The overall low rate of innocent defense is the status quo. From the litigation stage, the innocence defense rate in the trial stage is higher than that in the prosecution and investigation stage; Judging from the types of cases, the innocence defense rate of economic crimes, duty crimes, drug crimes and violent crimes is relatively high. Further investigation shows that there are many factors that affect the innocent defense rate:
1. Objectively speaking, the high confession rate of criminal suspects and defendants, the quality of charges and the institutional conditions for filing an innocent defense are the main influencing factors, which fundamentally determine that the innocent defense rate cannot be very high, which is the basis for understanding the present situation of innocent defense in China. In the environment of high confession rate, the space for innocent defense becomes extremely small.
On the one hand, the quality of accusation is an important objective reason that affects the innocent defense rate, which is inversely proportional to the innocent defense rate. The higher the quality of the accusation, the lower the rate of innocent defense. On the other hand, if the quality of the accusation is low, the rate of innocent defense will be high.
On the other hand, although the quality of the accusation provides a certain space for the innocent defense, this space is actually quite limited. In the case that the suspects and defendants do not plead guilty and the quality of the charges is not high, the institutional conditions for filing an innocent defense are the key factors affecting the innocent defense rate. Because only with the institutional conditions for filing an innocent defense can the innocent defense be carried out.
However, in our country, the overall lack of defense system resources and the differences of system resources in different litigation stages lead to the overall low rate of innocent defense.
2. Subjectively, lawyers are unwilling to engage in criminal defense business based on interests; Lawyers do not plead guilty because of official pressure; Lawyers missed the defense information that might be innocent because they were unwilling to investigate and collect evidence; The existence of subjective factors such as lawyers' selective innocence defense based on the balance of interests has further aggravated the long-standing low level of innocence defense rate in China.