E/CN.4/1996/35/Add.2 page 15 decide whether or not to order his release or put right the reported defects. In addition, the court may order the detainee to be brought before it. Non-governmental sources informed the Special Rapporteur that in practice judges only very rarely avail themselves of the possibility to visit places of detention, even though the law authorizes them to do so. Judges decide cases on the basis of police reports, under a written procedure whereby neither is the detainee brought before the court nor are his conditions of detention verified. Consequently, in the light of the importance of such visits as a means of preventing torture, measures should be taken to generalize their use whenever necessary. 12/ 53. Regarding confessions, under article 481 of the Code a confession by an accused person shall serve as proof that he participated in an offence, under the following circumstances: that it is made before the judge hearing the case; that it is made freely and consciously; that the act to which he confesses is possible and plausible, in the light of the accused’s personal circumstances and status; that the corpus delicti has been lawfully verified by other means, and that the confession concurs with the facts and circumstances thereof. In addition, article 484 stipulates that any confession that is not made before the judge hearing the case and in the presence of the court clerk shall not constitute conclusive evidence, but merely circumstantial evidence or presumption of a more or less serious nature depending on the circumstances in which it was made and the merit that may be attached to statements by persons who claim they were witness to the confession. Article 323 requires a judge to take all necessary measures to ascertain that the accused or defendant has not been tortured or threatened with torture before he made his confession, and in particular to make sure that he has been examined by a physician. 54. Non-governmental sources reported that despite these requirements, it is in practice difficult to bar the use as evidence of a judicial or extrajudicial confession that has not been made freely and consciously, because article 483 of the Code virtually requires the accused to demonstrate "unequivocally" that the statement was made by mistake, under pressure or because he was not allowed free use of his faculties at the time he made it. The burden of proof thus falls entirely on the alleged victim. 55. In the introduction to the above-mentioned bill before Parliament concerning arrest on suspicion, the Government proposes to add a new subparagraph to article 319 of the Code, relating to statements by detainees before a judge. Under this subparagraph, the judge is required to ask detainees whether the police have complied with the obligation to inform them of their rights, which implicitly include the right to proper treatment. If this formality has not been performed, the judge shall declare invalid any statement which the detainee may have made to those who arrested him. 56. A number of sources told the Special Rapporteur that the legislative restrictions already referred to are compounded by another factor which makes it difficult to guarantee the protection of detainees against torture or ill-treatment, and which is connected with the nature of the Chilean system of criminal justice. The system, which is of the inquisitorial type, was described by government officials with whom the Special Rapporteur spoke as antiquated and deficient in terms of the guarantees it provides both to