We must be ethical and law-abiding people in order to be protected by the law. So can people who commit crimes get protection from the law?

Hello! A person who commits a crime still has his legitimate rights and interests protected by the law.

With the continuous development of the country’s economy, the continuous advancement of the process of governing the country according to law, the continuous improvement of the human rights situation, and the continuous deepening of citizens’ awareness of the rule of law, equality, and justice, criminals—this person with special legal status Citizens, the legal provisions, institutional guarantees and actual enjoyment of their rights have attracted increasing attention from all walks of life. In recent years, the protection of the rights of criminals in our country has gradually entered the track of legalization, especially the promulgation of the white paper "The Situation of Rehabilitating Criminals in China" in 1992 and the successive promulgation of laws and regulations such as the "Prison Law" in 1994. Prison-based executions The agency has taken a solid step of epoch-making significance in providing humanitarian treatment to criminals, respecting the personality of criminals and safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of criminals. Criminals enjoy legal rights corresponding to their special status, and recognizing and protecting their rights is an inevitable requirement of a society governed by the rule of law. To grasp the rights of criminals as a whole, it is necessary to have a clear understanding of issues such as what rights criminals should enjoy, the current status of criminals' rights, and how to effectively safeguard the legal rights of criminals. The clarification of these issues will definitely help law enforcement officials further establish the concept of human rights protection; help improve the quality of criminal rehabilitation; and help maximize the realization of the function of punishment. To this end, this article attempts to explore the rights of criminals as a whole, in order to provide some help in scientifically understanding the current status of the legal rights of criminals in our country.

1. According to the provisions of our country’s Constitution, Prison Law and other laws and regulations, the legal constitution of the rights enjoyed by criminals in our country

(1) Right to equality. Although criminals have committed crimes, as citizens, they still enjoy the right to equality stipulated in the Constitution and the law. This is determined by the principle that citizens are equal before the law. The main equal rights of criminals include: 1. The right to appeal. Including: the right to appeal for criminal, civil and administrative litigation and the right to appeal for administrative sanctions; 2. The right to accuse and report. Criminals have the right to report and accuse judicial organs, execution agencies and their staff of dereliction of duty and infringement to relevant state agencies; 3. The right to be a participant in litigation. Criminals who participate in litigation while serving their sentence still enjoy a series of litigation rights commensurate with their litigation status, such as the right to defense, the right to appeal, the right to apply for avoidance, the right to apply for identification, and so on. In particular, if a criminal commits a new crime while serving his sentence or is prosecuted for an additional or missed crime, the criminal shall have the right to defense and the right to appeal as the defendant.

(2) Political rights. Citizens' political rights refer to the rights of citizens to participate in the political life of the country. Criminals who have not been deprived of political rights should enjoy the political rights stipulated in the constitution and law in accordance with the law. For example, according to the "Several Provisions on Direct Elections for People's Congresses below the County Level" of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress on March 5, 1983 and the "Joint Notice on the Suffrage Rights of Criminals Serving Prison Sentences and Persons in Detention", those who have not been deprived of Criminals with political rights can exercise their right to vote, but because the criminal is under investigation, prosecution, or trial, the People's Procuratorate or the People's Court may decide to stop him from exercising his right to vote.

(3) Personal rights. Personal rights in a broad sense include the right to life, identity, personality, health and rights related to personal freedom, such as communication rights, freedom of religious belief, etc. The personal rights of criminals in our country include: 1. Right to life. If a criminal is not deprived of life according to law, his right to life should be recognized and protected. No one may be arbitrarily deprived of the right to life, including prisoners with suspended death penalty; 2. Right to health. Since the criminal has not been deprived of life, the criminal should enjoy the right to health while serving his sentence. In our country, criminals’ right to health includes food, clothing, housing, medical care and other living benefits; criminals who participate in labor enjoy the right to labor protection in accordance with the law; for criminals who do suffer from serious diseases, those who meet the conditions can be temporarily served outside prison; 3. The right to torture or corporal punishment or abuse. Our country's laws expressly prohibit supervisors of supervisory agencies and personnel entrusted by supervisory agencies to engage in supervision from beating, corporally punishing, or abusing supervised persons, and prohibiting them from instructing supervised persons to beat, corporally punish, or abuse other supervised persons; 4. Insufficiency of personal dignity Violated rights. The "Prison Law" stipulates in the general provisions: The personality of criminals shall not be insulted; the prison police shall not engage in behavior that insults the personality of criminals; 5. The right to communicate and meet. While serving their sentence, criminals may, in accordance with relevant regulations, communicate with others and meet with relatives and guardians; 6. The right to freedom of religious belief.

