사기죄에 있어 ‘기망’과 ‘보호법익’에 대한 연구

In the Korean Criminal Law the article 347 defines that “a person who defrauds another, thereby taking property or obtaining pecuniary advantage from another, shall be punished.” The requisite elements of general form of criminal fraud are deception of a victim by false representation or pretense with the intent of persuading the victim to provide with property and victim’s provision of the property in reliance on the deception. This study focuses on the deception among such elements of the criminal fraud. At present, criminal fraud is generally regarded as one of property crimes. But if it is only considered as a property crime, a significant part of the crime may be ignored. Criminal fraud consists of two important elements: deception and provision of property. As a consequence, those features should be considered at the same time to recognize criminal fraud. This study aims to clarify the concept of deception by identifying benefits of the criminal law in relation to fraud. In short, the benefits of the law are protection of property and freedom of disposal. In criminal fraud, deception can be recognized as an infringement of an individual right of disposal, which leads to violation of protection of property and subsequently, causes a loss of the property.