6 ms·
Surely if he knows you’re guilty, but they’ll never prove it, the question is more complicated?
by brians 9y ago
Surely if he knows you’re guilty, but they’ll never prove it, the question is more complicated?
- peg_leg 9y agoIf the mitigation of guilt is a not guilty plea then it's rather simple.
- buckminster 9y agoIn the UK a lawyer has duties towards both his client and the court. For a lawyer to lie to the court is a serious breach of his professional ethics. To represent a client he knows to be guilty on a not guilty plea is to lie to the court. In reality there is usually wriggle room concerning motive or the suitability of the charge, say. But I know a lawyer who has turned away clients who have flat out confessed to him.
- JoeAltmaier 9y agoIsn't there a famous movie scene where the murderer approaches a lawyer, who cuts him off and advises him on what a lawyer can do. (Anatomy of a Murder? Jimmy Stewart). He covers the issue of what the lawyer knows, and what he can do in each case. Pretty good writing.
- mcguire 9y agoI seem to recall another scene from Rumpole, where the character has taken on a student intern or something. While interviewing the client, the student asks, "But did you do it?" and Rumpole drags him aside and tells him, "Never ask that."
- berns 9y ago> To represent a client he knows to be guilty on a not guilty plea is to lie to the court. But how does he know his client is guilty? Is he supposed to judge his client?
- buckminster 9y agoThe guilt doesn't matter in a sense. For example, if the client tells the lawyer he robbed the bank, the lawyer cannot try to persuade the court that the client was somewhere else because he knows it isn't true.
- berns 9y agoI'm thinking how what you say relates to this case specifically. The client insisted in his innocence. Even if the attorney considers the evidence overwhelming, he could plead his client innocent without lying.
- nkrisc 9y agoBut how does the lawyer know it isn't true? Is the lawyer supposed to pass judgement on the evidence? Isn't that what the trial is for in the first place?
- dsp1234 9y agoif the client tells the lawyer he robbed the bank What reason would the attorney have for not believing the information that the client confesses voluntarily under the veil of attorney-client privilege?.
- gknoy 9y agoSometimes people lie to protect other people, or to conceal a secret that they might feel to be more devastating.
- dragonwriter 9y agoThe attorney could believe that his client is a pathological liar, among a near infinite array of other possibilities.
- testvox 9y agoInsanity, duress, maybe the defendant is trying to take credit for another person's crime in order to protect them.
- dsfyu404ed 9y agoWow. Considering the historical reliability of the ways in which we find people guilty of crimes that sounds like a terrible system.
- SilasX 9y agoI'm no expert, but that doesn't sound right. Specifically, it contradicts my model of Anglo-American jurisprudence, where I expect: 1) Defendants have the right to a trial, regardless of how "obviously guilty" they are in anyone's eyes. 2) Trials are, in part, about whether the state has met its burden to prove the elements of the case, regardless of the lay truth of the accused's guilt. [A] 3) Given the above, the work of a lawyer (in a trial) does not inherently involve the representation that "this defendant is innocent", but only that "there is insufficient evidence of that element of the case", which needn't be a fraud on the court, even if the prosecution's claim is true. (With that said, more specific lies can be off limits.) [A] A Man for All Seasons: "The world must judge according to its wits; this court must judge according to the law."
- buckminster 9y ago1) Yes. The lawyer can only know the client is guilty if the client tells him. 2) Yes. 3) Yes. The difficulty arises when the lawyer has been provided with evidence by the client which supports the charge. Ultimately it's the lawyers job to present the client's case, however implausible. However, "I did it but I want to pretend I didn't" isn't a case, it's a lie.
- SilasX 9y agoSo... you're agreeing or disagreeing that a lawyer can ethically represent a client who he believes "did it" by arguing that the evidence is insufficient? If you agree, that's walking back on your original comment; if you disagree, that seems to go sharply against 1/2/3. Edit: As the others note, this is going sharply against well-known legal principles. Do you have any authoritative citation that UK lawyers can't represent clients at all on a not-guilty plea while believing them to have "done it"?