网络诽谤犯罪“情节严重”的综合判断

The Comprehensive Judgment of“Serious Circumstances”in Cyber Defamation Crimes

网络诽谤犯罪的“情节严重”应当综合判断,否则容易造成机械司法和不当出入罪现象,进而导致刑法对言论自由的不当介入与过度限制。作为一种整体的评价要素,诽谤罪“情节严重”应当同时满足构成要件中危害行为的“情节严重”和危害结果的“情节严重”,不能只做简单、片面的形式判断。需要在达到入罪门槛基础上,对诽谤行为的传播内容、传播手段、传播效果方面是否足以危害公民名誉进行实质审查,将情节犯的判断拆分为诽谤内容的虚假负面性、诽谤手段的传播公然性、诽谤后果的恶劣严重性等要素逐一评价。对于溢出基本构成要件的其他情节,如行为人的人身危险性、被害人因名誉受损而自杀等,应当作为量刑情节进行考量,情节严重的可从重或加重处罚,避免量刑情节严重性与定罪情节严重性含糊不分、替代使用问题。诽谤罪“情节严重”综合判断应当按照犯罪构成要件情节、非构成要件情节的先后顺序审查,力争在司法办案中实现更高水平的法益保护和人权保障的有机平衡。

A comprehensive judgment is required in determining the“serious circumstances”in cyber defamation crimes.Otherwise,it may lead to rigid justice and unjust verdict,resulting in undue interference and excessive restrictions of the criminal law on freedom of speech.As a holistic evaluation element,the“serious circumstances”in defamation should satisfy the requirements for“serious circumstances”of both the harmful act and harmful result in the constitutive requirements and eradicate the irrationality of simple and one-sided formalist judgments.On the premise that the criminalization threshold is met,there should be a substantive examination of whether the content,means,and effects of the dissemination of defamation constitute harm to citizens’reputations.The judgment of circumstance crimes should be broken down and evaluated separately,including the falsity and negativity of defamation content,the publicness of the defamation’s spread,and the severity of the consequences.Other circumstances that exceed the basic constitutive requirements,such as personal danger to the perpetrator or the victim committing suicide due to reputational damage,should be taken into consideration in sentencing.In the event of serious circumstances,severe or aggravated penalties can be imposed.There should be no ambiguity or substitution between the seriousness of sentencing circumstances and the seriousness of conviction circumstances.In the comprehensive judgment of“serious circumstances”of defamation crimes,the review should be made in the order of constitutive circumstances and non-constitutive circumstances,thereby striking a proper balance between legal interests protection and human rights protection in judicial cases.