JURIST - Paper Chase: Chinese court bars evidence obtained through torture

[JURIST] A provincial appeals court has issued what is reported to be China's first ruling that confessions obtained by coercion, torture, or trickery cannot be used in court, and while defense attorneys hailed the decision as an important step toward ending police torture in the country, they cautioned that further reforms are necessary to adequately protect defendants. Activists say that despite a torture ban enacted in 1996, that police routinely use such tactics to extract confessions, and have suggested that the ruling is a move toward ending the practice. AP has more. China Daily provides local coverage, including a report on the case of a man wrongly imprisoned for his wife's death after a confession which he claims was extracted from him after 10 days of continuous interrogation.

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