刑事责任年龄起点制度的困境及其出路

The Predicament and Outlet of the Age Starting Point of Criminal Responsibility

近些年来,未成年人暴力犯罪案件频发,犯罪手段残忍,情节性质极其恶劣,社会危害性越来越高,同时,未成年人犯罪逐渐呈现低龄化趋势,不断地挑战我国现行法律所规定的14周岁刑事责任年龄起点,究竟是否应该降低现行刑法所规定刑事责任年龄起点,也引发了社会各界的激烈争论。通过对刑事责任年龄问题之间存在的争议进行解读,阐明争议背后更深层次的原因,来说明仅依靠规定绝对的刑事责任年龄下限,并不能从根本上应对目前犯罪低龄化现象所带来的法治风险,而应该合理借鉴英美法系中的“恶意补足年龄”制度,在加害人未达到刑法规定的最低刑事责任年龄时,通过证据证明其主观责任阶层具有相应的认识和控制能力,推定其达到最低刑事责任年龄,承担刑事责任。

In recent years,frequent juvenile violent crimes,with cruel means and very bad nature of the plot,are harmful to the society,and there is a trend of minor crime age at the same time,which constantly impacts China's present criminal law provisions of criminal responsibility concerning age 14,and whether to reduce the minimum criminal responsibility of age 14 also caused the social discussion.The paper clarifies the deeper reason behind the controversy,illustrates regulations of absolute age limit,and suggests to take reasonable reference of"malicious complement age"system in Anglo-American law system.