집행유예 제도가 현재 한국에서 다른 어떤 형벌보다도 형사정책적으로 중요한 수단으로 활용되고 있다. 그러나 그 중요성이나 활용도에 비하여 사회적으로나 법조계에서 큰 관심을 비교적 받지 못하고 있다.
형법 51조와 제62조는 3년 이하의 징역 또는 금고형에 대한 최대 5년까지의 집행유예를 허용하고 있고, 이를 선고하는데 있어서 정상참작이라는 행위자 요인 혹은 재범가능성 등이 고려될 수 있다. 그러나 이러한 집행유예 선고에 고려되는 요인이 갖는 주관성과 추상성과 단순화된 기준이 판사의 재량권과 결합될 가능성에 대하여 학계는 우려를 표하고 있다. 실제 독일의 경우 집행유예 기준의 세분화를 통하여 이러한 재량권 개입의 문제를 최소화 하기 위한 노력을 보여왔다. 판사의 재량권에 의해 선고가 달라질 수 있음은 이미 제한적 실질합리성 이론과 초점적 관심이론으로 설명이 되고 있다.
이러한 와중에 한국에서도 최근 집행유예기준이 실형에 따라 구체화되어야함이 주장되고 있다. 본 논문은 이러한 법학계에서 논의 되고 있는 실형에 따른 집행유예 구체화작업의 필요성을 경험적 근거로 검증해 보는 것이다. 이를 통하여 가장 복잡한 세부범죄 유형을 갖는 성범죄의 경험적 분석을 통하여 집행유예 기준 세분화 주장을 지지하고자 하였다. 성범죄 세부유형에 대한 집행유예 인자 및 설명력을 검토한 결과, 본 연구는 한 개 밖에 존재하지 않는 집행유예 기준이 성범죄 세부유형에 맞게 각기 제작되어야 함은 물론 실형구간에 따라 다른 요인들이 고려 요건으로 포함되어야 함을 주장한다. 즉, 실형에 따른 집행유예 세분화 작업의 필요성을 주장한 논거를 단순 타 법제와의 비교가 아닌 한국 법정의 관행과 제도의 적용을 경험적으로 증명하여 이들의 주장을 지지하고 있다. 더욱 구체적인 내용과 함의들은 본문에서 논하도록 한다.
The suspended sentence has been utilized frequently as an important tool in the criminal justice system in Korea. However, it was failed to attract concerns of legal scholars and practitioners as a subject of research topics in spite of the importance and actual application in the field. The article of 51 and article of 61 in Criminal Act state that characteristics of the offender, and relations to the victim, motivation and other circumstances shall be taken into consideration in determining the punishment as allowing the suspended sentence up to 5 years. Because these statement included vague and abstract contents which arouse any different decision by judges, it could be connected with discretion issue of the judges when it combines with the simple guideline of the suspended sentence. These concerns on discretion of judges are explained by the limited substantive rationality theory and the focal concern theory. Recently, there are legal researches which insisted a necessity of subdivided guidelines on the suspended sentence varied by the length of the prison sentence. The purpose of this paper is to support the view of the necessity for subdivided guidelines of the suspended sentence on sexual offense as examining using the empirical data. For this purpose, a current paper reviewed previous literatures on suspended sentence and analyzed the raw data on sexual offense which has the most complicated sub-crime group. The result showed the current guideline of the suspended sentence for sexual offense had more power to predict for sexual molesting than forcible rape, and for the sentenced offenders of less than 2 years than less than 3 years in predicting in-out decision. In addition, we found that the each subgroup has different significant factors to predict in-out decision by the length of sentence and type of sexual offense. Finally, current research supports the previous assertion which insisted the necessity of the subdivided guidelines for suspended sentence by length of sentence using empirical evidence. The detailed results and policy implications will be discussed in the context.
The suspended sentence has been utilized frequently as an important tool in the criminal justice system in Korea. However, it was failed to attract concerns of legal scholars and practitioners as a subject of research topics in spite of the importance and actual application in the field. The article of 51 and article of 61 in Criminal Act state that characteristics of the offender, and relations to the victim, motivation and other circumstances shall be taken into consideration in determining the punishment as allowing the suspended sentence up to 5 years. Because these statement included vague and abstract contents which arouse any different decision by judges, it could be connected with discretion issue of the judges when it combines with the simple guideline of the suspended sentence. These concerns on discretion of judges are explained by the limited substantive rationality theory and the focal concern theory. Recently, there are legal researches which insisted a necessity of subdivided guidelines on the suspended sentence varied by the length of the prison sentence. The purpose of this paper is to support the view of the necessity for subdivided guidelines of the suspended sentence on sexual offense as examining using the empirical data. For this purpose, a current paper reviewed previous literatures on suspended sentence and analyzed the raw data on sexual offense which has the most complicated sub-crime group. The result showed the current guideline of the suspended sentence for sexual offense had more power to predict for sexual molesting than forcible rape, and for the sentenced offenders of less than 2 years than less than 3 years in predicting in-out decision. In addition, we found that the each subgroup has different significant factors to predict in-out decision by the length of sentence and type of sexual offense. Finally, current research supports the previous assertion which insisted the necessity of the subdivided guidelines for suspended sentence by length of sentence using empirical evidence. The detailed results and policy implications will be discussed in the context.
