In order to promote the high-quality development of criminal defense in the new era of China and deepen the theoretical research on criminal defense, the “Fifth Criminal Defense Summit Forum of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law”, sponsored by the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law and Shanghai Duan and Duan Law Firm, was successfully held in Hangzhou on June 1, 2024, with nearly 300 delegates from universities and research institutes, public prosecutors and lawyers attending the forum. Nearly 300 representatives from universities and research institutes, public prosecutors and lawyers attended the forum. Tian Wenchang, Honorary President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law and Honorary Director of King&Capital Law Firm, Men Jinling, Vice President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, Part-time Lawyer of King&Capital Law Firm and Associate Professor of University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Zhu Yonghui, Vice President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law and Director of King&Capital Law Firm, and Vice Liang Yali, President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, President of the Beijing Branch and Director of King&Capital Criminal Defense Center, Hua Yang, President of the Dalian Branch of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, Director of the Beijing King&Capital Law Firm, and Yang Damin, President of the Nanjing Branch of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, Director of the Beijing King&Capital Law Firm, were invited to participate in the forum.
The opening ceremony of the forum was presided over by Prof. Feng Weiguo, Dean of the School of Criminal Law of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, and Ma Chaoqi, Vice President of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, delivered a welcome speech. Ma Zhaoqi expressed his warm welcome to the delegates, introduced the development history of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, a series of achievements made by the Institute of Advanced Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, and expected that the guests could reach more consensus and produce more results in this forum, which would contribute to the promotion of the improvement of criminal defense system and the progress of criminal justice in China.
Tian Wenchang, Honorary Director of King&Capital Law Firm
Northwest University of Political Science and Law Advanced Institute of Criminal Defense Honorary President, doctoral supervisor, King&Capital Law Firm Honorary Director Tian Wenchang, paragraph and paragraph of the global board of directors chairman Zhuang Xinwang, zhejiang province lawyers association full-time vice president ChenSanLian, respectively, made a speech at the opening ceremony.
The opening session, at the same time, the “northwestern university of political science and law of the fifth criminal defense summit forum” essay award ceremony, for 12 from the theoretical and practical circles of the winning thesis authors were awarded certificates, trophies, prizes. Among them, the paper of lawyer Liang Yali, Vice President of the Institute of Advanced Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, President of Beijing Branch and Director of King&Capital Criminal Defense Center, won the third prize.
After the opening ceremony, Tian Wenchang, Honorary President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, Doctoral Supervisor, and Honorary Director of King&Capital Law Firm, Prof. Xiong Qiuhong, Vice-President and Secretary General of the China Society of Criminal Procedure Law, and Director of the Institute of Litigation Law of the China University of Political Science and Law, and Prof. Zhang Jianwei, Vice-President of the China Society of Criminal Procedure Law, and Professor of the School of Law of Tsinghua University, made the keynote speeches respectively.
Mr. Tian Wenchang, Honorary Director of King&Capital Law Firm
Mr. Tian Wenchang delivered a keynote speech on the topic of “Conceptual Positioning is the Determining Factor for the Revision of Criminal Procedure Law”. He pointed out that since the promulgation of China's first criminal procedure law in 1979, it has been revised three times, and the tendency of progress can be seen, but the process is difficult and bumpy, and the road ahead is even more twists and turns. Which has a variety of reasons, such as: legislative experience and legislative technology, sectoral participation in the legislation of the interests of the game, judicial practice, some difficult to crack the reality of the problem and so on. But in-depth investigation, the concept of lagging behind is to affect the development process of the criminal procedure law of the deep-seated reasons.
In the fourth revision of the Criminal Procedure Law is approaching, facing many need to amend and improve the content, the legal profession has put forward a number of amendments to the proposal is enough to cause concern. In the final analysis, it is still a matter of conceptual orientation. In the concept of positioning can form a consensus, or at least on the premise of seeking common ground while reserving minor differences can form a basic consensus, the study and discussion of specific amendments to the program is of practical significance.
The concept of criminal procedure is rich in connotations, but the basic concepts that can lead the way in modern criminal procedure can be seen clearly. Such as: the value goal of safeguarding human rights as the leading goal, the principle of presumption of innocence, the principle of benefit of the doubt, the principle of the right to silence, the principle of direct speech, the principle of legal truth and so on. These issues should be the top priority for in-depth discussion and consensus building. If these leading value objectives and important principles involving the basic concepts of criminal procedure can be written into the Criminal Procedure Law, most of the other problems will be solved. Otherwise, the revision of the Criminal Procedure Law will still not be able to break through the shackles of the lagging concepts, and can only continue to swing forward on the thorny road.
Update the concept, never overnight. The fourth revision of the criminal procedure law, will not be a step. Therefore, the concept of updating the road is still a long way to go. And speed up the pace of the march, is the responsibility of the legal people, because this is a necessary road.
Professor Xiong Qiuhong delivered a keynote speech on the topic of “Modernization of Criminal Justice and Evolution of Defense System”. Starting from the discussion of the current situation of criminal justice, he suggested to take the problems of the criminal defense system as the guide to make substantive amendments to the criminal defense system and put forward specific proposals for amendments.
Professor Zhang Jianwei delivered a keynote speech on the topic of “Criminal Defense: Current Situation and Future”, proposing that the development of the right to defense should be changed from focusing on “state responsibility” to “state responsibility with the responsibility of the defender”; at the same time, based on the professional ethical requirements of defense lawyers, he proposed that At the same time, based on the professional ethical requirements of defense lawyers, it is proposed that lawyers should carry out litigation activities in a peaceful manner under the legal order.
This forum is divided into three units: “The Concept of Improvement of Criminal Defense System”, “New Forms and Problems of Criminal Defense”, and “Improvement of Principles and Rules of Criminal Defense”.
