5 ms·

I guess I assumed when they say "innocent until proven guilty", "proven" implies hard evidence, not just two facts that suggest that an event occurred.

• rdtsc 11y ago
  Yeah but "proven guilty" in a civil case is a different set of criteria than in a criminal case.
• peterwwillis 11y ago
  In most cases, there is no video tape, and almost never an actually smoking gun. "Proof" is whatever sounds reasonable to a judge or jury. It's also why our justice system is flawed: we sentence people without incontrovertible evidence all the time.
• tptacek 11y ago
  Defendants have a presumption of innocence, but accusers do not have a burden of mathematical proof. The closest you get to "innocent until proven guilty" in US law is common law's Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, and the Latin word "probatio" does a lot more work than just "mathematical proof". There's a good 30 minute Google jag you can have about this if you go search for [legal standards of proof].
  • rayiner 11y ago
    > The closest you get to "innocent until proven guilty" in US law is common law's Ei incumbit probatio qui dicit, and the Latin word "probatio" does a lot more work than just "mathematical proof". TIL.
    • tptacek 11y ago
      I am presuming that's a sarcastic way of saying "you're wrong"?
      • rayiner 11y ago
        Not at all! Just expressing that I learned both a new latin legal term and a fact about latin vocabulary today.
      • matheist 11y ago
        TIL = today I learned