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> You can't be charged with crimes they can't prove You certainly can be charged with any crime with or without evidence. And the way they make it stick is to

by bagels 8y ago

> You can't be charged with crimes they can't prove You certainly can be charged with any crime with or without evidence. And the way they make it stick is to offer a plea deal to avoid trial.

chillingeffect 8y ago
charged and held in jail
- pavel_lishin 8y ago
  Where do you think people go when they get arrested? And what do you think happens if they don't have money on-hand to pay bail?
ams6110 8y ago
No, you cannot be charged literally without evidence. A judge would throw the case out, and likely censure or sanction the prosecutor. Can you be charged on weak evidence, or even in some cases fabricated evidence? Yes, but that's a different matter.
- elif 8y ago
  You are describing a legal system that is written on paper. we have a real one. It's an easy mistake for programmers to make. We work in a world of provable absolutes that behave exactly as written.
- s73v3r_ 8y ago
  A judge would throw that case out, if you could afford a decent attorney who would be able to raise that point in a hearing.
- wl 8y ago
  > No, you cannot be charged literally without evidence. A judge would throw the case out, and likely censure or sanction the prosecutor. Of course you can. All that's required is someone allege there is evidence establishing probable cause. Perhaps that so-called evidence has a perfectly innocent explanation that the person making the allegations is unaware of or choses to ignore. Perhaps the person making the allegations is mistaken. Perhaps they are even lying. And sure, lack of evidence is grounds for getting cases thrown out. However, you need to make that case first. That requires time, representation and usually the services of a private investigator. The judge is not going to make that case for you. Even if you get baseless charges thrown out, prosecutors are very rarely sanctioned.
MrLeap 8y ago
This is what happened to my father about thirty years ago. While he was naive about a lot of things and didn't have good legal representation, he knew enough to refuse to plead guilty. The "compromise" that prosecutors arrived at was to threaten him with a massive prison sentence, and mislead him about what an Alford plea is. "We're not asking you to plead guilty, and you wont spend any time in jail! Just sign this!" My father avoided jail time but was branded a felon. Every couple of years since I was little I'd see him spend a few thousand dollars on attorneys trying to rewrite history or fix a new fire resulting from that plea. It took the whole family 30 years, unspeakable amounts of money and a really empathetic journalist but we managed to convince the governor of Missouri to pardon him a few years ago. A regular person who doesn't have the inhuman qualities my father does would have been ground up and destroyed. He managed to work 35 years at the same company even though a population of "vigilantes" wanted to find any reason they could to get him fired or just make him miserable. Every once in a while he'd let a story leak about how someone had rubbed grease on his work steering wheel or we'd have to go to the DMV to get new license plates because someone managed to get past his locking screws. My dad responded to this shit in a dispassionate way that still impresses me to reflect on. Someone might break into his locker and cut up his boots. If he said anything about it, it would be like "I should have known better than to use my locker." Then he'd treat going to the shoe store like going to the post office. It's just part of the chores one deals with. If I were in his shoes I wouldn't have made it.

by bagels 8y ago

> You can't be charged with crimes they can't prove You certainly can be charged with any crime with or without evidence. And the way they make it stick is to offer a plea deal to avoid trial.

chillingeffect 8y ago

charged and held in jail

pavel_lishin 8y ago
Where do you think people go when they get arrested? And what do you think happens if they don't have money on-hand to pay bail?

ams6110 8y ago

No, you cannot be charged literally without evidence. A judge would throw the case out, and likely censure or sanction the prosecutor. Can you be charged on weak evidence, or even in some cases fabricated evidence? Yes, but that's a different matter.

elif 8y ago
You are describing a legal system that is written on paper. we have a real one. It's an easy mistake for programmers to make. We work in a world of provable absolutes that behave exactly as written.
s73v3r_ 8y ago
A judge would throw that case out, if you could afford a decent attorney who would be able to raise that point in a hearing.
wl 8y ago
> No, you cannot be charged literally without evidence. A judge would throw the case out, and likely censure or sanction the prosecutor. Of course you can. All that's required is someone allege there is evidence establishing probable cause. Perhaps that so-called evidence has a perfectly innocent explanation that the person making the allegations is unaware of or choses to ignore. Perhaps the person making the allegations is mistaken. Perhaps they are even lying. And sure, lack of evidence is grounds for getting cases thrown out. However, you need to make that case first. That requires time, representation and usually the services of a private investigator. The judge is not going to make that case for you. Even if you get baseless charges thrown out, prosecutors are very rarely sanctioned.

MrLeap 8y ago

This is what happened to my father about thirty years ago. While he was naive about a lot of things and didn't have good legal representation, he knew enough to refuse to plead guilty. The "compromise" that prosecutors arrived at was to threaten him with a massive prison sentence, and mislead him about what an Alford plea is. "We're not asking you to plead guilty, and you wont spend any time in jail! Just sign this!" My father avoided jail time but was branded a felon. Every couple of years since I was little I'd see him spend a few thousand dollars on attorneys trying to rewrite history or fix a new fire resulting from that plea. It took the whole family 30 years, unspeakable amounts of money and a really empathetic journalist but we managed to convince the governor of Missouri to pardon him a few years ago. A regular person who doesn't have the inhuman qualities my father does would have been ground up and destroyed. He managed to work 35 years at the same company even though a population of "vigilantes" wanted to find any reason they could to get him fired or just make him miserable. Every once in a while he'd let a story leak about how someone had rubbed grease on his work steering wheel or we'd have to go to the DMV to get new license plates because someone managed to get past his locking screws. My dad responded to this shit in a dispassionate way that still impresses me to reflect on. Someone might break into his locker and cut up his boots. If he said anything about it, it would be like "I should have known better than to use my locker." Then he'd treat going to the shoe store like going to the post office. It's just part of the chores one deals with. If I were in his shoes I wouldn't have made it.