落实庭审实质化推进以审判为中心的诉讼制度改革——以修改后的《人民法院法庭规则》为中心

党的十八届四中全会明确提出了推进以审判为中心的诉讼制度改革要求,保障庭审在查明事实,认定证据、保护诉权、公正裁判中发挥决定性作用.新修订的《人民法院法庭规则》通过平等对待诉讼各方实现了控辩双方平等对抗;通过完善庭审公开让庭审活动剧场化、可视化;通过在刑事法庭配置同步视频作证室提高证人出庭率;通过刑事被告人着装的去“标签化”贯彻无罪推定的理念.《人民法院法庭规则》的修改以落实庭审实质化为抓手,积极回应“推进以审判为中心的诉讼制度改革”的要求.     

刑事二审的特点及监督

一、刑事二审程序的特点及成因对比一审程序，可以发现二审程序没有改变审判人员先走后审的审判方式。在二审开庭审理之前，审判人员就已通过阅卷、提讯等对案情有了清楚的了解；对二审判决或裁定有了基本的主张；对二审庭审中要解决的法律问题及方法，庭审各阶段的主要重点，都有了明确的计划。在二审程序中，检察员也不像在一审程序中那样承担着证实犯罪的唯一责任。对二审案件的审查，实际是检察员、审判员按照同样的审查方法、同样的审查标准．在同一诉讼程序中针对同样的审查内容对案件进行审理。刑事一审、二审在刑诉法修改后的差异是…     

普通程序一审律师辩护工作的适应与风险防范

本次《刑事诉讼法》修改,在普通程序的一审中,本着有利于提高庭审效率,有利于庭审实质化的目的,增加了一些程序方面和证据方面的制度。而这些新的制度安排,对律师的辩护工作而言,完全是崭新的。其中有些程序的启动完全由辩护律师来完成,律师在这些新的程序中所起的作用至关重要。一、庭前会议制度1、制度的设立新的《刑事诉讼法》在一审程序中,在第182条第二款新设了一项制度:"出庭以前,审判人员可以召集公诉人、当事人和辩护人、诉讼代理人,对回避、证人出庭名     

论程序正义视域中死刑案件二审开庭问题

死刑核准权归位后死刑案件程序的正当化、规范化问题成为司法实践的迫切需要,其中死刑案件二审程序的正当化问题由于二审程序在整个死刑案件程序中的独特功能和作用就显得尤为突出.深入研究和挖掘程序功能,保证死刑案件被告人辩护权等程序参与权,有效贯彻全面审查与重点审查相结合、事实审与法律审相结合、关键证人出庭作证与书面审证相结合等诉讼原则,规范完善死刑案件二审程序,成为确保死刑案件裁判结论实体公正和程序公正相统一、法律效果和社会效果相统一、惩罚犯罪与保障人权相统一的根本保障和基本要求.     

构建刑事诉讼证人、鉴定人出庭作证保障机制的思考

以庭审为重心的审判中心主义的实现,需要通过采取有效措施确保应该到庭的证人、鉴定人出庭,才能充分利用法庭调查、辩论程序核实证据,助推庭审真正成为法官审核证据材料、查明案件事实、整理诉辩争点、形成内心确信的必经程序。本文从证人、鉴定人出庭作证的实践困境出发,论述了新刑诉法规定的证人、鉴定人出庭必要性的认定,并在此基础上,对证人、鉴定人出庭作证的相关保障机制的构建提出了若干建议。     

从“审被告”到“审证人”?--诉讼制度改革背景下刑事庭审模式转型刍议

以“审被告”为主要特色的我国传统刑事庭审模式已经不能适应时代要求,为此应当构建一种以“审证人”为主要内容和表征的刑事庭审模式。我国新颁布的刑事诉讼法在要求和强制证人出庭方面的进步,体现了“审被告”模式向“审证人”模式转变的思路。而当下我国正在推行的变“以侦查为中心”为“以审判为中心”的诉讼制度改革,为庭审模式的转变提供了新的动力和契机。今后的刑事庭审模式改革,应在坚持已有进展的基础上,继续强化证人出庭力度,完善严格证明规则,同时赋予被告人沉默权,逐渐淡化“审被告”模式色彩,实现“审被告”模式向“审证人”模式的彻底转变。     

