Development Mediation of Inquiry officials on Criminal Cases to Prevent Domestic Violence in Thailand

Abstract

Police or inquiry officials is deemed as the starting point of justice process; authorizing to maintain public order, inquiring and collecting relevant evidence, arresting an offender to be punished by law, rendering justice administration to public, and playing an important role in diversion or mediation of some cases; especially an offence arising from the domestic violence owing to having an impact on family relationships which leads to social problem. The domestic violence has been persisting and becoming more serious in Thai society. This qualitative research consisted of the following objectives: 1) to study the criminal case histories of mediation in Thailand heretofore. 2) to study domestic violence provisions and models which were filed the complaint to inquiry official. 3) to study the authority of inquiry official in domestic violence mediation process. 4) to study problems caused by this violence mediation process and their resolutions. The data were collected and content analyzed from research articles, academic documents, and in-depth interview with group namely; ten of inquiry officials who had been notified complaint about domestic violence. The study found as follows: 1) the criminal case histories of mediation in Thailand divided into three periods namely; the past period which there was a community or a village headman, or a respectable man acted as a mediator, the afterward past period which there was a torturing pursuant to the Trial by Ordeal acted as a mediator, and the present period which there was a police official as a mediator. 2) the most frequent model of domestic violence notified to inquiry official was marital violence, violence against children by their guardian, and elderly abuse committed by their child/children, respectively. 3) inquiry official was a conciliator coordinating with two parties and following up its mediation. Recommendation for the research was to construct a new body of knowledge about solutions and model development of mediation process on domestic violence of inquiry officials.