On Issues Concerning Drunk Driving Crime

With the development of social economy, the popularity of automobiles israpidly increasing. The traffic accidents, especially accidents arisen fromdrunk driving, happen in high frequency and threat people’s safety. Duringthe past several years, some cases (for example the case of Li Qiming, SunWeiming, and etc.) of drunk driving caught media’s attention. The cases werehyped up by the media in unreasonable way, which cause people’s doubt on thejurisdiction and government’s administration. The public trust and socialstabilization were challenged. At the National People’s Congress and thePeople’s Political Consultative Conference in2010, Shi Jie, a member ofCPPCC and a lawyer, submitted a proposal for adding a crime for dangerousdriving into Criminal Law. He insisted that it was necessary for a countrywith long history of Liquor Culture to legislate in accordance with the comingof automobile age. On May1st, Dangerous Driving became a new crime and wasincluded in Criminal Law, one behavior of which is drunk driving.The author mainly discusses the drunk driving of the crime of DangerousDriving in this paper and brings forth some opinions through analyzing typicalcases occurs in the past one year. This paper comprises in five parts:The first part of the paper analyzes the background and importance to putdrunk driving into crime on the basis of similar legal provisions in foreign countries.The second part of this paper is to discuss the criminal pattern of drunkdriving. By means of analyzing the criminal pattern of damage offence, itconcludes that as a kind of abstract potential damage offense, drunk drivinghas the criminal pattern of criminal preparation, discontinuance of crime andattempt of crime.The third part discusses the conditions of joint offence in drunk driving,including drinking together both in omission and positive action, instigatingaccident maker escaping and harboring the criminal. This paper also discussesthe measure for punish and convict such behaviors.The fourth part is the most important of this paper. The author analyzesthe controvertible question that whether all kinds of drunk driving shall beincluded by Criminal Law. By reviewing Clause13of Criminal Law and explainingthe meanings of “roads”,“night drinking”,“act of rescue” and“justifiable defense”, the author concludes that it is improper to includeall kinds of drunk driving into Criminal Law.The fifth part of this paper provides some suggestions regarding drunkdriving crime, including the meaning and the scope of drunk driving,connection with laws and regulations. The author also put forwards his pointof view on extent for measurement of punishment and discretionarycircumstances of sentencing for drunk driving crime, hoping to be helpful forthe legislation of drunk driving crime.