공모관계에서의 이탈과 그 효과

The responsibility of co-principals is recognized when accomplices cause a criminal outcome based on their conspiracy. This conspiracy psychologically facilitates the actions of each accomplice, establishing causality for the overall crime. Withdrawal is related to severing this causality of the conspiracy. The Causality Interruption Theory posits that if a co-principal’s withdrawal severs their causality for the subsequent crime, the accomplice relationship is dissolved, and they are no longer held responsible. In other words, the resolution to commit the crime, which was motivated and reinforced among co-principals through psychological causality stemming from the conspiracy, can be broken by withdrawal. Furthermore, if the assessment of causality encompasses not only simple factual causation but also the normative aspect of the realization of risk, then even if the withdrawing party made a physical contribution (e.g., providing essential tools for the crime), their psychological causality could be negated if they subsequently made active efforts to induce other accomplices to abandon their criminal intent. Similarly, there may be grounds to negate the responsibility of a co-principal if the withdrawing party attempted to prevent the criminal outcome, or if the influence of the conspirator significantly diminished such that the crime committed after the withdrawal cannot be deemed a realization of the risk created by the conspirator. This suggests that withdrawal can be recognized even after the commencement of the execution of the crime, particularly when the crime is assessed to have proceeded by a new decision, separate from the influence of the withdrawing party.