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Was "anonymous justice" ever attempted? What if judges, juries and lawyers worked on cases where the accused and the victim are anonymous. Neither their sex,

by dudul 11y ago

Was "anonymous justice" ever attempted? What if judges, juries and lawyers worked on cases where the accused and the victim are anonymous. Neither their sex, nor race, nor anything is disclose. Would they help fix these bias where blacks get harsher sentences than whites and women lighter sentences than men for example? I don't know if it's realistic.

dragonwriter 11y ago
> Was "anonymous justice" ever attempted? No, and it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. > What if judges, juries and lawyers worked on cases where the accused and the victim are anonymous. How is the jury going to evaluate guilt or innocent based on evidence (whether physical evidence or witness testimony) -- including, particularly, evidence relating to the perpetrator, victim, and the details of their interactions that are essential to the question of guilt or innocence of the crime, if the identities, sex, race, etc., of the accused and the victim(s) are obscured from the jury? What you might plausibly do is remove sentencing from the trial court, and anonymize the bare findings of fact before forwarding them to a separate body that handles sentencing. That might have some utility, though it would still be subject to bias in the trial courts actually in completing the findings of fact used for determining sentence.
- dudul 11y ago
  How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? What you suggest in your last paragraph is pretty much what I had in mind. Facts would be gathered and then anonymized before being used for sentencing. Instead of "this black guy raped this white woman" they would make their decision based on "this person raped this other".
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? It's pretty relevant to evaluating whether a particular piece of evidence (whether a video or photograph, a witness description, etc.) implicates the guilt or innocence of the particular person charged with the crime. Which is, after all, the whole job of the jury. > What you suggest in your last paragraph is pretty much what I had in mind. Facts would be gathered and then anonymized before being used for sentencing. What I discuss in the last paragraph is something that can only happen after the jury has found the facts in a process in which the jury, judge, and lawyers knew who the victims and accused were.
  - CWuestefeld 11y ago
    But what is a "fact"? A whole lot of stuff comes down to he said/she said, or people interpreting complex interplay of factors differently. I'm not sure how often it occurs that "facts" in a criminal trial are uncontested. Especially when we're talking about witness testimony, the jury needs to see the witness to determine whether they believe them.
  - sheepmullet 11y ago
    > How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? Because it's part of the facts of the case (imagine for instance if you couldn't mention the color and make of a car that hit you)? Not to mention how would you hide the race and sex of a defendant from the jury? Not let the defendant into the courtroom? Move everything to written testimony?
  - anigbrowl 11y ago
    Well, you're going to have to sanitize all the testimony to obscure the specifics of race, gender, location, and other social context. In many cases all you'll end up with are an allegation and a denial, as you'll have no way to evaluate the demeanor of the various parties to the case. The fact that we are subject to bias doesn't mean that jettisoning our entire social technology (about how to read people and so on) is automatically going to lead to improved results.
lfam 11y ago
I see the value of this idea but I also see a very dark side. > Neither their sex, nor race, nor anything is disclose. Who decides what is contained by 'anything'? That process will become corrupt and only serve power. I don't think justice will be served by withholding information.

by dudul 11y ago

dragonwriter 11y ago

> Was "anonymous justice" ever attempted? No, and it doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. > What if judges, juries and lawyers worked on cases where the accused and the victim are anonymous. How is the jury going to evaluate guilt or innocent based on evidence (whether physical evidence or witness testimony) -- including, particularly, evidence relating to the perpetrator, victim, and the details of their interactions that are essential to the question of guilt or innocence of the crime, if the identities, sex, race, etc., of the accused and the victim(s) are obscured from the jury? What you might plausibly do is remove sentencing from the trial court, and anonymize the bare findings of fact before forwarding them to a separate body that handles sentencing. That might have some utility, though it would still be subject to bias in the trial courts actually in completing the findings of fact used for determining sentence.

dudul 11y ago
How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? What you suggest in your last paragraph is pretty much what I had in mind. Facts would be gathered and then anonymized before being used for sentencing. Instead of "this black guy raped this white woman" they would make their decision based on "this person raped this other".
- dragonwriter 11y ago
  > How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? It's pretty relevant to evaluating whether a particular piece of evidence (whether a video or photograph, a witness description, etc.) implicates the guilt or innocence of the particular person charged with the crime. Which is, after all, the whole job of the jury. > What you suggest in your last paragraph is pretty much what I had in mind. Facts would be gathered and then anonymized before being used for sentencing. What I discuss in the last paragraph is something that can only happen after the jury has found the facts in a process in which the jury, judge, and lawyers knew who the victims and accused were.
- CWuestefeld 11y ago
  But what is a "fact"? A whole lot of stuff comes down to he said/she said, or people interpreting complex interplay of factors differently. I'm not sure how often it occurs that "facts" in a criminal trial are uncontested. Especially when we're talking about witness testimony, the jury needs to see the witness to determine whether they believe them.
- sheepmullet 11y ago
  > How is sex, race etc required to evaluate guilt or innocent? Because it's part of the facts of the case (imagine for instance if you couldn't mention the color and make of a car that hit you)? Not to mention how would you hide the race and sex of a defendant from the jury? Not let the defendant into the courtroom? Move everything to written testimony?
- anigbrowl 11y ago
  Well, you're going to have to sanitize all the testimony to obscure the specifics of race, gender, location, and other social context. In many cases all you'll end up with are an allegation and a denial, as you'll have no way to evaluate the demeanor of the various parties to the case. The fact that we are subject to bias doesn't mean that jettisoning our entire social technology (about how to read people and so on) is automatically going to lead to improved results.

lfam 11y ago

I see the value of this idea but I also see a very dark side. > Neither their sex, nor race, nor anything is disclose. Who decides what is contained by 'anything'? That process will become corrupt and only serve power. I don't think justice will be served by withholding information.