The statistics compiled by the Ministry of Justice reveal that the number of those under prosecutorial interviews and interrogation who committed suicide has reached 83 for the 10-year period of 2004 to July, 2014 and that the number has been sharply increasing for the past several years. Suicidal incidents occurring from the onset of prosecutor’s investigation or during interviews/interrogation might pose a big societal shock and cause an interference in the prosecutorial processing, resulting in the closure of the case as “no further prosecution.” The media and the public are likely to have a very suspicious attitude regarding why one has committed suicide and to suspect that some political schemes or illegality might have played a role during investigation when it comes to the high profile criminal cases. The present study examines the causes of suicide committed by those under criminal investigation by the prosecutorial office and suggests countermeasures to prevent any suicidal incidents among those under prosecutorial investigation.
Suicide cases compiled by the Ministry of Justice showed that there were 83 suicides committed during the process of prosecutor’s investigation from 2004 to July, 2014. A dramatic increase in the number of suicide case after 2010 is noteworthy, considering only one-digit numbers before then. Of those cases, the proportion of white-collar crime was higher than other types of crime - 72% of them were white-collar crime and 28% other types.
Criminal investigation by prosecutors involves face-to-face interrogation and interviews with the suspects or criminals and hard-pressing efforts by prosecutors to obtain any statements and confessions leading to any clues for criminal evidence. There is basically a conflict of interest where suspects/criminals try to conceal or deny any clues or facts of crime on the one hand, and prosecutors press hard to obtain any criminal evidence in this process on the other. If suspects are high rank public officials or famous entrepreneurs so that the mass media and the public pay attention to the case, they are more likely to suffer from depression, stress and shame. In the high profile cases, prosecutors are not free from stress due to the responsibility for digging out any criminal evidence when they allegedly express their emotional stress and anger to the interrogated suspects.
One solution for preventing any coercive interrogation could be videotaping of interviews with suspects - now being used if only prosecutors think it necessary - and it should be required to adopt in all cases when the investigated asks for it.
Furthermore, an intensive educational program for investigators is necessary for stressing human rights of the criminal suspects and making the guidelines of investigation strictly conformed by them.
Investigators in criminal justice investigation agencies such as prosecutors and police officers are prohibited by law to publicize any criminal cases under investigation.
However, publication of criminal offenses through news media has occurred frequently without any criminal charges against it. The abnormal practice of agents’ provision of criminal cases for news media should be strictly prohibited so that any fringe of individual privacy and human rights and defamation thereof may not lead to suicidal incident among the investigated.
The role of news media in reporting high profile or white-collar criminal cases is crucial considering the tendency that news media often distorts or dramatizes criminal cases for their own discretion and interests, leading to a severe intrusion of individual privacy and unrecoverable defamation to the investigated. Media guidelines for publicizing crime incidents under investigation are called for.
Most of all, during the process of interview/interrogation by investigating agents, it is crucial that the investigated should be accountable for his/her suspected offenses before investigators and that investigators should strictly abide by the due-process rule.