증인진술서에 의한 진술과 위증죄의 성립 - 대상판결 : 대법원 2010. 5. 13. 선고 2007도1397 판결 -

Abstract

The Witness Written Statement system, was introduced, following the amendments of the Korean Civil Procedure Code on January 26th, 2002and of the Korean Civil Procedure Regulation on June 28th, 2002, with clear legal grounds as opposed to Japan. It is widely used in the civil procedure. The testimony of a witness who swears under oath is warranted a certain amount of credibility by the prospect of a perjury charge if a false testimony is given. However, in the case of witness written statements, whether the credibility of the written statements can be warranted by perjury has been an issue constantly discussed. As the Korean Supreme Court has recently delivered a case regarding the witness written statement system, in which it defined the meaning of a statement made through the witness written statement system and whether it may constitute perjury, the need to examine the problems of the current system and to summarize possible solutions with a focus on this finding, appeared. In conclusion, because the above judgment held that a 'statement' as a components of perjury must be 'made specifically in court', one cannot be punished for perjury even if he testifies in court that "the written statements are true" when the contents of the written statement are actually false. If the testimony of "my written statement is true" is unlikely to be subject to perjury under the current criminal law, then complementary legislation that punishes willful testimonies under oath vouching for the integrity of false written statements is urgent. This paper examines the necessity of such complementary legislation and remedial measures.