Research On Difficult Problems Of Judicial Application Of Anti-Murder Case Of Battered Women

Compared with common cases of intentional homicide,the case of battered women has its particularity: battered women are not only the perpetrator of intentional homicide,but also the desperate victims of domestic violence.In 2015,the Supreme People’s Court,the Supreme People’s Procuratorate,the Ministry of Public Security,and the Ministry of Justice jointly issued the "Opinions on Handling Domestic Violence Criminal Cases in accordance with the Law".The "Opinions" provides a legal basis for protecting the legitimate rights and interests of battered women.The Article 19 and Article 20 clearly state that justifiable defense against domestic violence should be recognized accurately,and defense factors and fault liability in cases should be fully considered.However,there are still some problems in judicial practice,such as the identification of justifiable defense is too conservative and the identification of the victim’s fault is not clear.In the qualitative aspect,the identification of the time and limit of defense in the traditional theory of justifiable defense is too strict,which leads to the conservative identification of justifiable defense in the case of battered women.In terms of sentencing,our country victims fault lack the unified identification standard,the judge’s understanding of victim fault is different,and in the judicial practice the difficulty of proving victim fault makes for victim fault identification is not standard.In the qualitative aspect,different circumstances should be distinguished for such cases: antimurder cases of battered women under specific circumstances should be included in the scope of justifiable defense;For the cases that can not be convicted through justifiable defense,the author tries to standardize the influence of the victim’s fault on the mitigation of sentence by paying attention to the victim’s fault in such cases.In view of the conservative identification of justifiable defense in anti-homicide cases of battered women,we can introduce the theory of battered women’s syndrome abroad to appropriately expand the application boundary of domestic justifiable defense.However,the extreme strength of justifiable defense determines that the application of battered women’s syndrome must be strictly limited:In addition to the frequency and intensity of domestic violence experienced by the abused woman,the identification of battered woman syndrome should also consider whether the abused woman faces an imminent threat and is able to escape the control of the abuser.It should be made clear that the main body of the judgment of battered woman syndrome is the expert assistant,and the role of the expert assistant should be expanded appropriately,the nature of their opinions should be determined as evidence,and the judgment of battered woman syndrome should be taken as the basis of fact determination.On this basis,the theory is connected with the system of justifiable defense,and the controversial elements of justifiable defense in such cases are reasonably defined,so that a part of the anti-murder cases of battered women constitute justifiable defense and can be convicted.In the cases which can not constitute justifiable defense,through the standardized application of the victim’s fault in these cases,minimize the penalties for the battered women.In order to maintain the stability of criminal law provisions,judicial interpretation can be used to make clear provisions on the scope of application,including the victim’s fault,the victim’s fault in the specific division,and according to the division of the victim’s fault to specify the reduction of the standard penalty.The guiding role of typical cases should be perfected,and the leading role of investigation organs in the collection of evidence should be played to provide a relatively unified path for the gentle handling of such cases.