and then put those questions properly and with evidence behind them.
- whether a permit was required at all for this specific device, judged on its real technical characteristics;
- whether the equipment answers the description of a radio transmitting device in the sense the article uses that term;
- who manufactured it and who used it, and whether the report attributes the right act to the right person;
- where within the range of 10 to 30 the penalty should sit, given the circumstances of the case;
- whether the confiscation reaches property that in fact belongs to a third party.
What to bring to a consultation
A first meeting is far more productive when the documents are already in front of the lawyer. It helps to bring the following.
- The report or decision in full, with every annex and the date it was served on you.
- Technical documentation for the device: manual, power output and frequency data, model and serial numbers.
- Proof of purchase and anything that establishes who owns the equipment.
- Any correspondence or application concerning a permit, if such exists.
- Photographs of the site and of how the equipment was installed.