Buying flight delay insurance "get compensation" 3 million, civil disputes or criminal offenses?
Point of view
If the criminal law is always put ahead of social governance, if the hand of the criminal law is always stretched out in the microeconomic activities, then this society will lack vitality, and the cost of social governance must be very high.
According to reports, a woman with the surnamed Li in Nanjing defrauded nearly 3 million yuan in fraudulent use of nearly 900 flights due to fictitious itinerary, and has been criminally detained by the local police on suspicion of fraud and insurance fraud. But many netizens think that such a conviction is too far-fetched, saying that "the rules you set, I took advantage of your rules, you sue me for fraud" "People, tickets, flight delays are not fake, what cheat?"
The resumption of the case is roughly the same: Li had previous experience in aviation services. She first selects flights with higher delay rates and then checks for extreme weather on her voyage. If he finds a flight that may have a large delay, Li will use different identities to purchase air tickets and insure a lot. Once a delay occurs, he will apply to the insurance company for compensation. If the flight is not delayed, she will refund the ticket before the plane takes off to reduce losses.
This matter has caused no small controversy. It is undeniable that the law has a certain professional threshold, and many of these disputes are emotional. But the law is rooted in life and serves life, with a fireworks breath from beginning to end. For most cases, ordinary people can make correct judgments based on their conscience and common sense.
In this case, the reason for the detention of Li Mou was that he used his or her relatives’ and friends’ identity information to purchase airfare and aircraft delay insurance. He was suspected of deliberately fabricating an insured person who did not exist at all when entering into an insurance contract with an insurance company, and defrauding him of insurance money. There are objectively frauds in criminal law evaluation.
But the question is, whose identity is the key to purchasing insurance? The point is whether this identity information is true. Because the insurance company does not screen customers, it only checks whether the person who purchases the delay insurance also purchases a flight ticket at the same time. Therefore, as long as Li used real identity information to purchase insurance and paid the full consideration, she completed a legal contracting act.
If every single act is legal, how can a collection of these single acts suddenly slip into crime? Whether the insured knows or agrees may affect the determination of insurance interests and the effectiveness of insurance contracts, but this dispute is still a civil dispute and will not be directly escalated into a criminal offense.
An insurance contract is a kind of contract of fortune, and its essential feature is the uncertainty of the insurance subject. Combined with this case, that is, when signing the insurance contract, Li was not sure whether the flight was necessarily delayed. However, this does not mean that Li cannot collect information to make his own judgment and thus make decisions that are beneficial to him.
Some of the rules of this world have moral attributes and some do not. A rule that does not have a moral character is essentially a benefit distribution rule.
Hayek once pointed out that rules are not essentially obstacles to behavior, but only provide a reference for people to choose and make decisions. Just like on the basketball court, players can use fouls as a tactic and tactic, with the intention of seeking the advantage of the game.
In the final analysis, Li's behavior is to use loopholes in the rules to seek his own interests. If an insurance company does not want to see similar behavior, the preferred method is to improve the insurance clauses and improve the insurance rules. The second option is to go to the court to claim that the insurance contract is invalid instead of seeking the police power to intervene. Reliance on police power will maintain or even exacerbate the inertia and inefficiency of market players.
The market economy encourages people to think hard, and encourages people to make money and become rich. Some methods of making money may be novel or even unreasonable, but unreasonable does not mean illegal or even criminal. As far as Li's behavior is concerned, the socialization qualitative should be "wool", which can be regarded as speculation, but it is hard to say crime.
From a legal perspective, there is obviously no pan-moralist tendency in criminal law enforcement. I always want to put unreasonable economic activities into the criminal law cage. If the criminal law is always put in front of social governance, if the hand of the criminal law is always stretched everywhere in microeconomic activities, then this society must be lack of vitality, and the cost of social governance must be very high.
A true legal person must look at the core of the case with an understanding and insight into the whole society, rather than being trapped in the mud by some crooked appearances and unable to extricate themselves. I hope this case will be properly handled in the end.
□Deng Xueping (lawyer)