Problem Of False & Forced Confessions Across Jurisdictions With Focus On Juvenile False Confessions

Problem Of False And Forced Confessions Across Jurisdictions With A Focus On Juvenile False Confessions

Sanchli Sethi, Jindal Global Law School

ABSTRACT

The route from commission of an offence to punishing or acquitting the accused is a long and extensive one. From filling of the First Information Report to investigation to the actual trial, it involves a number of phases with even more actors exercising official duty during the course. One of the most crucial stages in a trial proceeding is that of Evidence. It holds the power to make or break a case. It is this stage that the court relies on heavily to decide on the fact in issue. The defendant’s admission of committing the alleged act is what the opposite party desires the most. Hence, confessions and admissions occupy a pivotal role in criminal and civil trials respectively.1 As Jennifer Lackey2 remarks, ‘Confessions are powerful, they often swamp all other evidence...the case is virtually closed (after an admissible confession)’.3 Under the Indian Evidence Act, 1872 (hereinafter referred to as the ‘Act’), there is no specific definition of what a confession comprises of. The codified laws largely pertain to their admissibility. A huge part of foundational understanding of confessions in the Indian context come from precedents. Lord Atkin, in the Privy Council decision of Pakala Narayan Swami v. Emperor4, remarked, a confessional statement is not one which makes an inference to the committing of a crime,

“A confession must either admit in terms the offence or at any rate substantially all the facts which constitute the offence. An admission of a gravely incriminating fact, even a conclusively incriminating fact is not in itself a confession”