Liang Yali, Director of King&Capital Criminal Defense Center
In the first module, “The Concept of Improvement of Criminal Defense System”, Prof. Guo Shuo from China University of Political Science and Law was the moderator of the keynote speech. Liang Yali, Vice President of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, President of the Beijing Branch, and Director of King&Capital Criminal Defense Center, made a special speech on the topic of “Reform of Criminal Evidence System Centered on Trial”. Ms. Liang believes that the reform of criminal procedure system centered on trial is the key measure to strengthen the judicial protection of human rights and realize the justice of criminal justice.
From the perspective of criminal defense, she shared her thoughts on the reform of the criminal evidence system centered on trial, and believed that there are three core requirements of the criminal evidence system centered on trial, and criminal lawyers need to closely follow these aspects when defending. The first is to strictly implement the illegal evidence exclusion rules. From the formation and use of evidence process, improve the evidence system, first of all to standardize the investigation and evidence collection behavior, which depends on the operation of illegal evidence exclusion rules. The second is to promote a unified standard of evidence. Only if the evidence requirements at all stages of litigation are consistent, can the behavior of investigation and prosecution be effectively constrained by the trial. What is advocated here is the unification of the evidence standards of the investigating, prosecuting and judging tripartite, rather than the unification of the standard of proof. Third, to establish a unified standard of evidence review. At present, it is necessary to establish a fusion of “reasoning” and “comparative verification” thinking of the use of evidence review guidelines, leading the various stages of criminal proceedings.
Beijing Kyoto (Dalian) Law Firm
Mr. Hua Yang, Director of Beijing King&Capital (Dalian) Law Firm
In the second session of “New Forms and Problems of Criminal Defense”, Hua Yang, Director of Dalian Branch of Advanced Institute of Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law and Director of Beijing King&Capital Law Firm, acted as the moderator of the talk.
Zhu Yonghui, Director of King&Capital Law Firm
Zhu Yonghui, Deputy Director of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, and Director of King&Capital Law Firm, in his speech, believed that there are a lot of new forms and problems in criminal defense in recent years, among which the voluntary nature of the defendant in the leniency of guilty plea and punishment procedure deserves special attention. He suggested: First, in the investigation stage to implement the right of lawyers to meet for the first time and the right to approve the right to read the file, to ensure that the suspect first get the help of lawyers, in the clear and true plea of guilty and punishment. The second is to improve the rules on sentencing recommendations at the examination and prosecution stage. Suggest that the prosecution publicize the specific calculation of sentencing recommendations, in order to allow lawyers to have a “bargaining” basis. At the same time, it should be stipulated that the prosecution in this stage can only be out of the defendant pleaded guilty to punishment sentencing recommendations. Third, in the trial stage to protect the defender's right to plead not guilty, it is recommended that in the case of plea bargaining lawyers in court to do not guilty, does not affect the defendant plea bargaining continues to be established, in the defendant plead guilty to the premise of lawyers in court to do not guilty, the provisions of the prosecution shall not be withdrawn to plea bargaining sentencing recommendations to “blackmail” the defendant. The defendant may not be “blackmailed” by the prosecution by withdrawing the plea and sentence recommendation.
Beijing King&Capital (Nanjing) law firm director Yang Damin
In the third session of “Improvement of Criminal Defense Principles and Rules”, Mr. Yang Damin, Director of Nanjing Branch of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law and Director of Beijing King&Capital Law Firm, acted as the moderator of the keynote speech.
Men Jinling, Part-time Lawyer of King&Capital Law Firm
In the keynote speech of the session, Men Jinling, deputy director of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Criminal Defense of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law, part-time attorney of King&Capital Law Firm, and associate professor of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences University, argued that in the criminal procedure, the reasons for the procuratorial authorities to initiate a protest against the prosecution should be strictly controlled, and protest against the prosecution due to the defendant's appeal should be eliminated. Article 228 of the Criminal Procedure Law stipulates that the grounds for the procuratorial authorities to initiate a protest require that the first instance judgment and ruling are “truly erroneous”, and in conjunction with the second paragraph of Article 332, which states that “...... if a higher-level people's procuratorate considers the protest improper, it may submit the protest to the people's court at the same level. Improper, may withdraw the protest to the people's court at the same level, and notify the people's procuratorate at a lower level” to do systematic interpretation, it can be concluded that this ‘genuine error’ is the substantive reasons, to be subjected to substantive review, the higher procuratorate supervision and review, if the reasons for the protest does not comply with the ‘genuine error’. “There are errors”, but also can be directly withdrawn from the lower level procuratorial organs, is to prevent the procuratorate to handle the irrationality of the staff, so as to maintain the fairness and impartiality of the criminal justice and public credibility.
Representatives of King&Capital Law Firm took a group photo to mark the occasion.
It is reported that the northwestern university of politics and law advanced institute of criminal defense was established in July 2017, long-term commitment to the development of the discipline of criminal defense, cultural promotion, personnel training and lawyer training; 2024, has been admitted to the domestic first batch of 30 “criminal defense direction” postgraduate students; institute of organization of the preparation of the theory of criminal defense, practice, In 2024, the first batch of 30 postgraduates in the field of criminal defense has been admitted; the series of teaching materials on criminal defense theory, practice and training prepared by the Institute have been well received in China; the periodical publication of China Criminal Defense has a high recognition in the industry; the criminal defense training model of Northwestern University of Political Science and Law has been widely recognized and is being promoted in the country; and the “Criminal Defense Forum” has been held for five times, which has become the most popular forum in China. The “Criminal Defense Summit Forum” has been held for five sessions, and has become a professional conference with great influence in the field of criminal defense in China.
