몽록 심재우, 심온 김일수 선생의 인간존엄과 사형폐지 사상 재조명 —신체형으로서 인간존엄에 반하는 사형제도 폐지론—

Since 2008, South Korea has been one of the de facto abolitionist countires. However, its legislature has not taken a legislative decision to abolish or suspend the death penalty and has not stopped legislating the death penalty. Korean Constitutional Court continues to recognize the constitutionality of the death penalty, and the judiciary is very cautious about imposing death sentences, but still imposes them. Korean government has just not made a decision to resume executions, so it has reached a state of de facto abolition. It can, thus, be said that South Korea's death penalty system is in a state of legal and policy neglect; it is difficult to find any substantive progress toward abolition in the so-called de facto abolitionist state. Professor Shim Jae-woo's idea that the death penalty is a clear violation of the requirement to guarantee human dignity leads to Professor Kim Il-su's abolitionist theory. The idea of human dignity demands the abolition of the death penalty in criminal law. The death penalty is a remnant of retributive thinking that is meaningless as a criminal policy. The idea of using the death penalty to suppress crime cannot be consistent with the ideology of a modern democratic constitutional order. From the perspective of liberal, rational, and humane criminal policy, the death penalty should be clearly and legally abolished. In the light of Shim and Kim abolitionist ideas, there is no more civilized or humane way of executing people, even if the execution is carried out in a closed and concealed manner. All methods of execution are physical in nature and therefore violate the dignity and humanity of the condemned.