Our country’s Criminal Procedure Law requires that in addition to “punishing crimes”, effective measures should also be taken to “protect innocent people from criminal prosecution” and “protect citizens’ personal rights, democratic rights and other rights. “At the same time, the revised Criminal Procedure Law has also made the following new provisions in terms of focusing on human rights protection: criminal suspects are allowed to hire lawyers to provide legal assistance during the investigation stage and entrust defenders to defend themselves during the prosecution stage; the People’s Court has expanded the number of defendants designated by the People’s Court. The scope of defenders; expand the scope of private prosecution cases to enable victims to enjoy a wide range of direct prosecution rights; at the same time, position the victim as a party and grant them basically the same litigation rights as the defendant, thereby effectively strengthening the protection of the human rights of victims; and cancel the detention review system , scientifically and clearly stipulates the types, objects, conditions and deadlines for coercive measures taken by public security and judicial organs, etc. On the one hand, these regulations are conducive to the investigation of crimes, and on the other hand, they also strengthen the human rights protection of criminal suspects and defendants.
(2) Establish a litigation mechanism in which the public prosecutor, procuratorate, and judicial organs divide responsibilities, cooperate with each other, and restrict each other.
Unlike many foreign countries that only regard courts as judicial organs, my country's Criminal Procedure Law stipulates that criminal proceedings include investigation, prosecution, and trial. State organs that conduct criminal proceedings include public security organs, people's procuratorates and people's courts. Although these three agencies are different in nature, they have equal status in our country's criminal proceedings and are all specialized agencies in our country's criminal proceedings. Among them, the public security organs are mainly responsible for investigation, the People's Procuratorate is responsible for prosecution, and the People's Court is responsible for trial. Unless otherwise provided by law, no other agency, group or individual has the right to exercise these rights.
At the same time, on the basis of the division of labor and responsibilities among the three agencies, my country's Criminal Procedure Law also emphasizes the mutual cooperation and mutual restriction of the three, and makes specific provisions on this: the public security organs must arrest criminal suspects through the people's Approval by the procuratorate is followed by enforcement by the public security organs; if the people's procuratorate discovers that the people's court has violated legal procedures in handling cases, it has the right to submit corrective opinions to the people's court, etc.
(3) Established a series of scientific criminal procedure principles suitable for China’s national conditions.
Many basic principles of China’s similar procedural laws are in line with China’s national conditions and are unique to China: such as the principles of mutual responsibility, mutual cooperation and mutual restriction between public prosecutors and judicial organs; the principle of relying on the masses; the principle of taking facts as the basis. According to the principle of taking the law as the criterion; the principle of legal supervision of criminal proceedings by the People's Procuratorate, etc.
(4) Implement a litigation model that combines authority and litigation.
The revised Criminal Procedure Law retains some reasonable provisions on the principle of authority of the original Criminal Procedure Law, such as the public security organs and the People’s Procuratorate unilaterally taking investigation and prosecution actions in accordance with their authority during the investigation and prosecution stages; during the trial stage , the judge has the right to interrogate the defendant, question witnesses and appraisers, and investigate and verify evidence during the trial. At the same time, drawing on the useful experience of the adversarial system, it is stipulated that criminal suspects can hire lawyers to provide legal assistance during the investigation stage, and can entrust defenders to defend themselves during the prosecution stage. Especially at the trial stage, the court's pre-trial review will be changed from substantive review to procedural review. The review effectively avoids the judge's preconceptions and handles the case objectively; the interrogation of the defendant, the questioning of witnesses and expert witnesses, and the presentation of documentary evidence are first conducted by the prosecution and defense. Even if the judge carries out these activities, it only plays a supporting role. The judge can only conduct investigation and verification when he has doubts about the evidence during the trial. In addition, the prosecution and defense can not only argue with each other during the court debate stage, but also express opinions on the evidence and case facts and argue with each other during the court investigation stage.
(5) Grant the People’s Procuratorate the power of legal supervision over criminal proceedings.
Unlike Western countries, China’s People’s Procuratorate is not only responsible for public prosecutions, but also has legal supervision functions.
Specifically, the People's Procuratorate has the power to initiate investigations into crimes such as corruption and bribery by state employees, the power to review all public prosecution cases and decide whether to initiate public prosecutions, the power to appear in court to support public prosecutions when hearing cases in the People's Court, and the power to investigate public security organs. Supervise the legality of investigation activities, trial activities of the People's Court, execution of penalties and other related activities.
(6) Provides some litigation procedures and evidence systems that are consistent with China’s actual conditions.
On the basis of summarizing long-term judicial practice experience, my country’s Criminal Procedure Law stipulates some litigation procedures that are consistent with my country’s actual conditions: such as cases endangering national security, criminal cases that may be sentenced to life imprisonment or death, foreign Criminal cases in which a person commits a crime shall be heard by the Intermediate People's Court in the first instance; during the investigation process, if the public security organ deems it necessary to arrest the criminal suspect, it shall be reviewed and approved by the People's Procuratorate, and the People's Court shall hear the criminal case, and the second instance system shall be implemented; if the death penalty is imposed, The case must go through the death penalty review process; if the referee is found to have made an error after it becomes legally effective, a retrial and other trial supervision procedures can be initiated.