The National Assembly of Korea revised the Criminal Procedure Act on June 30, 2011 and announced it on July 18, 2011. The Ministry of Justice announced legislation of ‘The Regulation on Criminal Investigation Command on Control of Judicial Police and Criminal Investigation Rules of Control of Judicial Police’ in advance. However, the National Police Agency rejected the revision draft to be likely to have difficulties at enactment of the Presidential Decree of the Act. This study investigated internal investigation and its issue to be independent from opinions of the Prosecutors’ Office as well as the National Police Agency concerning internal investigation, and to discuss understanding of internal investigation under revision of the Criminal Procedure Act.
The internal investigation is said to be the first stage of the criminal investigation to be an activity that criminal investigation agency investigates actual conditions of a case to verify suspicion of the crime: And, the filing is said to be an official procedure that criminal investigation agency notifies cognition on existence of crime suspicion: And, give up of filing is said to be an official procedure that criminal investigation agency criminal investigation agency notifies cognition on non-existence of crime existence. And, definition of both internal investigation and filing can be a classification standard in practice so that suspects of internal investigation shall be assured of rights of defendants regardless of legal regulations and/or crime suspicion. In particular, the suspects shall be assured of prior notice of reasons of the investigation, and assistance from the lawyer.
Not only internal investigation but also criminal investigation can be distinguished from point of view that internal investigation is thought to be prior stage of criminal investigation. But the internal investigation that is thought to be first stage of criminal investigation is not distinguishing from criminal investigation but start of control of criminal investigation. In other words, internal investigation that requires control shall be distinguished from the one that does not require control.
The study suggested judgment standards of start of criminal investigation as follow:
Firstly, inspection agency cognized suspicion of the crime. Secondly, inspection agency did constraint disposition in accordance with the Criminal Procedure Act. Thirdly, others than victim should be given internal investigation. Fourthly, when others than victim asked for either protection of rights or formal criminal investigation, criminal investigation was thought to start.
And, human rights protection system shall be developed in favor of the ones who are given internal investigation, and not only prosecutors but also the police shall set up criminal investigation command system based on mutual cooperation to have faithful internal investigation system.