Our country's constitution stipulates that citizens have the right to freedom of religious belief. The white paper "The Situation of Reforming Criminals in China" also declares: "Criminals have the right to believe in religion." However, the right of criminals to religious belief means: "criminals who believe in religion are allowed to maintain their original status while in custody." Some religious beliefs." The scope of freedom of religious belief is different from that of ordinary citizens.

(4) Property rights. Our country's laws stipulate that the legal property of criminals shall not be infringed upon, and supervisory personnel may not demand or misappropriate it; and the non-daily necessities of criminals shall be kept by the supervision agencies and will be returned upon release. The criminals may be allowed to collect them if they have legitimate uses. In addition, criminals also enjoy inheritance rights and some property rights in intellectual property rights according to law.

(5) Social economic, cultural and educational rights. Including the right to work, the right to rest, the right to obtain material assistance, the right to education, and scientific and cultural rights, etc.: 1. Labor rights. According to the provisions of the Constitution, the labor of any citizen, including criminals, has the duality of rights and obligations. Therefore, criminals should also have the right to labor. Articles 4, 8, 72, etc. of the Prison Law are all specific provisions of the labor rights of criminals. ; 2. Right to rest. As laborers, criminals also have the right to rest. The "Prison Law" stipulates that prisons must refer to national regulations on working hours for criminals' working hours, and criminals have the right to rest on statutory holidays and rest days; 3. The right to obtain material assistance. Articles 37 and 73 of the "Prison Law" clearly stipulate the conditions for criminals and released persons to obtain material assistance; 4. The right to education. According to the provisions of the Constitution, education also has dual attributes. For criminals, on the one hand, this is a right and an important part of the criminal's right to development; on the other hand, it is an obligation, with the mandatory nature of reform; 5. The right to cultural activities. Criminals enjoy certain rights to engage in scientific research, literary and artistic creation, and cultural, sports and entertainment activities in accordance with the law. The "Prison Law" stipulates that prisons can reward criminals who have made inventions, made technological innovations, or taught production techniques to a certain extent; prisons should organize criminals to carry out appropriate sports activities and cultural and entertainment activities.

(6) Marriage and family rights. Including criminals' freedom to marry, the right of legal marriage and family to be free from illegal infringement, and other rights related to marriage and family. According to the relevant provisions of my country's Marriage Law, freedom of marriage includes two aspects: freedom of marriage and freedom of divorce. Regarding marriage, although some administrative regulations or other internal regulations in our country do not allow criminals to get married while serving their sentences outside prison, the law does not prohibit whether they can get married in prison. In practice, there are also examples of criminals getting married in prison. In terms of divorce, criminals enjoy complete substantive and procedural rights, and their freedom of divorce is not subject to any interference.

(7) Other rights. In addition to the above-mentioned rights, Chinese law also stipulates other rights for criminals, such as the right of criminals to receive items and money in accordance with relevant regulations; those who have expired or been sentenced to parole can be released or paroled in accordance with regulations and obtain corresponding benefits. Certificates of rights; female prisoners, juvenile prisoners and ethnic minority prisoners enjoy some special rights. In addition, whether commutation and parole are the rights of criminals is currently controversial. I believe that commutation and parole of criminals are a type of criminal reward given by the prison police to the criminals' reform performance. They are implemented in accordance with relevant laws and regulations and do not have rights. Freedom is therefore not a right enjoyed by criminals themselves.

