Your
Advocate
This
week your advocate is M. Moazzam Husain of the Supreme Court of Bangladesh.
His professional interests include civil law, criminal law and constitutional
law.
Q:
I'm trying to find out how long the police can hold a person in jail
before trial and when it has been to long they get let go?
Angel Griswold , On E mail .
Your
Advocate: It seems you wanted to know the legal position in
Bangladesh in relation to your subject of query. Bangladesh Constitution
, Article 33(2) says - "Every person who is arrested and detained
in custody shall be produced before the nearest Magistrate within a
period of twenty-four hours of such arrest, excluding the time necessary
for the journey from place of arrest to the court of the Magistrate,
and no such person shall be detained in custody beyond the said period
without the authority of a Magistrate". This law is a bit excepted
where any person is arrested or detained under any law providing for
preventive detention. Article 35(3) of our Constitution reads- "Every
person accused of a criminal offence shall have the right to a speedy
and public trial by an independent and impartial court or tribunal established
by law".
In Bangladesh police may detain a person in their custody for a period
not exceeding fifteen days subject to an order of the Magistrate passed
on that behalf. But the Magistrate authorising such detention in police
custody shall record his reasons for so doing. Law authorises the court
to grant bail in some cases, if investigation could not be completed
within one hundred and twenty days. Law also authorises the courts to
grant bail if the trial cannot be concluded within one hundred and eighty
days in case of Magistrate and three hundred and sixty days in case
of Sessions Judges.
There is nothing like too long detention to justify release of any accused.
Long detention may serve as a mitigating circumstance and the judge
may take a lenient view in determining the punishment proposed to be
given. And a recent law has authorised the court to deduct the time
of pre-trial detention from the total sentence awarded. In another recent
law entitled-" Speedy Trial Tribunal Act, 2002," 90 days are
fixed for disposal of cases transferred to such tribunal for trial.
In case of failure Tribunal is required to report to the Supreme Court
with a copy to the Government the reason of such failure for a further
extension of time. There may be two such extensions of 30 days and 15
days for disposal of the case. In an unavoidable case of difficulty
tribunal would be competent to send back the case to the court from
which it was sent to the Tribunal for disposal. But in this Act also
there is no specific provision of law making an accused entitled to
release merely on account of delay in trial or investigation.
Corresponding
Law Desk
Please send your mails, queries, and opinions to: Law Desk,
The Daily Star 19 Karwan Bazar, Dhaka-1215;
telephone 8124944, 8124955, 8124966; fax 8125155, 8126154; email <[email protected]>