二审刑事案件改判、发回重审的原则和标准

二审程序又叫上诉审程序，是第二审人民法院根据当事人的上诉或者人民检察院的抗诉，就第一审人民法院尚未发生法律效力的判决或裁定认定的事实和适用的法律进行审理时所应当遵循的步骤和方式、方法。二审程序的主要任务是对一审法院作出的判决或者裁定所认定的事实是否清楚、适用法律是否正确、诉讼程序是否合法，进行全面审查和审理，并依法作出判决或裁定，以维持正确的判决和裁定，纠正错误的判决和裁定，充分发挥上级人民法院对下级人民法院的审判监督作用。我国刑事诉讼法对二审程序的提起、案件的审理、审限都作了明确的规定，是二审…     

我国刑事审判制度改革若干问题之探讨——以《刑事诉讼法》再修改为视角

审判制度在刑事诉讼中处于中心地位。我国现行《刑事诉讼法》对审判程序的规定存在缺陷,亟待通过修法加以解决。应当扩大第一审简易程序的适用范围,设置新型简易程序;改革证人出庭作证制度,并完善相关配套措施,以提高证人出庭率;规定符合我国国情的非法证据排除规则;切实解决律师辩护“三难”问题,扩大法律援助适用范围,且修改《刑事诉讼法》第38条;切实解决二审开庭问题,完善上诉不加刑原则;对死刑复核程序进行适度诉讼化改革。     

直接审理二审刑事案件的几个问题

在司法实践中,对二审刑事案件的审理方式有两种;一是书面审理,即不再传唤当事人和通知诉讼参与人到庭,不进行法庭调查和法庭辩论,只根据一审法院移送的全部卷宗材料进行审查并作出二审裁判。二是直接审理,即通过正式开庭,提审被告人,传唤当事人和通知其他诉讼参与人到庭参加庭审调查,法庭辩论等诉讼程序,然后作出二审裁判。长期以来,实际上书面审理成了主要审理方式,随着我国法制建设的发展,司法透明度和司法民主意识增强,二审刑事案件审判方式已开始引起司法领导部门重视,要求有关二审法院以根本上扭转对二审刑事案件,尤其是对上诉案件偏重于书面审理的倾向,注重运用直接审理方式进行二审。直接审理方式在刑事诉讼中的地位日益突出,     

刑事诉讼证人出庭作证难的法律思考

我国对刑事诉讼庭审方式的改革，由原来的纠问式改为控辩式，这对刑事诉讼证人出庭作证就有了更进一步的要求。同时新的刑事诉讼法确立的控辩式庭审方式能否得到贯彻落实，也是关系到刑事诉讼改革成败的大事。在刑事诉讼中，证人出庭对于人权保护与查明案件事实，防止主观臆断，保证裁判的准确性具有极大的意义。但是现在人民法院对证人拒绝出庭的事实，存在着睁一只眼，闭一只眼的现象，这实际上起到了鼓励证人不出庭的作用，使少数犯罪嫌疑人终因证据不足受惩罚或免受应得惩罚，而造成冤假错案。 笔者以辩护人身份多次参加过刑事案件诉讼…     

受审能力探析

受审能力是被告人接受法庭审判的能力。我国对受审能力的研究还处于起步阶段，立法上还有许多空白之处。本文从评定标准、提起、确认与法律后果等方面对受审能力进行了探讨。     

Domains of competency to stand trial

Attempts to improve the clinical rigor of competency to stand trial evaluations have resulted in the development of several psycholegal measures. Among the most widely used of these measures are the Competency Screening Test (CST), the Fitness Interview Test (FIT), and the Georgia Court Competency Test—Mississippi State Hospital Revision (GCCT-MSH). To examine the theoretical domains of the competency construct as assessed by these measures, a series of exploratory factor analyses were performed combining previously reported data on the FIT and GCCT-MSH with a new outpatient sample of 353 court referrals. For the CST, data from a previous sample were compared to the original validation study. Of the three measures, only the GCCT-MSH showed evidence of stable, independent factors. A comparison of the GCCT-MSH to theDusky standard suggested a need to further develop empirical measures to better represent underlying constructs related to the defendant-attorney relationship and defendant's participation in his or her defense.     

