III. The Modification of the Prison Law in 2012 Strengthened the Protection of Prisoners' Human Rights

On October 26, 2012, the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress adopted the decision on the modification of the Prison Law of the People's Republic of China. Based on the Prison Law promulgated in 1994, seven parts were amended. On the one hand, the amendments were made mainly to ensure correct and effective implementation of the newly amended Criminal Procedure Law and coordinate different legal stipulations; on the other hand, it also strengthened the protection of prisoners' human rights. The latter can be reflected in the following five aspects:

(I) Reducing the scope of fixed-term imprisonment executed in house of detention, which can protect prisoners' rights. One of the amendments is reducing the remaining term of a prisoner's sentence executed by detention house from less than one year to less than three months. The direct consequence is that the scope of criminals executed in detention house is greatly reduced. In principle, all the prisoners sentenced to fixed-term imprisonment should be executed in prisons. Prison is a special department to execute criminal punishment while detention house is not a special execution area after court judgments in a strict sense. It is a temporary place to execute the punishment for the prison in order to ensure smooth criminal accusation and detain the criminal suspects who are not judged. Based on the standardization and legalization of execution, undoubtedly, it can help better protect prisoners' rights in prisons.

(II) Enhancing the scope of criminals temporarily serving their sentences outside prisons and standardizing the law-enforcement procedures to embody the humanitarianism principle in executing criminal punishments. Article 17 of the new Prison Law was amended as "For criminals who are handed over for execution of their criminal punishment according to Article 16 of the law shall be put in prison. After the imprisonment, the criminals shall be given physical examinations. If the circumstances of the criminals temporarily serving their sentences outside prisons are found in the examinations, the prisons shall formulate written opinions and submit them to the prison administration departments above the provincial level for approval." This consists of contents in three aspects: First, under the circumstance in line with imprisonment targets and imprisonment terms, criminals who have qualified legal documents stipulated by Article 16 of Prison Law should be put in prison; second, it clearly enhances the scope of serving sentences outside prisons. There is a development and evolvement process regarding the circumstances that allow criminals to serve their sentences outside prisons. According to the Criminal Procedure Law modified in 1996 and Prison Law issued in 1994, in case of one of the following circumstances, criminals can temporarily serve their sentences outside prisons: (1) if a criminal is seriously ill and needs to be released on parole for medical treatment; or (2) if a criminal is a pregnant woman or a woman who is breast-feeding her own baby. The Reply of the Supreme People's Court on Temporarily Serving the Sentences Outside the Prisons, which was promulgated on November 2, 1998 and implemented on January 19, 1999, further affirmed the above-mentioned two circumstances, and noted the criminals who cannot take care of themselves and constitute no dangers to the society can also temporarily serve their sentences outside the prisons. The Criminal Procedure Law modified in 2012 also absorbed the enhanced stipulation and affirmed that criminals in the above-mentioned three categories can temporarily serve their sentences outside the prisons. The Prison Law modified in 2012 also absorbed the content; third, it also stipulates the procedures of handling the circumstances of criminals temporarily serving sentences outside the prisons after physical examinations. So far, two types of departments can decide temporarily serving sentences outside the prisons, namely, the prison administration departments of the level of the province, autonomous region and municipality directly under the central government, and the people's court making the original judgments. This amendment clarifies that while giving physical examinations on prisoners, the prisons can deal with the circumstances of prisoners temporarily serving their sentences outside the prisons by formulating written opinions and submitting them to the prison administration departments above the provincial level for approval, instead of "the decision on temporary execution outside prison shall be made by the people's court which handed the criminal over for the execution" as stipulated by the original law. This is more timely and easier to be implemented and can better protect prisoners' rights.

(III) Community correction was included in the Prison Law for the first time to be in line with the international trend of socialized punishment execution. Community correction is a non-prison punishment system, which is different from prison correction. Originated in countries such as the United Kingdom and the United States in the mid-19th Century, it is widely used in the world. China launched the pilot project of community correction in 2003 and promoted it throughout China in 2009. According to the Amendment to the Criminal Law (VIII) announced in 2011 and the Criminal Procedure Law modified in 2012, the state fundamental laws clarify the legal system of community correction, providing the legal basis for the development of community correction work. In January 2012, the Ministry of Justice, the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate and the Ministry of Public Security jointly issued Implementation Measures of Community Correction, which came into effect on March 1, 2012. Accordingly, the Prison Law should also be amended. Before the amendment, the Prison Law stipulated: If a prisoner temporarily serves his sentence outside prison, the public security organ in the place of the prisoner's residence shall execute his sentence. The prison that originally held the prisoner in custody shall promptly inform such public security organ of the prisoner's performances of reform in prison. The modified Prison Law stipulates: If a prisoner temporarily serves his sentence outside prison, community correction shall apply according to law and the community correction organizations shall execute his sentence. The organ that the prison that originally held the prisoner in custody shall promptly inform the prisoner's performances of reform in prison to also changed from the public security department to community correction organization. Thus, the new type of criminal punishment execution system combining prison punishment execution with non-prison punishment execution has been established. So far, an increasing number of criminals serve their sentences in communities, which can ease the crowdedness in prisons and help protect the rights of prisoners and criminals serving their sentences in communities. Community correction is a gentle way of executing criminal punishment. For the criminals who serve their sentences in communities, community correction can stimulate their motivation of self-reform and help maintain social harmony and stability.

Go to Forum >>0 Comment(s)