174 Conclusion: Extensive Interpretation of the Limits of Lawful Confession The theory" of statutory proof relied, in hard cases, essentially on the confession as a method of proof. Whereas in many cases it was impossible to acquire two eyewitnesses, for no one had personally witnessed the crime, it was always possible, at least theoretically, to have a guilty suspect confess. Therefore, it was common in the nineteenth century to have a priest persuade the suspect to confess; in practice, the trial was discontinued and postponed, so that the prison preacher could urge the accused “to a true and sincere confession.Without interrupting the proceedings, the court itself could ask the accused to confess. In the period of legal proof, as shown above, the significance of confession was important enough to influence the courts to stretch the limits of a lawful confession; often and contrary to the Lawof 1734 and the standing opinio doctorum, extrajudicial confessions were given the value of lawful ones. In other cases of imperfect evidence, the tendency is similar. The requirement of full proof was met if the accused admitted to having committed an essential part of the deed with which he was charged; also, it was up to himto show that his action had not caused the fatal result. Similarly, admitting basic elements of a crime was per se considered sufficient as full proof; the burden of evidence to establish a lawful defense lay on the accused if he or she claimed to have acted unintentionally or without duress. In the nineteenth century, it was no longer possible for the accused to dispose of his or her confession by revoking it; once given freely before a court, a confession was considered a full proof, unless the accused was capable of showing that his or her confession, for some reason, did not entail the truth. Regarding recanted, limited, and qualified confessions, court practice came to fill a void poorly regulated by statutory law. On the contrary, insofar as extrajudicial confessions are considered, the situation was quite different. According to the ius commune doctrine, the eighteenth-century juristic writing and the Law of 1734, extrajudicial confession clearly had the value of circumstantial evidence only. That courts often regarded extrajudicial confessions as good as in-court confessions is an example of their inclination to shun the strict rules of the statutory theory of proof whenever the rules tended to render practical decision-making excessively difficult. Moreover, the significance vested in the confession shows in some of the cases in which local courts stretched the limits of a lawful confession. These cases, at least as far as grounds for decision are concerned, usually changed in the upper instances. ... till en sann och uppriktig bekännelse ...” See for example Hirschman, pag. 356/183C. See, for instance, Laitila, pag. 387/1850. See, for instance, Gustaf Carlsson Bengtilä, pag. 109/1820. 34 «
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