2. The current status and deficiencies in safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of criminals

From the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949 to the present, especially since the reform and opening up, with the continuous development of my country’s economy and society, the concept of human rights has With the continuous deepening of the law, the issue of protecting the rights of criminals has increasingly attracted widespread attention and attention from all walks of life. The country has also signed a series of guidelines and international normative documents on the rights of criminals, such as the "Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners"; Covenant on Human Rights and Political Rights; Declaration on the Protection of All Persons from Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; "Principles of Medical Ethics on Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment" and the "United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for Juvenile Justice (Beijing Rules)", etc., and extensively participates in international exchanges and cooperation on the protection of offenders' rights.

The country has also formulated the "Prison Law" and revised the "Criminal Law", "Criminal Procedure Law" and other relevant laws and regulations. The Ministry of Justice has carried out large-scale institutional reform of prisons across the country, adjusted the layout of prisons, and basically achieved These measures have greatly improved the environment for criminals to reform, increased their enthusiasm for reform, and made important contributions to the security and stability of the country. Although we have made significant achievements in safeguarding the rights and interests of criminals, we have also seen many shortcomings in protecting the rights and interests of criminals, which need to be constantly improved. Mainly manifested in the following aspects:

(1) There is still a big gap between the standards for protecting the rights of international criminals. Although our country has joined many international conventions or treaties on the protection of criminals, it has made significant achievements in protecting the rights of criminals, and the quality of criminal rehabilitation has also been greatly improved. These achievements are obvious and have been recognized by most of the world. It is recognized by the country. The fact that individual countries have repeatedly rejected China's human rights proposals at United Nations human rights conferences is a good proof. But we must also see the actual problems. Since our country is still in the primary stage of socialism, the material foundation is still relatively weak, and the development of productivity is unbalanced. The living conditions of prison criminals are still far behind the internationally accepted requirements. For example, the living conditions, living and medical treatment standards are still relatively low, etc., which cannot be ignored.

(2) The laws and regulations for the protection of criminals’ rights and interests are not sound enough and the police force allocation is unreasonable. It has been 13 years since the "Prison Law" was promulgated in 1994, and the "Implementing Rules of the Prison Law" have not been promulgated yet. In the past ten years, the country has undergone earth-shaking changes, and many provisions of the "Prison Law" have become outdated. The "Prison Law" itself is a relatively abstract provision, which is difficult to grasp in judicial practice and lacks operability. Different regions, or even different prisons in the same region, have different understandings and operations of the "Prison Law". It is urgently needed to be introduced. Relevant judicial interpretations. Judging from the requirements of modern prison construction, the overall police force in the prison is insufficient, especially the police resources with professional skills are still quite scarce, which is not in line with the minimum police deployment standards stipulated by the Ministry of Justice and the expert talent requirements that must be equipped for the correction of criminals. There is a big gap. However, due to various institutional and mechanical reasons, it is difficult for many people who want to work in prisons to do so, which directly affects the improvement of the quality optimization of police resources. Another issue is the allocation of police forces within the prison. The prison authorities deploy too many police forces and there are too few grassroots police forces. The focus of the prison's work should be on the grassroots level. Only when the grassroots police force is guaranteed can the safety of the prison be guaranteed and the various rights of criminals can be truly realized. accomplish.

(3) The prison hospital (medical clinic) lacks the ability to diagnose and treat diseases. Most prison hospitals (medical clinics) have simple facilities and outdated equipment. The overall medical level of medical staff is not high. There is no way to treat slightly more complicated diseases. They cannot fundamentally guarantee the right to health of prisoners. This not only affects the enthusiasm of criminals to reform, but also affects the criminals' enthusiasm for reform. It brings safety risks to the reform order in the prison area. For example, a certain criminal suffered from severe psoriasis all over his body and itched unbearably. Especially in summer, his body was so itchy that he couldn't sleep all night. Later, the criminal simply stopped sleeping at night because he couldn't get enough rest. It affected the prisoner's normal work, and the prisoner's sentence was relatively long, which caused great psychological pressure. He also wanted to reform, but the disease seriously affected his emotions and caused great harm to the prisoner's body and mind.

