On The Issues And Countermeasures In The Application Of Civil Suit Collateral To Criminal Proceedings

As a kind of legal relief system, the system of incidental civil action plays a positive role in safeguarding judicial justice and effectively protecting the legitimate interests of persons involved. However, along with the continuous increase of people's legal consciousness, the existing legal rules bring perplexity to more people and also bring inconvenience for the specific work of judicial staff. Persons involved, especially victims, strongly desire that their civil interests can be protected by criminal law. Based on the above understanding, structure of this thesis is arranged by the author as below:This thesis is divided into the following three parts:Part-1, the meaning and current situation of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings are expounded with the emphasis on in this part. It is made clear that the civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings refers to that during criminal proceedings, the people's court not only solves the criminal responsibility of accused person, but also incidentally solves the compensation for damage caused by their criminal behaviors at the same time. For the time being, the following are included in the request scope of incidental civil action: the material damage suffered from personal rights are violated by criminal behaviors and the material damage suffered from property is destroyed by criminal offender, while the spiritual damages compensation for victims is not included in it.Part-2, list the issues existing in the application of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings in detail. First of all, the uncertain hearing scope of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings in judicial practice. Superficially, the right relief for criminal victims has relatively sufficient legal grounds. However, after surveying each legal rule, it can be found that the specific provisions concerning the civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings proposed by victims are conflicted with each other so as to lead to the emptiness of the rights of civil compensation received by the victims of partial criminal cases. The definition of compensation scope is relatively vague. For instance, in judicial practice, it is often difficult to differentiate destruction and occupation, disposal. Plaintiffs are strongly reacted for the issue of excluding mental damage awards. The victims of criminal cases usually suffer deeper mental damages from criminal behaviors than that from civil trespass, such as the intentional injury of disfigurement, rape, insulting, slander etc., material damages are often insignificant, so it can't satisfy the expectation of victims and their families for only compensating material damage.Next, the cases of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings have the problem of difficult to hear, which is mainly reflected on the two aspects of short limitation of hearing and difficult to mediate. Because among the criminal cases accepted by grass-roots courts, intentional injury case and traffic accident case are in the majority, this kind of case is usually simple, basically, facts and evidences also have no disputes, and it is easy to hear criminal part, so summary procedure is often adopted to hear. However, because it needs a long time to hear and mediate the part concerning civil matters, exceeding legally prescribed time limit for trial is particularly prominent. Moreover, in judicial practice, generally, the successful mediation of supplementary civil compensation is taken as one circumstance of sentencing discretion by judges to give a lesser punishment for accused person, especially for some criminal cases with minor offense, such as light harm, traffic accident, conversion and fraud cases with small amount, there are large percentage to sentence probation. Even for some cases of severe damage, accused person will also be sentenced probation for reaching agreement through mediating and fulfilling its functions well. It is easy to make people form the notion of buying abatement of penalty with money, so judges are in a dilemma during mediation.Last, there is also the problem of difficult to implement in practice. Because quite a few of accused person embark on the criminal road for economic difficulty, few of property can be implemented after offence. For the person subject to enforcement who has already been passed a sentence, it is also difficult to pay back debt by depending on one's own financing ability. The family members who have the obligation to compensate also will collide with compensation for accused person was sentenced, it is very difficult to implement the case of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings. The existing property preservation system and prejudgment execution system are made useless. Because of the rights can't be realized caused by the above reasons, the plaintiffs of incidental civil action often choose appeal to the higher authorities for help under the condition of no way out.Part-3, focus on analyzing the countermeasures for dealing with the issues in the application of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings. First of all, make clear the acceptance scope of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings. Firstly, persons involved should be given procedural option, which stipulates that after suffering losses because of criminal behavior, victims can not only propose it incidentally in criminal proceedings, but also can separately file a lawsuit to civil court after completing the investigation of criminal case. Secondly, it is stipulated that persons involved can not only institute incidental civil action for the economic losses suffered from personal injury or destroyed property, but also can make claim for indemnification for properties are illegally possessed or squandered by offenders. Thirdly, it is made clear that the emotional damages caused by criminal behaviors can also be instituted together. Fourthly, enlarge the subject of duty to inform the rights of victims and focus on completing the informing system for the two links of investigation and examination. Thus, ensure victims to make clear their rights and prepare early, and guarantee civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings make good play.Next, propose the countermeasures for solving difficult hearing. In connection with the issue of short limitation of hearing, raise the proposition that simplified criminal cases should be allowed to extend 60 days for trial time after the approval of the president of the court; in connection with the issues of difficult to mediate, it should correctly process the relationship between compensation and the measurement of penalty measurement, for specific, consult the relevant regulations concerning the judicial policy of alternating leniency with severity for the implement of criminal cases issued by Supreme People's Court. It is emphasized that during the process of mediation, insist on that the amount of civil compensation should not be simply linked with the extent of punishment measure on the lenient side, but synthetically determine it according to the motive, initiative and the ability of actual performance of accused person's participating in mediation as well as the degrees of mistakes of both parties, along with combining specific cases. If fail to mediation, don't give a severe punishment.Last, in order to effectively relieve that the cases of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings are difficult to implement, it is proposed to establish property status investigation and file transfer system. In virtue of the power of investigating organ, starting from the criminal cases are investigated and put on record, the investigating organ should investigate the property status of criminal suspect who are probably instituted incidental civil action, adopt registration measure, draw up clear statement, without the allowance of illegally dispose of property, and transfer the investigation and registration conditions to subsequent organs along with the files, which lay foundations for future implementation. After court accepts and hears a case, establish the operational mode of property preservation-orientation adopted by people's court and the active cooperation by public security organ and people's procuratorate. When the rights of plaintiffs still can't be realized after court ends its implementing measures, it stands in need of establishing the system of state compensation to victims, according to practical situations, establish the compensation system which gives priority to forfeited proceeds of crime, paid fine, the personal property from confiscating offenders etc. and is supplemented by state tax revenue.The system of civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings is a problem of great value to investigate, because in theoretical circles, there is not an unified cognition for civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings on many aspects, and the provisions of existing laws and judicial interpretations are relatively general and vague, there are still some contradictions among the specific contents of each specification, people call out legislators to further standardize civil suit collateral to criminal proceedings.