HC seeks to stop police from leaking alleged confession statements of accused to media

The Kerala High Court has directed the Director General of Prosecution (DGP) to instruct the State Police Chief to issue a circular preventing the alleged custodial confession statements of accused persons from being leaked to the media.

Even if in certain circumstances portions of such statements are made public, the police should clarify that they are not admissible as evidence against the accused in a criminal trial, said a Division Bench of Justice A.K. Jayasankaran Nambiar and Justice Jobin Sebastian.

The media should act responsibly by not reporting such confession statements. A larger bench of the court had clarified last year that a final and authoritative determination of guilt or innocence of an accused person could be pronounced only by a judicial authority. If the media expresses any such definitive opinion directly or indirectly, such statements would not get the protection of free speech under Article 19(1)(a) of the Indian Constitution, the court said.

The court noted that such acts of indiscretion by the police would have the undesirable effect of jeopardising the criminal justice system in the country. It would also erode public faith in the judicial institution, the court said, while referring to recent media reports in this regard.

The Bench expressed its displeasure with media reports regarding the alleged custodial confession of an accused in a suspected murder case, which was probed by the Crime Branch (CB).

In one such incident involving a CB probe into the Bindhu Padmanabhan missing case, key suspect Sebastian C.M. of Pallippuram, near Cherthala, was reported to have confessed to killing and burying Bindhu, a native of Kadakkarappally, who had been missing for 19 years. He is said to have admitted that the murder took place at his Pallippuram house, where evidence was collected on September 27.