Legal Review of the Status of Evidence Owned by Third Parties Who Do Not Action in Good Faith in Court in General Criminal Cases

Abstract

Evidence plays a significant role in the criminal trial process, even though its status is not as evidence in court as defined in Article 184 of the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP). However, evidence is always presented and questioned by the judge to both the defendant and witnesses during the trial. This is intended to ensure the judge is convinced to declare the defendant guilty of committing a crime or otherwise. This is also expressly stated in Article 183 of the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP) that a judge may not sentence a person unless at least two pieces of evidence are presented along with the judge's conviction. Therefore, the acquisition of evidence is carried out procedurally as stipulated in the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP). After it has been used in evidence, the judge in his decision is obliged to determine the status of the evidence, which becomes a problem when the third party who is the owner of the evidence is not present at the trial, so that if the evidence is stated by the defendant to be his property which has been used in a criminal act, the judge will declare that the evidence is confiscated for the state or destroyed, while the third party who is actually the legal owner because he was never present to provide information, has no way of resisting the determination of the status of the evidence.

Evidence plays a significant role in the criminal trial process, even though its status is not as evidence in court as defined in Article 184 of the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP). However, evidence is always presented and questioned by the judge to both the defendant and witnesses during the trial. This is intended to ensure the judge is convinced to declare the defendant guilty of committing a crime or otherwise. This is also expressly stated in Article 183 of the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP) that a judge may not sentence a person unless at least two pieces of evidence are presented along with the judge's conviction. Therefore, the acquisition of evidence is carried out procedurally as stipulated in the Criminal Procedure Code (KUHAP). After it has been used in evidence, the judge in his decision is obliged to determine the status of the evidence, which becomes a problem when the third party who is the owner of the evidence is not present at the trial, so that if the evidence is stated by the defendant to be his property which has been used in a criminal act, the judge will declare that the evidence is confiscated for the state or destroyed, while the third party who is actually the legal owner because he was never present to provide information, has no way of resisting the determination of the status of the evidence.