Many readers will have already seen that Chiranuch Premchaiporn, Director of Prachatai, has appealed against the court verdict which found her guilty under the 2007 Computer Crimes Act. Back in May, she was found guilty and was sentenced to one year in prison with a fine of 30,000 baht. The court reduced the penalties by a third and suspended the jail sentence for a year.
In her appeal, Chiranuch challenges that Computer Crimes Act and the conduct of the prosecution’s case against her, arguing that “standard practices” under the Thai law are out of line with international practice and “take into account any impact on the rights and freedoms of the people, as well as the costs and practicality of website administration, and technological limitations…”.
Chiranuch “says that in a criminal trial the prosecution has the burden to clearly prove the defendant guilty as charged, but in her case it never produced any evidence to support its claim of a standard practice for web service providers, and did not prove that her practice failed to follow such a standard. The decision of the Court of First Instance was not in line with the principle of hearing evidence in a criminal trial, and the prosecution did not prove her intention in committing the offences.”
