Perfection Of Criminal Compulsory Medical Decision Procedure In China

The criminal compulsory medical procedure is a mandatory treatment measure implemented for mentally ill individuals who are at social risk and have no criminal responsibility.Compared with ordinary criminal cases,criminal compulsory medical cases do not receive much attention.After China’s criminal compulsory medical procedure was written into the Criminal Procedure Law in 2012,it enriched the legislative system and provided guidance for judicial practice.In 2018,the Criminal Procedure Law continued relevant provisions and basically achieved the legalization of criminal compulsory medical treatment.However,due to the deviation of legislative understanding,the program focuses on defending society in terms of legislative purpose,and the litigation concept of the program has not been consistently applied throughout the program,resulting in the program presenting certain administrative characteristics.The interaction of two factors has led to many problems in the criminal compulsory medical decision-making process that need to be improved.Firstly,the scope of application of the criminal compulsory medical procedure is too narrow,and the applicable objects of the criminal compulsory medical procedure only include mental patients who have committed serious violent acts and have no criminal responsibility ability,but do not include mental patients who have limited criminal responsibility ability and mental patients who have committed non violent crimes and have no criminal responsibility ability,Such regulations cannot play the role of social defense in criminal compulsory medical procedures;The second issue is the formalization of the review of judicial psychiatric appraisal opinions by judges.Due to the fact that most judges do not have medical knowledge reserves,they can only conduct formal reviews of judicial psychiatric appraisal opinions,which leads to judges’ excessive trust in the appraisal results and excessive reliance on judicial psychiatric appraisal opinions;Thirdly,the evaluation criteria and criteria for social danger are vague.China’s laws do not uniformly stipulate the evaluation criteria for social danger,resulting in judges having greater discretion.This may lead to different judgments in the same case,which is not conducive to achieving judicial fairness;The fourth is that the victim’s right to participate in the procedure has not been guaranteed,and China’s laws and judicial interpretation do not clearly stipulate the victim’s right to participate in the procedure,which makes the victim’s rights in the criminal compulsory medical procedure in a shelved state,resulting in the victim’s rights and interests are vulnerable to damage.On the basis of comprehensive research on these issues,taking into account foreign experiences and the current judicial situation in China,corresponding solutions are proposed: firstly,expand the scope of application to include mental patients with limited criminal liability and those who have completely no criminal liability for nonviolent behavior in the scope of application of criminal compulsory medical procedures,in order to achieve the goal of social defense;The second is to strengthen the substantive review of judicial psychiatric appraisal opinions by judges,avoid excessive reliance on judicial psychiatric appraisal opinions by judges,and implement the principle of putting trial at the center;The third is to clarify the identification requirements of social danger,further improve the scientific and rational identification of social danger,and effectively implement fair justice;Fourthly,it is necessary to fully protect the right of victims to participate in the proceedings,so that they can effectively participate in court trials and safeguard their legitimate rights and interests.