The paper aims to reveal the features of the current norms of criminal legislation and the law enforcement practice on parole in Russia and the Republic of Lithuania. Some scholars (P. N. Panchenko, S. I. Kurganov, V. I. Radchenko, et al.) see the essence of punishment in coercion. This is fully consistent with Article 43 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, according to which punishment is a measure of state coercion. Coercion is a necessary feature of criminal punishment since it is usually carried out against the will of the punished person, who is obliged to obey the court’s decision. Another group of authors (M. V. Yuyukina, Yu. I. Skuratov, V. M. Lebedev, I. Ya. Kozachenko, and Z. A. Neznamova) indicate the presence of state coercion but do not highlight it as essential. The author analyzes the legal nature of parole, including a comparison with the positions of law enforcement. The author substantiates the position that parole terminates the legal relationship associated with the execution of the sentence and imposes obligations of probationary nature on the convicted person. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.