Published on: 27 August 2023 at 14:06 IST
Court: King’s Bench
Citation: King V. William Woodcock (1789)
Honourable King’s Bench has held that the justification for the sanctity / presumption attached to a dying declaration, is twofold namely
- Ethically and religiously it is presumed that a person while at the brink of death will not lie, whereas
- From a public policy perspective it is to tackle a situation where the only witness to the crime is not available.
It is held that “Dying Declaration” essentially means the statement made by a person as to the cause of his death or as to the circumstances of the transaction resulting into his death. The admissibility of the dying declaration is based on the principle that the sense of impending death produces in a man’s mind, the same feeling as that of a conscientious and virtuous man under oath.
The dying declaration is admissible upon the consideration that the declaration was made in extremity, when the maker is at the point of death and when every hope of this world is gone, when every motive to file a false suit is silenced in the mind and the person deposing is induced by the most powerful considerations to speak the truth.
“…the general principle on which this species of evidence is admitted is, that they are declarations made in extremity, when the party is at the point of death and when every hope of this world is gone : when every motive to falsehood is silent, and the mind is induced by the most powerful consideration to speak the truth; a situation so solemn, and so awful, is considered by the law as creating obligation equal to that which is imposed by a positive oath administered in a Court of Justice. (b) But a difficulty also arises with respect to these declarations; for it has not appeared and it seems impossible to find out, whether the deceased herself apprehended that she was in such a state of morality as would inevitably oblige her soon to answer before her Maker for the truth or falsehood of her assertions. …. Declarations so made are certainly entitled to credit; they ought therefore to be received in evidence : but the degree of credit to which they are entitled must always be a matter for the sober consideration of the Jury, under all the circumstances of the case.”
Drafted By Abhijit Mishra