Treating incompetence to stand trial

InJackson v. Indiana (1972), the United States Supreme Court held that the primary justification for detaining defendants who are incompetent to stand trial is to provide them with relevant treatment. Unfortunately, the majority of forensic facilities place more emphasis on treating mental disability than on the specific symptoms that legally define incompetence to stand trial. Since this appears to be inconsistent withJackson, a study was conducted to test whether a treatment that deals with the specific symptoms of incompetence to stand trial would be more effective. As predicted, 21 patients who received such treatment showed significantly more improvement on an assessment instrument than 20 patients who received the more common form of treatment. In addition, more patients in the experimental treatment group than in the standard treatment group were able to be recommended to the court as competent. Implications are discussed.     

Feigning incompetency to stand trial

The vulnerability of competency to stand trial instruments to malingering was previously unexamined. In this study, the Georgia Court Competency Test (GCCT) was administered to offenders asked to feign incompetency; their results were compared to controls and pretrial defendants (both competent and incompetent). Offenders appeared to be able to simulate incompetency and tended to score lower on the GCCT than their truly incompetent counterparts. For the detection of simulators, a newly developed Atypical Presentation scale for the GCCT showed promise. In addition, several strategies were explored that included simulators' failure of very simple items (i.e., floor effect) and variable success on items of increasing difficulty (i.e., performance curve). Optimal cutting scores are presented for forensic clinicians to screen defendants for feigned incompetency.     

东京审判与南京大屠杀

Nanjing massacre is undoubtedly an outstanding event that indicates the savage acts of the Japanese soldiers during World War II, and its cruelty shocked the whole world. But up to now, there are still some people in Japan denying this period of history. The Trial by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East (“Tokyo International Tribunal”) puts the monstrous crimes committed by the Japanese militarists in record, nails their violence in Nanjing to the history’s pillar of shame for ever, and declares publicly to the later generations that such violence shall never be forgot. Zhu Wenqi, professor of international law, works at Law School of China Renmin University (since 2002 till now). He got Ph.D in University of Paris II and finished his post-doctor research programs in Europe and USA, and started to work in the China Foreign Ministry as Diplomat and also Legal Advisor (1988). And then, he worked in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia as legal assistant of the judges, Legal Advisor and Appeals Counsel of the Officer of the Prosecutor of the Tribunal (1994–2002).     

When crimes are joined at trial

In two experiments, subject-jurors read evidence from actual criminal cases, decided on the guilt of the defendant, and answered several additional questions. The defendant was accused of one charge (murder or rape) or two charges (both murder and rape). In both experiments, the defendant was more likely to be convicted of either crime if the two charges were joined in one trial. Trait ratings indicated that the defendant was perceived in a more negative way when standing trial on two offenses. The order in which the charges were heard had no effect, nor did instructions to subjects to judge the cases separately.Portions of this paper were presented at the American Psychology-Law Society Meeting in Cambridge, Massachusetts, October, 1981. The research was supported by a grant from NSF to Elizabeth Loftus.     

Speedy trial and the legal process

The role of speedy trial in state proceedings is empirically investigated for defendants in criminal homicide (N=444). Employing multiple regression techniques, an assessment is made of the relationship between the length of time involved in defendants' legal processing, their sociolegal status, and the final dispositions awarded by the court. The findings show that blacks and jailed defendants are processed more swiftly than their white and bailed counterparts. The consitutional guarantee of speedy trial also appears to be a state resource, in that cases adjudicated promptly result in higher conviction rates than those which are delayed. This is especially so for defendants who are not released on bail, and may be attributed to the prosecutorial success that accompanies the availability of witnesses whose memories are unclouded by time and the existence of a social climate that calls for retribution. While not related to postponement in the present study, it is suggested that the efforts of counsel in obtaining delay may become increasingly important with the adoption of the new federal guidelines.