Section 14: Later law changing the conditions of a safety measure
Statutory text (Thai original)
ในกรณีที่มีผู้ถูกใช้บังคับวิธีการเพื่อความปลอดภัยใดอยู่ และได้มีบทบัญญัติของกฎหมายที่บัญญัติในภายหลังเปลี่ยนแปลงเงื่อนไขที่จะสั่งให้มีการใช้บังคับวิธีการเพื่อความปลอดภัยนั้นไป ซึ่งเป็นผลอันไม่อาจนำมาใช้บังคับแก่กรณีของผู้นั้นได้ หรือนำมาใช้บังคับได้แต่การใช้บังคับวิธีการเพื่อความปลอดภัยตามบทบัญญัติของกฎหมายที่บัญญัติในภายหลังเป็นคุณแก่ผู้นั้นยิ่งกว่า เมื่อสำนวนความปรากฏแก่ศาล หรือเมื่อผู้นั้น ผู้แทนโดยชอบธรรมของผู้นั้น ผู้อนุบาลของผู้นั้นหรือพนักงานอัยการร้องขอต่อศาลให้ยกเลิกการใช้บังคับวิธีการเพื่อความปลอดภัย หรือร้องขอรับผลตามบทบัญญัติแห่งกฎหมายนั้น แล้วแต่กรณี ให้ศาลมีอำนาจสั่งตามที่เห็นสมควร
English translation
Where a person is subject to the application of a measure of safety, and a provision of a law enacted afterwards changes the conditions for ordering the application of that measure of safety, with the result that it cannot be applied to the case of that person, or that it can be applied but the application of the measure of safety under the law enacted afterwards is more favourable to that person, then, when it appears to the court from the record, or when that person, that person's legal representative, that person's curator, or the public prosecutor applies to the court for the application of the measure of safety to be cancelled, or applies to receive the benefit under the provisions of that law, as the case may be, the court has the power to make such order as it thinks fit.
ThaiLawOnline translation, written from the Thai original and verified
Firm annotation
Section 14 addresses the middle case between Section 12 (authority and time of the law) and Section 13 (outright abolition): here the safety measure still exists but its conditions have been changed by a later law. The court is empowered to revoke or modify an existing measure to match the new law, but only where doing so is more favourable to the affected person, and it may act on its own view or on the request of an interested person. The reference to an interested person is broader than the person subjected to the measure in Section 13. Together, Sections 12 to 15 form a coherent favourable-law regime for safety measures, parallel to the treatment of penalties in Sections 2 and 3.
Why this matters in practice
Section 14 is the tool to use when a safety measure remains on the books but its conditions have become more lenient under a later law. An interested person, not only the person under the measure, can ask the court to revoke or modify it to the more favourable new conditions. The gate is that the change must benefit the affected person; the court will not use Section 14 to make a measure harsher. In practice this arises with long-running measures such as preventive detention, where amendments narrow the grounds or shorten the period. Anyone subject to an ongoing safety measure should check whether later amendments justify a Section 14 application.
Supreme Court decisions interpreting this section
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Supreme Court Judgment No. 709/2503 (1960)
Under Section 14 the court has power to order as it thinks fit regarding a safety measure, and may accordingly cancel preventive detention imposed on the defendant.
After the assault offence could not ground preventive detention and only a qualifying theft offence remained, the Supreme Court held that the court had power under Section 14 to order as it thought fit and could cancel the defendant's preventive detention.
Curated decisions with case numbers verified against the Supreme Court database. English renderings are the firm's editorial translation for study.
Cited in 17 Supreme Court decisions (1958 to 2026)
Selected citing decisions
- Decision 674/2520 (1977)
- Decision 1559/2506 (1963)
- Decision 709/2503 (1960)
- Decision 3836/2568 (2025)
- Decision 2778/2561 (2018)
- Decision 6416/2556 (2013)
- Decision 2851/2552 (2009)
- Decision 8611/2547 (2004)
This list is selected automatically, weighted towards judgments that turn on this section rather than ones that merely recite it when passing sentence. It has not yet been reviewed by the firm.
Most often cited alongside
- Section 83 11
- Section 91 9
- Section 90 9
- Section 29 5
- Section 30 5
- Thai CrPC s. 225 5
Sections that appear in the same judgments as this one most often. The figure is the number of decisions.
Counted across the firm's corpus of 83,652 Supreme Court decisions, 1921 to 2026. The count is complete; the stated year range trims rare outliers so it describes where the citations actually sit. These figures are computed by us and are not official court statistics. How we count these, and what we measured
Frequently asked questions
Can a safety measure be modified if a later law changes its conditions?
Yes. Under Section 14, the court may revoke or modify the measure to match the later law, if that is more favourable to the person subjected to it.
Who can request a change under Section 14?
The court may act on its own view, or an interested person may request revocation or modification, which is broader than the person subjected to the measure.
Related guides on ThaiLawOnline
Cite this section
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Plain citation
Penal Code, s. 14 (Thailand) -
Academic citation
Penal Code (Thailand), s. 14. ThaiLawOnline, https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-14/ (accessed 17 August 2026). -
Thai citation
ป.อ. มาตรา 14 -
Permalink
https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-14/ -
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<blockquote cite="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-14/"><p>Where a person is subject to the application of a measure of safety, and a provision of a law enacted afterwards changes the conditions for ordering the application of that measure of safety, with the result that it cannot be applied to the case of…</p><footer>Penal Code, s. 14 (Thailand) — <a href="https://www.thailawonline.com/thai-penal-code/section-14/">ThaiLawOnline</a></footer></blockquote>
The Thai text is authoritative. The English is an unofficial translation by ThaiLawOnline, free to reuse with attribution.