장애인복지법상 진술조력인 제도의 현황과 개선방안

Abstract

Fully revised on January 27, 2021 and enforced on January 28, 2021, 「Article 59-16 of the Act of Welfare for persons with disabilities, support of statement assistants」 expands the participation of statement assistants for victims with disabilities and the target for selection of statement assistants, the target of support has been expanded from victims under the age of 13 or having difficulty in communicating with disabilities to victims of all crimes with disabilities, in addition to sexual violence and child abuse crimes, for the existing Sexual Violence Punishment Act and Child Abuse Punishment Act. Even investigative agencies have become obligated to carry out procedures such as confirming whether an assistant is selected, and notifying that they can be selected if the victim has difficulty in communicating and expressing opinions during the investigation. However, despite the expansion of the scope of support, the assistance system is limited to crime victims who have difficulty communicating, any help cannot be currently obtained where they need help concerning statement assistance unless they are crime victims. In this regard, the study suggests a plan for the rational operation of the revised statement assistant system. First, a professional statement assistant with practical experience and knowledge related to the disability must be selected and trained when selecting a statement assistant. Persons with disabilities show a significant difference from the general public in expressing their opinions, so a high level of expertise and skills are required when communicating with people with disabilities. Therefore, the divided institutional arrangement for the selection of specialized statement assistants for the persons with disabilities should be made first in the selection process of statement assistants. Second, the number of recipients of support for statement assistance should be expanded. By assisting the communication of suspects, defendants, testifiers, and witnesses who lack communication skills during the course of investigation and trial, it would. protect the human rights of those who complain for injustice with distorted statements due to lack of assistance. Third, it is necessary to expand and recruit the number of assistants and to secure a sufficient budget. In some regions, as the assistants assigned to the one-stop support system in other regions are utilized due to the absence af full-time assistants and lack of budget, it is necessary to improve the actual system and prepare guarantees to receive it. This can be executed by securing a sufficient budget for selected statement assistants, not only to be stably assigned and work full-time at welfare centers for persons with disabilities, and specialized child protection agencies, but also to work full-time at investigative and judicial agencies such as the National Police Agency, Prosecutor’s Office and court.