강력범죄 피의자 신상공개제도에 대한 비판적 검토

Abstract

Our country maintained the posture of disclosing the identity of violent crime suspects in detail until the 1990s. In the wake of a female middle schooler sex violence incident at Miryang in 2004, personal information of assailant students was disclosed, prompting the controversy on human rights violation, and police, in order to protect human rights of the suspects, avoided the identity disclosure for the suspects by covering them with caps and masks. As in October 4, 2005, 'Rules of Police Officers for Human Rights Protection' and ‘Regulations for Human Rights Protection’ were enacted, investigation agencies began not to disclose personal information of suspects such as face. And National Human Rights Commission of the ROK also ruled that disclosure of the identity of suspects in the course of investigation prior to indictment violated personality rights and portrait rights. But as, around 2010, violent crimes repeatedly continued to take place, public opinion was again in favor of disclosing the identity of suspects. Particularly Chosun Ilbo and Joongang Ilbo disclosed the face of Kang XSun in January 31, 2009, breaking the practice of not disclosing the identity of the suspects until being found guilty. This triggered the controversy about disclosing the face of suspects. Then, in March 2010, the face of Kim XTae was disclosed in many media outlets, resulting in the disclosing the identity of suspects as a practice. Positively reflecting people's sentiments and media's movement as such, the National Assembly newly enacted Clause 8-2 ‘Special Cases regarding Punishment of Certain Violent Crimes’ to prepare the base regulation regarding the disclosure of suspect’s face. The issue of whether or not to disclose the identity of violent crime suspects as above has become the national interest whenever a specific incident took place. And as a matter of fact, currently plenty of legal and policy-wise issues are being pointed out in the process of the enforcement. Under the circumstances, this study sought to point out the issues in detail focused on the content and operating state of the current system of disclosing the identity of violent crime suspects. ① Related with the principle of presumption of innocence ② Related with inconsistent disclosure focused on the criteria of judgment, the main principal of judgment, period of going public, method of going public ③ Related with the purpose of the identity disclosure system focused on guaranty of people's right to know, prevention of repeated crimes, prevention of crimes, finding of additional criminal facts ④ Related with due process focused on lack of securing appeal right, lack of control by the judiciary, formality of defining the system, causing harm to the suspect's family. The study, rather than suggesting the reasonable methods to improve the current system, ultimately would like to argue in favor of complete abolition of the current system of disclosing the identity of violent crime suspects.