On Social Investigation Reports About Criminal Justice

Criminal justice social investigation report system exists in many legal system more developed countries. Modern persistence investigation system began in the United States in the1840s. To the1980s, persistence investigation report in the United States had the fixed format. Common law countries say social investigation report system for persistence investigation report. And in the continental law system, it is called the personality survey system. Although appellation is different, the system has proved to have very good scientific and social effect in the theoretical research and practice application, and has got the recognition of the two common law countries. In our country, this system is currently only in the field of juvenile justice, which has not been out whether it can be promoted to adults judicial. This is because, on the one hand, there’s a lot of debate about whether the social investigation report itself has evidence attribute; on the other hand, the investigation report used only in the field of juvenile justice also has many shortcomings. For instance, the system has nott been reflected in the form of regulations and laws; and even if reflected in that form, most of the "stipulations" are too principle to have compulsion. What’s more, the survey subject’s uncertain and the investigation report quality’s not high cause the system can’t be widely used in adults criminal justice.However, the implementation of the social investigation report system really has very important significance. It is not only the need to realize the task of China’s criminal law, but also the need to make the sentencing more reasonable. Because nowadays, sentencing reform in our country is in boom time, and we more need to make a survey of "discretionary circumstances for sentencing" outside of "legal circumstances for sentencing ".Through the investigation of criminals’ circumstances, such as personal details, family background, crime motive, crime means, circumstances of the crime and the performance before and after crime, we can know its social harmfulness and put forward the resolve idea. It is not only important for measurement of penalty of being a reference, but also good for judges to make the proper punishment. Social investigation report can better reflect the public opinion, making sentencing no longer the judge’s patent, but can more fully reflect the demand of victims. This is also the need of judicial democratization.Therefore, it is necessary to promote the system to adults judicial field, regulate the survey subject, research contents, research program, survey reports’ review and use and establish the supervision and guarantee mechanism, so as to provide scientific reference to judge sentencing. One important thing to note is that for the system in juvenile justice has many problems,, it need to be solved step by step. So the system promotion and set up must be gradual, absorbing foreign advanced experience, combining with China’s national conditions to set out the social investigation report system which is suitable for our country.