살인범죄 양형요인 연구- 초점관심이론 중심으로 -

초록

This study aims to empirically analyze the influence of sentencing factors in homicide crimes based on the focal concern theory. Sentencing is an important indicator of judicial justice and requires fairness, appropriateness, and rationality in its outcome. As one of the various attempts to reduce sentencing variation among judges, efforts have been made to standardize sentencing factors to create sentencing guidelines. However, the debate on sentencing variation among judges still persists. The focal concern theory postulates that sentencing deviations can occur based on a judge's primary concern. Especially for homicide offenses, sentencing reasons are reported to vary across judges in sentencing reports, and empirically identifying judges' focal concerns may provide another source of sentencing variation. The data used in this study is a total of 1,887 cases of homicide crimes in Seoul between January 1, 2012, and December 31, 2023, in which one offender was convicted in the first trial. Of these, 232 cases were used in the final analysis, excluding cases with restricted access, such as infanticide, or for which no judgment exists. To identify the focus of judges in sentencing, we analyzed key words in the sentence. Among the sentencing factors that judges focused on, we found that the more serious the motive for the crime, the more premeditated or brutal the crime, the more contested the case, or the more prior convictions, the longer the sentence. On the other hand, the sentence decreases if the victim provoked the incident or does not want to be punished. Whether the offender turned themselves in, whether they used a weapon, or their gender did not have a statistically significant impact on sentencing.

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