SPP Confirms New Policy on Exclusion of Illegal Evidence

July 1, 2005

Prosecutors must exclude illegally obtained testimony when deciding whether or not to indict a suspect, declared a Vice President of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) on May 26. According to an article in the China Youth Daily, the SPP Vice President said that "All oral evidence illegally obtained through torture or violence or illegally collected through intimidation, enticement, or fraud, etc. should be considered illegal evidence and resolutely excluded in accordance with the law."

Prosecutors must exclude illegally obtained testimony when deciding whether or not to indict a suspect, declared a Vice President of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP) on May 26. According to an article in the China Youth Daily, the SPP Vice President said that "All oral evidence illegally obtained through torture or violence or illegally collected through intimidation, enticement, or fraud, etc. should be considered illegal evidence and resolutely excluded in accordance with the law." When police or prosecutors have collected evidence without strict respect for the law, they must collect the evidence anew or take other remedial measures before they can use it as a basis for a criminal charge.

The SPP announced the policy at a national conference of prosecutors. The SPP also noted that prosecutors who collect evidence illegally or engage in other violations of law or policy, such as manufacturing evidence or meeting privately with suspects and their representatives, would be suspended and subject to administrative discipline or prosecution. The SPP announcement on illegal evidence could be a step toward the endorsement of an evidentiary rule that would require criminal courts to exclude such evidence, or an effort to head off such a rule by demonstrating that prosecutors will deal with such problems in the investigation phase of the criminal process.