The Impact Of Criminal Victim’s Fault On Sentencing

Seeing from crime statistics data in recent years, we can acknowledge thatvictim’s fault is important factor to the crime. The offender and victim are two aspectsof crime. It can be said to some extent that, some crimes are the co-result of offenderand victim, victim plays a very important role in the occurrence and development ofcrime. It’s unfairness for the sentencing if only punishes the offender. Therefore in thecases that victim has fault, we should take it into consider, and the victim andoffender should share the responsibility. Accompany with the development of societyand the promotion of human rights movement, the traditional criminal principleshould also be changed. This requests that our attitude about the question that victim’sfault influence sentencing should be changed together with the change of criminalprinciple.However, the victim’s fault in our sentencing system does not attract the enoughattention. It is only regarded as discretionary matter in sentencing without unifiedmeasure standard. Hence the victim’s fault cause great problem in judicial practice.The earliest study of the victim’s fault behavior is victimology and criminology. Theirmain purpose is to prevent crimes and victimization by researching the behavior ofvictim’s fault. Later the criminal law theory also began to study the behavior of thevictims’ fault, it also considers that victim’s fault behavior can affect the offender’scriminal liability. Victim fault in criminology and criminal law is different. Victims’fault in criminology sometimes can not affect the offender’s sentencing, but it isdifferent in criminal law. The victim’s fault discuss in this paper is in criminal law.The first part of this paper is an overview of the victim’s fault, introducing theconcept, characteristics, and classification of it. The first chapter is a preliminaryintroduction to the basics knowledge of the victim’s fault. The second chapter mainlydiscuss the basis that victim’s fault influence sentencing. The mainstreamresponsibility sharing theory and condemnable reduction theory of criminal lawtheory analyze the reason that victim’s fault influence sentencing from differentpoints. Natural law philosophy also provides the legal basis of the victim’s faultinfluence sentencing. The third chapter is the key chapter of this paper, it mainly introduces how victim’s fault influence sentencing in judicial practice. This chapterstarts from the demarcation of victim’s fault; later introduces the position victim’sfault has in sentencing, and finally cites several related cases in judicial practice. Thefourth chapter describes the legislative status of victim’s fault. It introduces relevantlegislation in foreign and domestic respectively. It tries to get some enlightens fordomestic relevant legislation by analyzing different legislations in different regionsabout this system.The last chapter mainly introduces the idea to improve the legislation ofregarding victim’s fault as legal sentencing action. It separately introduces thenecessity of victim’s fault influence sentencing and the detail ways that victim’s faultinfluence sentencing. In the part of detailed idea statement, the writer puts forwardsuggestions in legislative and judicial normalization, further make the victim’s faultsystem more perfect. The conclusion part is a brief summary of this paper; it statesthe necessity and urgency of the legalization of victim’s fault. Taking advantage ofkinds of academic resources, the paper combs and researches the influence of victim’sfault in sentencing. By analyzing a variety of real cases occurred in the judicialpractice, the paper discusses the difference in the extent that different victim’s faulthas on sentencing, and then concludes the general rules victim’s fault has onsentencing. The writer hopes to promote the improvement of relevant criminal lawsby researching the foreign law’s stipulation of the influence victim’s fault has onsentencing and borrow their relevant experience.