On The Application Of The Death Penalty

The formation of policies of death penalty is under rules' control. Mao Zedong's thought on death penalty may be summarized as killing few and careful. According to the thought, China made the policy of retaining and restricting death penalty. 1979 criminal law embodied the policy distinctly. But after 1979, crimingal legislation pursued the policy of enlarging and laying stress to death penalty. Now we should stick to the policy of restricting death penalty.The applicati9n of death penalty should follow the following principles: the principle of purples; the principle of justice; the principle of humanity; the principle of cost. The principle of purpose demands that the application of death penalty should be suited to special prevention and general prevention. The principle of justice demands that the application of death penalty should be suited to the gravity of crime. The principle of humanity demands criminals should be treated as a human being. The principle of cast is to use the least penalty cost to procure the most penalty benefit.The 48~th article of Chinese criminal law stipulates that death penalty is only applicable to the criminals who commit extremely serious crimes. That is the macrocriterion for the application of death penalty. Two points can be consulted to judge whether crimes are extremely serious. One is that abjective harmfulness is extremely serious; the other is that subjective madlignancy of Criminals is extremely odious.The concrete criterions for the application of death penalty include: criminal amount; criminal object; criminal subjec; criminal result and the quality of behavior.There are some problems with review procedure of death penalty. The problems include: simple concrete procedure; sealed review process; centralized review subject; different cretirions for death penalty, and weak relief right of defendants. The first question to reform and consummate review procedure of death penalty is to abandon the traditional sense of power and efficiency first, stick to the sense of guaranteeing human fights and just procedure and design a set of scientific procedure rules. Trying model of review procedure of death penalty must be rebuilt. Trying deadline of review procedure of death penalty must be clear. Supervision mechanism for review procedure of death penalty must be consummated.