The Empirical Study Of The Pilot Reform On Standardization Of Sentencing Procedure

This thesis is composed of three parts besides an introduction and a conclusion.The first part explores the present situation of the pilot reform on standardization of sentencing procedure objectively from the normative and practical perspective respectively. Centering on the pilot experiences of Y court together with relevant pilot texts, this part describes objectively, from the normative perspective, such contents as putting forward the sentencing recommendations by procuratorial authority, informing the defendant the right to defense in sentencing, informing the procedure participants the participation of sentencing procedure, the operation of three kinds of trial procedure on sentencing, and the rules on sentencing evidences, sentencing appraisal, sentencing reasoning. In order to summarize the pilot experience comprehensively, the following explores, from the practical perspective, the present situation of the pilot reform on standardization of sentencing procedure by the methods of case analysis, audit viewing, data statistics, individual interview and questionnaire, which will lay an objective foundation to the following parts.The second part analyzes, on the basis of the first part, achievements and problems of the pilot reform on standardization of sentencing procedure. The achievements are listed as follows: (1) the quality of trial and judicial credibility has been improved and social evaluation is good; (2) the workload is heavier, but which do not have apparent impact on the efficiency of criminal trial; (3) the sentencing procedure is more open, and the sentencing defense has been protected at a certain extent; (4) the supervision of discretion of the judge has been consolidated, which helps prevent the"invisible corruption"; (5) the judge's sentencing consciousness has been improved, the same as the judge's judicial ability. Although such reform has obtained a lot of achievements, it has been discovered many problems as such reform goes deeper. At present, the main problems are as follows: (1) the victim can not participate the sentencing procedure effectively; (2) the sentencing recommendation is not regular enough; (3) the debate on sentencing is insufficient, and the right to defense has not been protected well; (4) the operation of trial procedure on sentencing is not reasonable enough; (5) there is no rules governing sentencing evidences, and it is hard to get evidences for sentencing; (6) the sense of analysis on sentencing is not adequate and sentencing reasoning is not sufficient.The third part makes a further prospective study on the pilot reform of sentencing procedure. It firstly demonstrates the superiority of the approaches of the sentencing procedure, then analyzes the system background of the reform, and finally puts forward six suggestions on pilot reform. This article argues that, compared with entity approaches, the procedure approaches have certain advantages. At the same time of constantly improving the entity approaches of the sentencing justice, the reform shall put focus on the procedure approaches. For the purpose of achieving the openness and justice of sentencing, the reform shall, on the consideration of the concrete practice of China's criminal justice system, establish reasonable and feasible sentencing procedure to restrain the discretion of the judge.