Ideology of Criminal Procedure and Retrial

Criminal retrial refers to an extraordinary remedy procedure that corrects a finalized judgment for the benefit of the person who received it when there is a significant factual error in the judgment, even if a conviction has been finalized (Criminal Procedure Act, Article 420). The preclusive effect of a finalized judgment should, in principle, be maintained and respected as a final promise of the legal community, and legal stability is upheld through this preclusive effect. However, leaving a manifest error in a finalized judgment unrectified, to the extent that it is intolerable in light of a sense of justice, undermines not only the individual interests of the defendant but also the ideal of substantive truth-finding in criminal justice. By correcting clear errors, the retrial system serves to maintain and balance procedural justice and substantive justice in criminal justice. This criminal retrial procedure falls under the broader scope of criminal procedure law. In general, criminal procedure law is guided by the principles of discovering substantive truth, due process, and prompt trials. These principles work in harmony and complement each other to lead the criminal process with the goal of procedural justice. Although a retrial is an extraordinary remedy procedure, it is still a criminal procedure aimed at procedural justice, and naturally, the principles of criminal procedure inherently govern the retrial process. While the principles of discovering substantive truth and due process actively influence the retrial, the principle of prompt trials plays a more restrictive and cautious role in this context. Among these, the principle of discovering substantive truth is realized as the most proactive guiding principle in criminal retrials. Criminal retrial is intended to correct errors in the discovery of the substantive truth in previous judgments and to uncover the new substantive truth. In other words, criminal retrial can be said to be the discovery of substantive truth itself. And The retrial procedure is a process that identifies the failure to comply with due process in the original trial and discovers the substantive truth anew in accordance with due process. Therefore, the retrial procedure can itself be considered a restoration of due process. However, criminal retrials are based on the original final judgment, so this could be interpreted as being contrary to the principle of speedy trials. This is because the overall criminal procedure is extended in time through criminal retrial. Therefore, the principle of a speedy trial can be said to demand even more expediency in the retrial process. I believe that the most effective way to concretize swift retrial proceedings lies in speeding up the retrial initiation process (retrial petition procedure). In other words, it is necessary to interpret and conduct the current retrial initiation process under the principle of ex officio authority.