변사사건 처리의 형사절차상 문제점 및 개선방안 - 경찰의 변사사건 처리 절차를 중심으로 -

Abstract

The investigation of the cause of death in modern countries is not only a judicial procedures to determine criminal involvement, but also extends to administrative purpose or civil areas such as public safety, public health, epidemic prevention, and insurance relations. These changes are seen as a contribution to the protection of public rights through prompt decision of the cause of death as well as efforts to uncover the criminal death. However, the postmortem investigation system mainly with judicial autopsy by investigative agencies has various problems such as lack of expertise, ambiguity of terminology related to the postmortem inspection in the law, unclear object, and lack of forensic experts. It is expected to be difficult to make solutions in the short term due to various challenges such as manpower, budget, and coordination of authority between agencies. Therefore, in this study, we try to find effective improvement measures as follows through a comparative legal examination in the procedure of postmortem cases by the police who are mostly in charge of the investigation. First, most of the terminology in the laws and regulations related to the postmortem inspection of the unknown is mostly abstract and unspecific and the object of the inspection tends to be expanded as it descends to lower statute, which may infringe on the basic rights of the deceased and the bereaved. Therefore, it is necessary to narrow the scope of judicial investigation. Second, the inspection is for the unknown body and it is conducted by the order of the prosecutor under the current law. However, there is no subject to determine whether it is unknown or not, so it is essential to prepare legal ground to the administrative postmortem investigation by the police to find out the unknown and criminal death together. Third, in the case of accepting postmortem inspection by the police into the law, it is necessary to establish a how to secure expertise to recognize the external credibility of the current postmortem inspector in police agencies for the expertise and responsibility of the inspection and to secure an organic linkage system with a forensic medical examiner or forensic pathologist and legal stability.