British Confession Law

Abstract

Confession statement is deemed the most crucial instrument dealing with the psychologi­cal treatment, day-to-day life, and the criminal justice system administration. In other words, confession concerns and facilitates all aspects of the human society; it, particularly, saves cost and time in criminal process in all criminal justice system around the world. Until the present era, confession is deemed the best evidence and considered the King & Queen of Evidence. As a result, it has been long used to prove the defendants guilt in both civil law and common law countries. This article proposes the legal foundation in the England regarding the confession admissibility standard conforming to the PACE and the Codes of Practice under the English jurisprudence. The author wishes to indicate that article 84 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Thailand, which was adopted in 2005 to prohibit the court from admitting the defendants confession as evidence conflicts with the legal jurisprudence all over the world. It is also incongruent with the value of evidence and common sense which basically the defendants statement, instantly spoken to the arresting police after warning of legal right, is the most trustworthy because the defendant has no time to fabricate the story. In addition, the new legal framework of Thailand might create the undesirable impact to the interest of society as a whole. Then, this article might remind some people and might be the basis to reconsider the reform of the Thai criminal justice system.