독일 형사상소제도 개혁논의의 시사

The Supreme Court announced a plan to announce a proposal to improve the criminal appeal system at the end of 2020. They showed their willingness to end the discussion on improving the criminal appeals system, which had been slowed down by the criminal proceedings related to the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Actually discussions on reform of the appeal system in criminal procedure have continued since the enactment of the Criminal Procedure Act 1954. It would be no exaggeration to say that all possible solutions have already been proposed. Therefore, in this article, we tried to turn our eyes to the outside for a moment to examine the current state of discussions on reform of the criminal appeals system in Germany, and to find out their implications for our current discussions. In particular, the author proposed the following fundamental solutions; Even if we consider the number of populations, GDP and individual incomes of two countries, it is necessary to increase the number of judges, which is currently only 1/7 in Germany, and expand the first trial courts so that practical hearings in courts could be possible. In order to reduce appeals, the reasons for the judgment(ratio decidendi) must be detailed in the judgment of the fact-trials. It should be kept in mind that a single, faithful hearing can reduce useless appeals. The trial process for fact finding should be recorded so that it can be used in the appeal trial. Any amendment to the current appeal system will be only a (temporary) fix without solving these basic and fundamental problems.