아동학대범죄의 예방과 대책을 위한 과제

Abstract

Recently, child abuse cases have been increasing steadily, and the aspects have been transformed into violent crimes such as serious injury and murder, beyond mere physical and mental abuse, causing serious social problems. The problem is that most offenders of child abuse are their parents. As a result, it is the case that protection of the a household is more concerned with than the punishment of the offenders, which repeats the vicious cycle that leads to the second crime. The government recognizing its seriousness enacted the Act on Special Cases Concerning The Punishment, etc. of Child Abuse Crimes (hereinafter referred to as "Special Act") in January 2014, centering on the two axes of severe punishment of the offender and protection of the victim. Nevertheless, the child abuse is on the increase and victims of abuse are not adequately protected. As a result, the victims of child abuse are suffering from the second harm such as anger control disorder, suicide attempt, depression, and social phobia. The problem is that the public opinion that the abuser should be severely punished is widespread and legal penalties are strengthened whenever such child abuse case occurs. But they are still indifferent to the measures to protect victims of child abuse. In other words, the victims of child abuse who are isolated from their parents who are offenders at the same time have no place to go. Although the Special Act was enacted to solve these problems, it has had legislative limit since its enactment and still contains problems. So, it needs to be supplemented legislatively. Especially, the Special Act calls for urgent supplement as it only strengthen the punishment of the offenders and lacks measures to care for victims suffering from abuse. This study is to prepare for enactment and policy for prevention of the child abuse that is on the increase, punishment of the offender, and protection of the victims of child abuse. For this purpose, we are reviewing the foreign institutions wether there are parts that we can take and examining the problems contained in the Special Act. In particular, we will examine practical criminal justice for child abuse, and examine the way to build a more progressive institutional basis for more severe punishment of offenders of child abuse.