미성년자인 성범죄 피해자를 위한 공소시효의 중단 및 연장에 관한 제문제

Reconsidering tolling the Statute of Limitation Problem for Minor Victims of Sex Crimes

Lately in Korea, the Statute of Limitations has been in the center of social issues even among lay people, partially because there have been many henious crimes which were not brought to justice for years. The statute of limitations for those crimes has run out, so now it is legally implausible to bring charges against some people even if they are found to be guilty of those crimes. One area where the statute of limitations has been a big issue is the field of various sex crimes committed against minor victims. Usually, it takes years for minor victims of sex crimes to bring charges against the perpertrators, because quite often they feel powerless to report the crime to the authority and they find themselves oppressed by the criminals even after the particular crimes have committed. In that sense, statute of limitation has not provided them with a shield which protects them from being invaded by the criminals. Rather, thanks to the procedural barriers, minor victims have to bear the pain forever because so called justice is not there when it is needed. This paper presents several ideas that can be utilized to fix that problem mentioned above. Abolishing the statute of limitation for sex crimes might imbalance the whole system of statute of limitations. As a compromise, it is recommended that the change for new scheme of statute of limitations should be limited to the sex crimes when victims are minors. Also it is suggested that the statute of limitations for such crimes should be tolled till the minor victims reach majority. Many useful grounds to make that idea into reality have been discussed. In addition, if all the ideas mentioned above would not be able to see the light, the current system of making most sex crimes as offenses subject to complaint might be a way of getting around the problem.