死刑的误判与废除

2016年年底,多年来备受关注的聂树斌强奸及故意杀人案以最高人民法院第二巡回法庭宣告聂树斌无罪而告平反昭雪。这是继云南杜培武故意杀人案、湖北佘祥林故意杀人案、河南赵作海故意杀人案、浙江张高平及张辉叔侄故意杀人案、福建念斌投毒案、内蒙古呼格吉勒图故意杀人案、海南陈满故意杀人案等之后,又一起牵动我国社会公众的神经与情感,在当事人家属反复不断申冤、各界人士鼎力相助几十年之后,终于迎来但的确迟到的那一缕司法正义的阳光。自然地,每一桩冤案错案的平反昭雪,都会让当事人家属稍感欣慰,对无端沉冤而消失的生命也有那么一点稍许的慰藉,同样也都会让社会公众多多少少舒那么一口气。但对于当代中国的法律人而言,恐怕少许的欣慰实在无法缓解心中基于职业良知而背负的司法正义不到或者迟到的"罪孽"的沉重。因为我们知道,我们的社会可能至今都还有很多的冤案错案,正在排队等候着见到司法正义曙光的那一刻;我们的社会今后依然可能还会产生各式各样的冤案错案,从而让正义蒙羞。与众多得到平反或者未能得到平反的冤案错案一样,聂树斌案也好,呼格吉勒图案也好,无论其影响程度有多大、影响范围有多广,都终将归于沉寂而成为历史中的一个事件。但作为法律人,我们恐怕不应该轻易忘记这些冤案错案,也不应该随意地越过这些冤案错案,尤其是在我国全面推进依法治国,通过建设中国特色社会主义法治体系以努力建设社会主义法治国家的时代背景下,我们更应该通过对这些冤案错案的理性反思,来对我国的相关制度及其实践以及对作为制度实践的参与者的我们自身进行深刻的反思和批判,以寻求即使不能杜绝也要尽可能减少冤案错案的发生,向习近平总书记提出的"努力让人民群众在每一个司法案件中都能感受到公平正义"的目标不断迈进。为此,我们邀请了清华大学法学院周光权教授、中国青年政治学院林维教授、吉林大学法学院徐岱教授、沈阳师范大学法学院及法律与公共政策研究中心姚建宗教授,共同参与这次以"反思冤案错案"为主题的笔谈。

In late 2016,the Nie Shubin rape and intentional murder case,which had been paid much attention,received acquittal and was rehabilitated by the second circuit court of the Supreme People's Court. This affected the nerves and emotions of the public and was another sunshine of judicial justice,which was late but finally come after decades with the persistent efforts for justice by his family members and the help of personages of all circles,after Du Peiwu intentional murder case in Yunnan Province,Yu Xianglin intentional murder case in Hubei Province,Zhao Zuohai intentional murder case in Henan Province,uncle and nephew Zhang Gaoping and Zhang Hui intentional murder case in Zhejiang Province,Nian Bin poisoning case in Fujian Province,Hugejiletu intentional murder case in Nei Monggol Autonomous Region,Chen Mangu intentional murder case in Hainan Province,and etc. Naturally,the rehabilitation of every misjudged case may comfort the party's family members slightly,so do the innocent disappearing life and the public. However,for lawyers in modern China,the slight comfort cannot relieve their sense of heavy 'guilt'of the lateness and absence of judicial justice because we know that there may be still many misjudged cases to this day which are waiting for the dawn of judicial justice and in the future,misjudged cases may still appear and humiliate justice.Similar to many of the misjudged cases that have been rehabilitated and those that have not,no matter how great the impacts of the cases are and how wide the scope of the influence is,cases including Nie Shubin Case and Hugejuletu Case,will eventually become silent and be an event in history,but as lawyers,we should not easily forget those misjudged cases or easily ignore those cases,especially under the time background that our country is comprehensively promoting the policy of law-based governance and constructing the socialist legal system with Chinese characteristic to strive to build a socialist country under the rule of law. In this era,we should pay more attention to the rational reflection of those misjudged cases,and reflect and criticize the related systems and their practices and ourselves who act as the participants of the systems and the practices to seek to reduce misjudged cases as many as possible if they cannot be completely eradicated. We should stride forward to the aim of 'striving to make everyone feel fairness and justice in every judicial case'proposed by General Secretary Xi Jinping.For this purpose,we invited Professor Zhou Guangquan from the Law School in Tsinghua University,Professor Lin Wei from China Youth University for Political Sciences,Professor Xu Dai from the Law School in Jilin University,Professor Yao Jianzong from the Law School and Public Policy Research Centre in Shenyang Normal University to participate jointly in this writing with the theme of 'a reflection of misjudged cases'