Research On The Causes And Countermeasures Of Extorting A Confession By Torture

In the modern society, extorting a confession by torture, which always deeply destroys justice and foundational franchise, have been abandoned by all civilized countries including China. A strange phenomenon is that Templars and judges and inquisitors are strongly against extorting a confession by torture; on the other hand, many cases about extorting a confession by torture are exposed. These cases are famous with bloodiness and absurdity. Why extorting a confession by torture cannot be forbidden absolutely in our country? How can we put an end to extorting a confession by torture? This is the topic I try to study in this paper.Extorting a confession by torture refers to the action made by the prosecutor adopting some methods such as corporal punishment, disguised corporal punishment or spiritual torture, etc. to coerce the person prosecuted to confess the crimes when the prosecutor interrogates the person prosecuted in the criminal proceedings. It has four characters. The first one, extorting a confession referred in this paper is a behavior happened in the criminal proceedings, those happened in administrative proceedings and civil proceedings will not be talked about .The second one , in this paper the subjects who do extorting a confession must be the officials in judicial department .It do not referrer the cases by other people .The third one, in this behavior, objects are those criminal suspects, while ,the cases that objects are witness and other people joining in the criminal proceeding will not be talked. The last one, the purpose of torture is extorting a confession, in the purpose of others will not be talked in this paper. The concept above is just to found a theoretic foundation.Extorting a confession by torture in our country happens with a few characters as below. It exists in our criminal proceedings at large .The method about extorting a confession is very bloody. A new phenomenon is that the method be used more and more covert. The present situation of extorting a confession by torture today in China: viewed only from the opened data of the investigation of the crimes of the extortion of a confession by torture, the absolute number of the extortion of a confession by torture is not large, and in fact only part and even a small number of the cases are investigated and there exists a large"untrue number". And more, according the legal system of our country, victims can only receive a small amount compensating for his damnify. It is unfair.In my opinion, the causes of extorting a confession by torture are mainly as below: Firstly, historic causes. The eastern countries generally have the tradition of the value orientation of the social interests higher than the individual interests. At present, China lies in the period of the social transition, and the capability of the nation regulating and controlling society is softened, which forces its value orientation in emphasis of the national and social interests and neglecting of the individual interests. Secondly, causes of legal system. The legislative defects in the extortion of a confession by torture are mainly represented as the ones of the regulations on the crimes of extortion of a confession by torture, no clear principle of presumption of innocence, absence of right to silence, no determination of opposing coercion and proving his or her own crimes and no complete rules of elimination of the illegal evidence. Thirdly, causes of executing the law .In fact, there are a lot of items in our legal system to prohibit extorting a confession by torture, but they do not worked very well. The reason is that it is lack of superintendence. Fourthly, benefits causes. Large benefits such as economic benefits and criminal pursuit benefits drive people to do extorting a confession by torture.According analysis above, I thick we can try to solve the problem in these ways. The objective existence of the extorting of a confession by torture must be faced; the reasons for its existence must be scientifically explored and its damages must be clearly known, in addition that great efforts should be given to find the methods of restricting the extorting of a confession by torture. First of all, we must change our traditional ideas about extorting of a confession by torture. We must recognize the importance of protecting human rights; especially individual rights .We must change from dependence of vtestimony of a witness to testimony of a witness. On the other hand ,legal system is to be perfected about witness. A Principle of"against lawless witness"is needed to protect human rights. The government should establish a whole system to encourage technology about this developed. It can lightened policemen's press, so it can reduce the"benefits", which must be good to prohibit extorting of a confession by torture. Policemen's mentality health is another factor. Their work is indeed difficult, so we must pay more attention to the profession training, so that they can afford hard work. Finally, we must design and perfect a whole system about how to supervise and punished the behavior of extorting of a confession by torture. Many kinds of power can participate in this system, such as"people's congress", political party, procuratorial organ, medias. This is the key to prohibit extorting of a confession by torture.