The Empirical Study On The Excessive Objectivity Of Evidence Adjudication In Criminal Felony Cases

In the past ten years or so,the concept of evidence adjudication that has been constantly objectified has gradually occupied the absolute dominant position in judicial theory and practice,and while we see that the objectiveized evidence adjudication has a positive significance for the correct determination of the facts of the case,we should also be vigilant about whether it has the risk of overcorrection in practice,especially in felony cases that are more prone to objectification problems.The author selects the most typical felony case,intentional homicide,as the research object to conduct empirical research,analyze whether there is a problem of excessive objectification in felony cases,what are the reasons,and propose feasible countermeasures.Combing through the evidence from the empirical research sample,it can be seen that the judicial practice of intentional homicide cases in recent years has more or less shown the characteristics of excessive objectification: first,there must basically be objective evidence to prove that the crime has indeed occurred;second,there must basically be objective evidence to prove the identity of the defendant and the offender;third,it seems that "excluding reasonable doubt" has been elevated to "excluding all doubts".However,the lack of objective evidence in criminal cases and the difficulty of achieving perfect proof are the norm in judicial practice,which makes it unreasonablely difficult to convict intentional homicide cases,and even improper indulgence in difficult cases.As a typical representative of felony cases,intentional homicide is most likely to have the problem of excessive objectification of evidence,and can best reflect the problems arising from the overall operation of felony cases in judicial practice.Through the empirical analysis of intentional homicide cases,we can preliminarily conclude that the problem of excessive objectification of evidence has arisen in the judicial practice of felony cases in China.The essence lies in the fact that with the excessive elevation of the standard of proof in felony cases,the subjective standard of "excluding reasonable doubt" has changed in specific form to an objective standard of "excluding all doubts" in which the objective evidence corroborates each other.In essence,the excessive objectification of evidence adjudication in felony cases is manifested as the excessive objectification of the "corroborative adjudication" in felony cases.The over-objectification of the "corroboration" of adjudication in felony cases is mainly due to two reasons: judicial concept and institutional environment.Specifically,the reasons at the level of judicial concepts are: the epistemology of "optimism" in judicial proof;the concept of judicial human rights protection;the thinking of "iron cases";reflection and accountability for unjust,false and wrongly decided cases;distrust of judges;and caution in verbal evidence.At the institutional and environmental level,the reasons are: indirect and non-verbal trial methods;trial separation;and repetitive factual trials.The excessive objectification of the "corroboration" judgment in felony cases has produced the following negative effects on the practice of criminal proof in the following four aspects: it has created an incentive for illegal evidence collection during the investigation stage;it has paid too much attention to corroborating the facts and paying insufficient attention to comprehensive verification;the evidence of the prosecution,defense,and trial has not been substantively unfolded,exacerbating the formalization of the trial;and excessive corroboration.We should start from the following six aspects to reshape the evidence adjudication of felony cases in China and move toward a balanced evidentiary adjudication doctrine that combines objective and subjective: adhere to the dominance of confirmation;adjust the excessively high standard of proof;strengthen the proof method of reasonable inference such as free mental evidence and presumption;introduce the persuasion mechanism of "best interpretation theory";attach importance to procedural justice and build a confirmation model supported by due process;promote the substantiveization of court trials;and fully disclose the reasoning of judgment documents.In addition,the following two new ideas in the academic community are also of great research value: to build a new model of "general justification/openness and standardization of reasonable inference";to separate the conviction procedure and sentencing procedure of death penalty cases,and not to change the standard of conviction of death penalty cases and to improve the standard of sentencing.