Research On Relatives’ Theft

Theft occurs frequently in our daily life, severely disrupting the social order and infringing the interests of our people and nation, so both the criminal law of China and foreign country focus on combating it. The most important feature of theft is its frequency and property stealing. Some thefts may involved with stealing smaller property interests of victims, some may involved with stealing larger ones, but whether it is a large property interest or a small one, the masses hate this kind of behavior bitterly, strongly urging the relevant law enforcement organs to crack down on such illegal and criminal acts. Relatives’theft occurs between the relatives, compared with the general theft, subjective evil and dangerousness of perpetrators are relatively low, the ownership of stolen property often is not clear, while most victims do not want their relatives to subject to criminal sanctions, therefore, social harm and influence of relatives’theft are relatively small. It is because of those reasons that most countries and regions treat differently relatives’theft with a lighter attitude of leniency. After the foundation of PRC, two basic criminal laws of China did not make provision for relatives’theft, just made a general provision by way of judicial interpretation. Compared with Advanced and scientific relatives’theft system of Foreign and ancient China, there are many drawbacks on China’s current system of relatives’theft, which need improving and perfecting urgently.Firstly, The author discussed the provisions on relatives’theft of different countries. The author traced the origin of relatives’theft and discusses relatives’theft provisions of ancient China, the period of the Republic of China, new China, civil law system and common law system. Although most of the countries and regions make different rules on relatives’theft, the attitude towards offender’s are basically the same, that is to say, treat them with a lighter attitude of leniency. The author believed that the fundamental reason is that these countries and regions have a common legislative value orientation:take the harm to society as the bases of intervention of criminal law, maximize the penalty function, respect the wishes of the victims and protect human rights, and consider them as the legislative principles, build harmonious family relations and social relations.Secondly, the author discussed the characteristic of relatives’theft in the aspect of crime form, which is different form the common theft. The author expatiated these differences from three aspects:joint crime, the unfinished crime and cognition error in fact. The author thinks that one will be punished according to the rules of relatives’ theft if he steals property from his relations in collusion with strangers who will be punished according to the rules of common theft. In relatives’theft, offender and victim have relationship or live together, therefore the course of a crime in preparation isn’t usually exist in relatives’theft and the time of accomplishment of crime usually differ from that of common theft. The cognition errors in facts in relatives’theft mainly lie in two cases:the offender steals from their relatives or strangers, thinking of their identities by mistake. Whether to steal objects from relatives or strangers, so long as not going beyond the scope of the crime of theft, it constitutes theft, and will be dealed with according to common theft provisions.Lastly, the author discussed the shortcomings of Chinese relatives’theft system and gave some suggestions for improvement. The author began by describing the shortcomings of Chinese relatives’theft system. Compared with the advanced relatives theft system of the ancient China and foreign country, there are many flaws on Chinese relatives theft system, lie in that the relative range is narrow, convicted conditions is not clear, sentencing standards is unscientific, mitigation is difficulties, the victim is in a passive position, whether investigate for criminal responsibility of perpetrators. Then the author put forward some suggestions on improving the legal system of Chinese relatives’theft based on legislative experience of relatives’theft system of China and foreign country. Suggestions for improvement include expanding range of actors of relatives’theft, investigating for perpetrators of criminal responsibility clearly and specially, a case chargeable only upon complaint, and prescribe the problems of conviction and punishment according Penal Code.