성폭력범죄는 주된 피해자가 오늘날 사회적 약자로 일컬어지는 여성과 아동을 대상으로 하며 살인으로 이어지는 2차적 범죄를 초래할 가능성이 있다. 또한 성폭력범죄는 재범 위험성이 높은 범죄로 현재 심각한 사회적인 문제로 대두되고 있다. 아동·청소년을 대상으로 2000년에 시행된 성범죄자 신상공개를 시작으로 수차례의 법률 개정을 통하여 신상정보 등록제도와 인터넷 공개제도 및 우편 고지제도 등이 새롭게 도입되었고, 그 대상범위도 성인을 대상으로 한 성폭력 범죄자로까지 확대되었다. 이와 같은 개정으로 신상공개제도는 초기의 위헌성과 실효성에 대한 논란을 극복하고 비교적 안정적인 추세에 이르렀으나 대상범죄가 광범위하다는 점과 그로 인하여 신상등록대상자에 대한 관리를 맡고 있는 경찰인력에도 한계가 있다는 점, 기존 취업제한제도에서 일률적으로 10년간 아동·청소년 관련기관에의 취업을 제한한다는 점, 가해자 가족이 2차적으로 피해를 입고 있다는 점에 대하여 논란이 되고 있다. 현재 가해자 가족이 받게 되는 폐해는 국내외를 막론하고 발생하고 있으며, 우리나라의 경우 신상공개대상자의 수가 매년 증가하기 때문에 그 폐해는 점차 증가될 것으로 보인다. 이처럼 현행 신상공개제도는 그 대상범죄를 광범위하게 규정하고 있고, 그에 따라 경찰 인력도 부족한 실정이며 취업의 제한을 차등화하지 않고 일률적으로 10년으로 제한하고, 가해자 가족에 대한 인권 침해 및 사회적 문제 등을 고려하지 않고 있기 때문에 법체계상으로 제도 운영상의 문제점이 나타나고 있다. 이와 같은 문제점을 해결하기 위해서는 합리적인 대상범죄의 축소, 신상등록대상자에 대한 전담경찰관의 인력 증원, 취업제한의 차등화와 가해자 가족 지원에 대한 정책적인 지원이 필요하다.
Sexual assault is the crime against women and children who are socially vulnerable in most cases, and it can lead to the secondary and even fatal effect, death of the victims. In addition to this effect, it influences the society strongly and heavily as it has a high risk of recidivism. As disclosure system of personal information of sexual offenders was introduced by disclosing personal information of child molesters in 2000, it has adopted registration of personal information of sexual offenders, disclosure of the information on the Internet and notice system by mail, and the scope of application has expanded to the sexual offenders against the adults revising some of provision in the related law. Disclosure system became stable by resolving the violation of constitution and overcoming the controversies of its effectiveness at the very beginning. However, it still has ongoing controversies as follows: first, the scope of type of crime applying the system is too broad. As a result, it has made the police reach the limit on the resources in charge of managing the offenders. Next, there is a matter of balancing in terms of restricting both of offenders against the children and the youth, and the adults with 10-year-restriction on employment in the child-and-youth-related institutions. Last, but definitely not the least, there is a matter of secondary victimization on offenders’ family. This dissertation discussed related law on disclosure of personal information on sexual offenders in the United States, the United Kingdoms, Canada, and Australia. And it was found that there exists some differences in registration period of sexual offenders by the risk of recidivism and severity of the offense and its punishment in Anglo-American law. In case of the United States, they provided objective standard of evaluation on registration and/or disclosure of personal information based on the ratings made by the district attorneys using the risk of recidivism of sexual offenders. Moreover, the offenders’ family have gone through social stigmas because of the crime that they didn’t commit. And the number of the registrated offenders are increasing each year. Thus, it is reasonable to say the harmful effect of social stigma on the offenders’ family will increase as well. To minimize the unnecessary victimization and to reduce the recidivism of the offenders, they have been provided with support programs in the United States, the United Kingdoms, Canada, Australia, and Japan through the non-government organizations or rehabilitation institutions. Current disclosure system of personal information has some legal drawbacks in implementing: the scope of type of crime applied, limitations in the police resources, non-differentiation in 10-year restriction on employment by the risk of recidivism, violation of human rights of offenders’ family and other social issues. Thus, it needs to adopt the government support programs for reasonable rearrangement of the restriction period, increase in human resources in the police who are in charge of managing the registrated, differentiation of restrictions on employment by the risk of recidivism, and support for the offenders’ family.
