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Thai Criminal Prosecution: Prosecutor's Inquiry & Indictment

Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing Criminal Prosecutions here in the Kingdom specifically the prosecutor's role in inquiring further into a case and making a decision as to whether or not to bring an indictment in the matter.

The thing I need to explain to those who are watching this video is I am an American Attorney; I am qualified in the United States. I am a Thai citizen but I am not a Thai Attorney-at-Law. We have attorneys working here at our firm. I am the Managing Director of the Firm. The Thai attorneys provide legal advice and legal assistance to our clients and to members of the public where necessary. That being stated, again I am not a Thai Attorney. This is simply provided for informational purposes only. Some of the attorneys on our staff have reviewed the information I am imparting herein and this is basically just a general overview and should not be taken as specific legal advice. The attorneys in our firm have gone ahead and reviewed the bullet points I am going to be discussing here and just a sort of a general overview in the English language to provide some context, nuance and very superficial understanding of the process, this video is being made and it is being made by me because I can prove this information with American legal language to provide further nuance. For example, things like the word “indictment” which I just used isn't exactly spot on to what that particular aspect of the preceding is. Just like there are other aspects of the overall proceeding where I will use American legal terminology and it is not spot-on and that needs to be understood. This is for informational purposes only. It is to provide context and insight to lay people who may have an issue with respect to a criminal prosecution in Thailand.

Now in the prior video we did we discussed matters pertaining to the police inquiry and whether or not they make a recommendation to go ahead and proceed. So they go ahead and make a recommendation to a prosecutor whether or not probable cause exists to go ahead and pursue a case and press charges in the Thai courts. So there is another video on this channel on that topic. The title of that video is Criminal Prosecution in Thailand: Police Investigation Phase.  I urge those individuals watching this video to go to our search function, if you haven't seen a video yet, watch that video first and then come back and watch this video here. 

So moving forward, presuming the police have gone ahead and given the recommendation, now the prosecutor needs to make some decisions. Generally speaking they need to decide whether or not the police investigation was sufficient to go ahead and move forward with pressing charges or whether further inquiry is necessary. The Attorney General's office here in the Kingdom is not required necessarily to go ahead and make any further investigation but they do have the discretion to go ahead and make a further investigation should they deem it appropriate. Again the prosecutor, after further investigation or upon review of what the police have gone ahead and undertaken, decides that formal charges need to be filed with the court. They make that determination and they file those charges accordingly.

Now the prosecution needs to go ahead and inform the individual being charged as well as presumably, if they have one, their attorney so as to provide fair warning that the case is proceeding and that is in order to go ahead and move to the next phase which is the plea phase where they have got to go ahead and have that individual enter their plea. Now there is another video on this channel with respect to a plea. I am not going to get into that specifically in this in this video.

The thing to take away from this video is after the police have gone ahead and undertaken their investigation, they move the case over to the prosecutor's office and the prosecutor then needs to go ahead and make a determination as to whether or not they are going to go ahead and proceed with the matter. Now, something to keep in mind with respect to this. We are talking about this in the context of a case where there has been a complaint filed and you know it is between the two parties kind of thing. This is not the same as somebody who has been apprehended directly by the Thai Police in the commission of a purported crime where a police officer has said “Yeah, I apprehended this suspect in the commission of what I believe to be a crime”, and they go ahead and arrest and detain them on the spot. Under those circumstances, the overall process is similar but under those circumstances that individual is probably going to be incarcerated while this process progresses. In the next video we do on pleas in Thailand this is exceptionally important because and in a video we do on bail, that individual having or not having bail is going to be is going to be a major issue because they may or may not have been detained for at least a relatively prolonged period of time up to the point at which the prosecutor decides to go ahead and proceed with the case.