Kaduna outlaws suspect’s torture during interrogation

Torturing crime suspects during arrest or investigation to obtain confessional statement by security agents without their lawyers, is now illegal in Kaduna state, the Director, Public Prosecution, Kaduna state, Bayero Dari, has said.

 

He said the signing of the bill on Administration of Justice Law into law by Governor Nasir El-Rufai in May this year, has made it mandatory for suspect’s lawyer to be present during investigation and interrogation, while the process is recorded electronically to forestall any form of torture.

 

Bayero noted that the new bill is a radical departure from previous laws that had been existing since 1968 during the then Northern region when states were created and Kaduna state and others adopted it.

 

Speaking with newsmen shortly after the opening session of a 3-day training for critical stakeholders on administration of Justice in Kaduna on promoting United Nations convention against torture, the director said the governor signed it into law and it effectively came into law on the 29th of May, 2017.

 

The law according to him, has radicalised the whole process of obtaining statement, arrest and prosecution of crime suspect and then time of stay in the cell without trial.

 

He said: “Now you can no longer be arrested by proxy, meaning that you can no longer be arrested for offence committed by someone else.

 

“Secondly, you cannot be interviewed by police officer in the absence of your legal practitioner. Your legal practitioner must be around and once the statement is being taken, it must be taken with digital recorder. And then a chief magistrate has the right to visit any detention facility and ask for who is detained, reason for his detention and how long he has been detained.

 

“The Chief judge also had a monitoring committee, and the committee goes round all the courts, detention facilities in the state, police and ask for books and whoever is detained unnecessarily will be advocates for while the officer in charge will be questioned”, he added.

 

 

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