i t
7
criminal?
such conduct constitutes a crime, but is not serious enough for illegal punishment.
According to
one Chinese writer the question of warrants criminal punishment must
whether illegal conduct
be established by a comparison of relevant provisions of the Administrative Penalty Regulations and the Criminal Law. (1) For example, Article 23 (a) of the Regulations
establishes the offense of theft, swindling or forcible
seizure of a small amount of property. This offense
corresponds to
forcible seizure
established by
meaning of
the criminal offense of theft, swindling or
of
a relatively large amount of property
Article 151 of the Criminal Law. The
the terms, "relatively large amount" and "small amount" have been set by the Supreme People's Court and are legally binding on the public security forces.
two
There
are many administrative and criminal
offenses which do not dovetail together as neatly as these
theft provisions.
Consequently public security authorities have а reasonable amount of discretion in
deciding whether to recommend criminal prosecution or to
retain the case as an administrative offense. There is a
rough parallel between the concepts of Administrative Penalties Regulations offenses and summary offenses under
the English law. The fundamental difference lies in the authority of the Chinese public security organs rather than courts of law to impose Administrative Penalties.
The Regulations contain very few procedural
requirements.
suspect to
A public security detachment may require a
appear for questioning by means of a written
). However, a verbal summons is
'summons" (
傳嘆
sufficient
offence.
if the
Coercion
individual is discovered committing an
may be used if the summons is not