Chapter v  Right to be Presumed Innocent and Privilege against Self-Incrimination 97 guilt, which served to encourage the public to believe him guilty and prejudged the assessment of the facts by the competent judicial authority. 389 In Pesa v Croatia, the European Court similarly found a violation of the applicant’s right to be presumed innocent because of a statement made in the media by the State Attorney and the Head of the Police.390 In Daktaras v Lithuania, the impugned statements were made by a prosecutor to reject the defense lawyer’s request to discontinue the prosecution at a pre-trial stage. The European Court found that the statements did not breach the principle of the presumption of innocence. First of all, they were not made outside the context of the criminal proceedings, such as, for instance, in a press conference. Furthermore, the prosecutor had used the same words as those by the defense lawyer in asserting in his decision that the applicant’s guilt had been “proved” by the evidence in the case file. Although the European Court found the use of the term “proved” unfortunate, it concluded that, having regard to the context in which the word was used, it was clear that both the defense lawyer and the prosecutor were only referring to the question of whether the case file disclosed sufficient evidence of the applicant’s guilt to justify proceeding to trial.391 5.1.5 The presumption of innocence in relation to custodial remands, preventive detention Denial of bail to an accused (See also 6.4.3), and the consequent remand in custody of a person who has not been convicted, does not affect the presumption of innocence.392 However, because article 9(3) of the ICCPR and article 5(3) of the ECHR guarantee the right to trial within a reasonable time or to release pending trial, the denial of bail does demand that the accused person must be tried as expeditiously as possible.393 The Human Rights Committee has also made it clear that the length of pre-trial detention should never be taken as an indication of guilt.394 Preventive detention will also not normally affect the right of persons to be presumed innocent because such forms of detention do not involve a criminal charge against a person.395 However, in Cagas v the Philippines, the Human Rights Committee took the view than an excessive period of preventive detention, exceeding nine years in that case, did affect 389 Butkevicius v Lithuania [2002] ECHR 331, para 53. 390 Pesa v Croatia [2010] ECHR 488, para 142; see also, Böhmer v Germany [2002] ECHR 647, para 56. 391 Daktaras v Lithuania [2000] ECHR 460 paras 43–45. 392 UN Human Rights Committee, CCPR General Comment 32 (2007), para 30. 393 UN Human Rights Committee, CCPR General Comment 32 (2007), para 35; Sextus v Trinidad and Tobago, HRC Communication 818/1998, UN Doc CCPR/C/72/D/818/1998 (2001), para 7.2; Jablonski v Poland [2000] ECHR 685, para 102; Castravet v Moldova [2007] ECHR 209, para 30; and Kučera v Slovakia [2007] ECHR 609, para 95. 394 UN Human Rights Committee, CCPR General Comment 32 (2007), para 30. See also UN Human Rights Committee Concluding Observations: Argentina, UN Doc CCPR/CO/70/ARG (2000), para 10. 395 Wairiki Rameka et al. v New Zealand, HRC Communication 1090/2002, UN Doc CCPR/C/79/D/1090/2002 (2003), para 7.4.