Torture quotes

I was reading yesterday's House of Lords judgement on torture and thought I'd quote some enlightening parts:

One of the first acts of the Long Parliament in 1640 was... to abolish the Court of Star Chamber, where torture evidence had been received, and in that year the last torture warrant in our history was issued. (p. 6)

"Once torture has become acclimatized in a legal system it spreads like an infectious disease. It saves the labour of investigation. It hardens and brutalizes those who have become accustomed to use it." Sir William Holdsworth (quoted on p. 7)

The prinicple agsint using forced evdience has spread to other legal systems (although the ones listed are based on English law):

"Rochin v California: “States in their prosecutions respect certain decencies of civilized conduct”

The People (Attorney General) v O’Brien, the Supreme Court of Ireland held... that "to countenance the use of evidence extracted or discovered by gross personal violence would... involve the State in moral defilement.” (p. 10)

There can be few issues on which international legal opinion is more clear than on the condemnation of torture. Offenders have been recognised as the “common enemies of mankind” (Demjanjuk v Petrovsky) Lord Cooke of Thorndon has described the right not to be subjected to inhuman treatment as a “right inherent in the concept of civilisation” (Higgs v Minister of National Security), the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has described the right to be free from torture as “fundamental and universal” (Siderman de Blake v Argentina) and the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture (Mr Peter Koojimans) has said that “If ever a phenomenon was outlawed unreservedly and unequivocally it is torture” (p. 28)

Article 12 of the 1975 Declaration on Torture: “Any statement which is established to have been made as a result of torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment may not be invoked as evidence against the person concerned or against any other person in any proceedings.” (p. 30)

Article 15 repeats the substance of this provision, subject to a qualification: “Each State Party shall ensure that any statement which is established to have been made as a result of torture shall not be invoked as evidence in any proceedings, except against a person accused of torture as evidence that the statement was made.”

The additional qualification makes plain the blanket nature of this exclusionary rule. It cannot possibly be read, as counsel for the Secretary of State submits, as intended to apply only in criminal proceedings. Nor can it be understood to differentiate between confessions and accusatory statements, or to apply only where the state in whose jurisdiction the proceedings are held has inflicted or been complicit in the torture. It would indeed be remarkable if national courts, exercising universal jurisdiction, could try a foreign torturer for acts of torture committed abroad, but could nonetheless receive evidence obtained by such torture. (p. 30-1)

In the United States.. it had been said to be “unthinkable that a statement obtained by torture or by other conduct belonging only in a police state should be admitted at the government’s behest in order to bolster its case”: LaFrance v Bohlinger.

In their work on The United Nations Convention against Torture (1988), p 148, Burgers and Danelius suggest that article 15 of the Torture Convention is based on two principles: “The rule laid down in article 15 would seem to be based on two different considerations. First of all, it is clear that a statement made under torture is often an unreliable statement, and it could therefore be contrary to the principle of ‘fair trial’ to invoke such a statement as evidence before a court... In the second place, it should be recalled that torture is often aimed at ensuring evidence in judicial proceedings. Consequently, if a statement made under torture cannot be invoked as evidence, an important reason for using torture is removed, and the prohibition against the use of such statements as evidence before a court can therefore have the indirect effect of preventing torture.” (p. 32)

Lord Bingham also states "I am not impressed by the argument based on the practical undesirability of upsetting foreign regimes which may resort to torture. This is an exercise which could scarcely be carried out without investigating whether the evidence had been obtained by torture, and, if so, when, by whom, in what circumstances and for what purpose. Such an investigation would almost inevitably call for an approach to the regime which is said to have carried out the torture." (p. 39), as well as saying "But the English common law has regarded torture and its fruits with abhorrence for over 500 years, and that abhorrence is now shared by over 140 countries which have acceded to the Torture Convention. I am startled, even a little dismayed, at the suggestion (and the acceptance by the Court of Appeal majority) that this deeply-rooted tradition and an international obligation solemnly and explicitly undertaken can be overridden by a statute and a procedural rule which make no mention of torture at all." (p. 40)

As Lord Caswell says "[By not resorting to torture, a country] will uphold the values encapsulated in the judgment of the Supreme Court of Israel in Public Committee Against Torture in Israel v Israel: “Although a democracy must often fight with one hand tied behind its back, it nonetheless has the upper hand. Preserving the rule of law and recognition of an individual’s liberty constitutes an important component in its understanding of security. At the end of the day, they strengthen its spirit and its strength and allow it to overcome its difficulties.” (p. 80-1)