(4) Prisons have never been able to escape the influence of heavy production tasks, and overtime work often occurs. Although prisons have undergone structural reforms, separated prisons from enterprises, and the state has fully allocated funds for prison reconstruction, due to the excessive financial burden on the state, financial allocations cannot meet the actual requirements of prison construction, so the production tasks of each prison have to focus on Even without major changes, superiors will still assign certain production tasks to the prison. In the assessment and promotion of leaders at all levels, the production situation of the unit is also an important assessment indicator. This approach makes leaders at all levels and even grassroots police officers Do not take labor production lightly. When faced with production tasks and tight delivery times, it is inevitable to work overtime, which will affect the criminal's right to rest to a certain extent.

(5) There are endless incidents of violations of laws and disciplines committed by prison staff. In recent years, the state has stepped up the investigation of prison police officers' law enforcement, and has successively issued many rules and regulations such as the "Five Prohibitions", the "Six Prohibitions", the Supervision and Implementation Measures for Police Law Enforcement and Discipline, and the Measures for the Accountability of Police Law Enforcement Responsibilities.

However, there are still a considerable number of police officers who break the law and are punished by party and government disciplines. Some are even sentenced to prison terms and have to change their police uniforms into prison uniforms. The lessons are very painful. Prison staff's violations of laws and disciplines are mainly manifested in: illegal use of guard equipment, causing physical harm to criminals; taking advantage of criminals' desire for commutation and parole to accept bribes and extorting criminals' families; using their power to have improper relations with criminals' families, etc. wait.

3. Some thoughts on safeguarding the legitimate rights and interests of criminals

With the continuous enhancement of our country’s national strength, the continuous deepening of reform and opening up, and the continuous advancement of the concept of human rights, the legal rights of criminals must be effectively guaranteed. It will definitely become the top priority of prison work. Formulating and improving laws and regulations to protect the rights of criminals is not conducive to improving the impartiality of law enforcement and ensuring the realization of criminals' legitimate rights. It is also helpful to increase the enthusiasm of criminals to reform, reduce the rate of re-offending, maintain prison security and national stability, and serve the grand goal of building a harmonious society. Goals are of great significance.

(1) Amend and improve the "Prison Law" and other relevant laws and regulations so that the protection of criminals' rights and interests can be followed. It is hard to imagine that the Prison Law has not been revised for 13 years since it was promulgated in 1994. Over the past decade or so, the prison industry has made great achievements, and the reform situation has undergone great changes. As an important basis for prison law enforcement, the "Prison Law" has not been modified in any way. It is really incredible, which directly leads to many problems in judicial practice. The problem cannot be executed. In addition, as a supporting regulation of the "Prison Law", the "Prison Law Implementation Rules" have not been promulgated. The consequence is that in law enforcement, there are large differences in various regions and even prisons. For example, Shanghai stipulates that the parole of criminals from other provinces and cities is limited to 18 provinces and cities including Jiangsu and Zhejiang. In order to further enable the reform of prisons to keep up with the development of the international situation and to provide a practical legal basis for the protection of criminals' legal rights, it is urgent to amend the Prison Law and formulate the Implementation Rules of the Prison Law.

(2) Strengthen the construction of prison hardware and software to improve the quality of life and education level of prisoners. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, many prisons were built in relatively remote and backward areas due to the needs of the situation at that time. This contributed to the stability and development of the country at that time. Decades have passed and social conditions have undergone tremendous changes. Continuing to place prisons in these remote and backward areas is not only unnecessary, but also brings many problems. For example, the traffic remains unchanged, which causes inconvenience to the police officers’ lives. Difficulty attracting talented people to work in prisons, etc. After the reform and opening up, the state carried out a series of major reforms in prisons, adjusted the layout, relocated some particularly remote prisons with extremely inconvenient transportation to areas with more convenient transportation, carried out prison reforms, and implemented the separation of prisons and enterprises. However, On the whole, the intensity is not strong enough, and there are still many problems that need to be solved. For example, the facilities of prison hospitals (medical clinics) are outdated and backward, and there is a lack of diagnosis and treatment facilities for common and serious diseases. Many old prisons have poor facilities and the density of prisoners is too high. The living space for criminals is too narrow and so on. As far as the construction of prison software is concerned, prisons generally give people the feeling of being closed. For a long time in the past, due to institutional reasons, it was difficult for social workers and college students to be attracted to work in prisons. Prison staff are basically veterans. The single source of personnel has resulted in some passivity in work. In recent years, the country has become aware of this problem, classified prison staff as civil servants, and openly recruited them from the general public and fresh graduates. This has achieved good results, especially in Shanghai, which has done relatively well in this regard.

