Under Construction: ESDP and the ‘Fight Against Organized Crime’

Abstract

This essay discusses the phenomenon of ‘organized crime’ as a matter for EU foreign and security policy. Primarily aimed at searching for conceptual guidance, it draws on literature on criminology and policing, presenting two different theoretical perspectives for analyzing the phenomenon of ‘organized-crime fighting’, a utilitarian and a critical one. Against this backdrop, the essay discusses how ESDP (European Security and Defence Policy) has developed and engaged the issue of organized crime. Specifically, it outlines the character of ESDP as a mechanism for ‘civilian crisis management’ and illustrates its ‘working’ through the case of the EU's police mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina (EUPM) by placing it in the two different theoretical frames. Deciding in favour of a social constructivist approach, the essay concludes by suggesting that a successful strategy must focus on the dissemination of the EU's understanding of ‘organized crime’ abroad.     

论刑事被害人的过错——以聚众斗殴罪为视角

在侵犯人身权利的案件中,犯罪的发生一般是源于犯罪人和被害人相互作用的结果,但我国刑法以犯罪人为中心,被害人过错在定罪量刑的过程中常常被忽视。对于以犯罪人和国家的二元结构模式,不利于犯罪人权利的保障。因此,司法机关在处理聚众斗殴的案件中很少考虑被害人是否有诱发和促进犯罪的发生。在聚众斗殴过案件中,一旦出出现有刑事被害人死亡的情形,司法机关通常按照刑法292条中的规定,以刑法232条故意杀人罪对犯罪行为人进行定罪量刑。鉴此,有必要将被害人的过错纳入聚众斗殴罪之定罪量刑中,按照主客观相一致的原则对犯罪行为人进行归罪惩处。     

Engaging With Criminal Prosecution: The Victim's Perspective

Despite more than a decade of policies that encourage prosecutors to proceed without the victim's input or actions in cases of intimate partner violence (IPV), prosecutors still often rely on the victim's participation to move a case forward. The purpose of this study was to identify the barriers and motivators influencing female IPV victims' engagement with the criminal justice system and their preferences regarding prosecution. Findings from focus groups with women who had experienced police response to IPV revealed that women wanted the violence to end but faced numerous barriers to engaging with the criminal prosecution process. The dominant voice favored police and prosecutors taking action toward prosecution without depending solely or heavily on the victim's active participation.     

A fatal interaction: The role of the victim and function of aggression in intrafamilial homicide

Abstract

This study examines the interaction between the victim and offender during intrafamilial homicide. It is hypothesised that in order to understand the fatal consequences of the interaction, a psychological model must take into account both the role of the victim, as either a significant person or non-significant object, and the function of the aggression, as either instrumental or expressive. The combination of these two proposed facets gives rise to four hypothesised styles of intrafamilial homicide. This hypothesis was tested by analysing 191 intrafamilial homicide cases from the Chicago HITS database. Fifty two crime-scene actions were analysed using Smallest Space Analysis which revealed four distinct thematic clusters of variables. These themes corresponded to the hypothesised facets of victim role and function of aggression. Two related to expressive acts, (a) those murders where the offender kills multiple members of his family and subsequently takes his own life, and (b) cases where the victim is not treated as a significant person in the interaction but is simply used as a target for the offender's rage. The other two relate to instrumental acts, (c) those murders that are a culmination of years of abuse in which the offender sees the killing as the only means of escape, and (d) homicides where the victim is seen as an obstacle to the offender achieving a goal and is removed.

A further test of the validity of these four themes in describing distinct forms of interaction within intrafamilial homicide was to examine the proportion of cases which could be classified according to the framework. The hypothesis that each relationship would map onto just one of the interactional styles was tested by χ² which confirmed that such exclusive relationships existed at the p < .001 level of significance. This has theoretical as well as practical implications in that in using this method of classification it may be possible to infer which family member is responsible for killing their relative.     

两岸刑事被害人权利之比较———以台湾刑事诉讼法为视角简

被害人作为刑事诉讼中的重要参与人之一,我国刑事诉讼法确认了其当事人的地位,对于其诉讼权利的保护也有明确规定.本文将通过对我国大陆地区和台湾地区刑事诉讼法规定进行对比,浅析我国大陆地区刑事被害人保护问题的完善.     

完善我国刑事和解制度若干问题的探讨简

修订后的《刑事诉讼法》确立了刑事和解制度,但是无论在理论上,还是在实践中,刑事和解在我国都处于起步阶段.要使该项制度在刑事诉讼中更好地发挥作用,就必须在刑事和解的适用范围、启动条件、和解主体、和解内容、对被害人的赔偿、刑事和解的确认及效力等方面,作进一步的研究和完善.     

A HEAVY THUMB ON THE SCALE: THE EFFECT OF VICTIM IMPACT EVIDENCE ON CAPITAL DECISION MAKING*

The past several decades have seen the emergence of a movement in the criminal justice system that has called for a greater consideration for the rights of victims. One manifestation of this movement has been the “right” of victims or victims' families to speak to the sentencing body through what are called victim impact statements about the value of the victim and the full harm that the offender has created. Although victim impact statements have been a relatively noncontroversial part of regular criminal trials, their presence in capital cases has had a more contentious history. The U.S. Supreme Court overturned previous decisions and explicitly permitted victim impact testimony in capital cases in Payne v. Tennessee (1991) . The dissenters in that case argued that such evidence only would arouse the emotions of jurors and bias them in favor of imposing death. A body of research in behavioral economics on the “identifiable victim effect” and the “identifiable wrongdoer effect” would have supported such a view. Using a randomized controlled experiment with a death‐eligible sample of potential jurors and the videotape of an actual penalty trial in which victim impact evidence (VIE) was used, we found that these concerns about VIE are perhaps well placed. Subjects who viewed VIE testimony in the penalty phase were more likely to feel negative emotions like anger, hostility, and vengeance; were more likely to feel sympathy and empathy toward the victim; and were more likely to have favorable perceptions of the victim and victim's family as well as unfavorable perceptions of the offender. We found that these positive feelings toward the victim and family were in turn related to a heightened risk of them imposing the death penalty. We found evidence that part of the effect of VIE on the decision to impose death was mediated by emotions of sympathy and empathy. We think our findings open the door for future work to put together better the causal story that links VIE to an increased inclination to impose death as well as explore possible remedies.     

试析我国刑事被害人补偿制度

从国家层面分析,国家救济体系是指基于法律、政策的保障,对遭受破坏的社会秩序的恢复,其目的旨在填补社会成员遭受侵害之后合法权益的损失。在上述由国家财力支持的救济体系中,刑事被害人救济制度则主要将帮扶对象限定为遭受犯罪侵害的刑事被害人,是指由国家主导并有统一立法,以缓解刑事被害人因受犯罪行为侵害而遭受到的困难、抚慰其精神创伤、减轻其合法权益所受到的损失为主要目的的救济制度。出于我国当前刑事被害人的巨大基数及保护现状,及早完善立法有着现实的必要性。     

刑事和解制度论纲

平衡理论、叙说理论和恢复正义理论是当今西方刑事和解理论中流行的三种解说,其中恢复正义是刑事和解最重要的理论基础。在我国刑事司法领域中,并不存在严格意义的刑事和解制度。基于刑事和解在被害恢复与加害恢复方面的双重价值,应当对此制度进行合理化的借鉴,构建刑事和解的中国模式。