(3) Ensuring the supply of prison funds and improving staff welfare benefits can effectively reduce the probability of police officers committing law enforcement crimes. It is undeniable that the welfare benefits of prison police officers have been greatly improved compared to the past, but compared with similar professions, the gap is still relatively large. Many police officers complain that everything has increased now, but their wages have not. On the other hand, as prisons are specialized places for reforming criminals, police officers are generally under great pressure, and the proportion of police officers suffering from various diseases is very high, which fully demonstrates the harsh working environment of prison police officers. Under this circumstance, due to the dual effects of life pressure and psychological pressure, as well as the influence of social pluralistic values, some weak-willed people will not hesitate to try the law. If we can effectively improve welfare benefits and improve the working environment of police officers, the illegal behavior of prison police officers will be reduced. Incidents of disciplinary violations will be significantly reduced, thereby better protecting the rights and interests of criminals and their families.

(4) Establish and improve various rules and regulations to fundamentally guarantee the legitimate rights and interests of criminals.

The French thinker Montesquieu had such a famous saying in his article "The Spirit of the Laws": "All people with power are prone to abuse their power. This is an eternal experience." Lord Acton, a professor at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom, also said Once said: "Power leads to corruption, absolute power leads to absolute corruption." This is a lesson learned from the past, and we cannot repeat the same mistakes... Extreme power leads to corruption, and there are many examples like this in life! Cases of violations of laws and disciplines have continued to appear in prisons in recent years, reflecting the prison's insufficient enforcement of laws and supervision. I think we can start from the following aspects: First, strengthen the training of prison police officers and continuously improve the quality of police officers. Although there are more various trainings for police officers and a lot of warning education, the effects are not endless. People are satisfied that we need to work hard on legal education and training to make police officers clearly aware of the serious consequences that violations of laws and disciplines may have on themselves and their families; second, the supervision and inspection of prison law enforcement by the Supervisory Procuratorate Office is strengthened, and there is a lack of dynamic supervision. mechanism. At present, there are two main ways for the prosecutor's office to conduct inspections of prison law enforcement, namely, the prosecutor's office mailbox and the prosecutor's contact system. It is difficult for the prosecutor's office to fully understand the police's law enforcement situation with these two supervision methods, and they are far from meeting the needs of prison law enforcement supervision. The third is to effectively improve the transparency of prison law enforcement and strengthen public supervision. Only when prison law enforcement is operated under the sun and actively accepts the supervision of the public can we ensure fair and civilized law enforcement. Due to historical reasons, prisons have little contact with society. With the steady advancement of prison reform, prisons should gradually turn from closed to open and accept public supervision. In recent years, the prison has hired social supervisors and allowed media interviews and reports, which are better opening measures. In the past, various media paid little attention to prisons, and once they were reported, there was a lot of negative news. Practice has proved that by accepting public supervision, the legitimate rights and interests of criminals can be effectively protected.

In short, with the continuous development of national political construction and the deepening of reform and opening up, the rights and interests of criminals will increasingly be protected fairly, and with the gradual advancement of prison reform, the rights enjoyed by criminals The scope will become more and more extensive. As prison police officers, they must master and understand the country's laws and regulations in a timely manner, strengthen the study of the concept of socialist rule of law, promptly change the concept of law enforcement, enhance the awareness of fair law enforcement, and do not make it appear that their actions have violated the rights of criminals. It’s a joke that has legitimate rights and interests but you don’t know yet. When understanding what rights criminals enjoy, we must also have a deep understanding of the problems and shortcomings that criminals encounter when exercising these rights in judicial practice, and then have a clear understanding of what efforts the prison needs to make to protect the rights of criminals. Understand and effectively safeguard the legal rights of criminals and the rights of criminals, promote the improvement of the quality of education and reform, reduce the rate of criminals re-offending, and make some contributions to building a harmonious society.