5 ms·

In cases like these, _all_ of the people responsible for: A. convicting him on insufficient evidence. B. failing to free him on sufficient evidence Need to

by maeon3 16y ago

In cases like these, _all_ of the people responsible for: A. convicting him on insufficient evidence. B. failing to free him on sufficient evidence Need to be brought in and asked for a reason for why this happened. If they can't come up with a solid reason justifying each action for why this has occurred, and if they do find a reason, remedies for the failure, then they have to serve the victims sentence. When an airliner goes down, bosses and leaders scramble to find a reason to prevent it from happening again to appease the public, but in a case like this, a fate far worse than getting injured in an airplane crash, they just shrug it off and make a vow to be more careful with this kind of thing. Better 100 guilty men go free than for an innocent man be jailed. The guys who incarcerated this innocent man better beef up their security systems. Injustice like this needs to be dealt with, and sadly, never will be. the end.

zdw 16y ago
The problem is our legal system is full of perverse rewards - for example, the DA's office and police force probably gets compensated depending on how much "crime" they "control". Thus, putting away people unjustly is rewarded, and they've externalized the negative consequences. They also get to see a parade of people who actually committed the crimes they're accused of, so making the generalization that "everyone who is accused is guilty" is fairly easy. Plus, the problem with trying to go after all those people is that, in cases like this, many are probably not in the same line of work, have retired or died. Imagine if you took a job where, 30 years after you quit, someone could come after you because of something that might not have been your fault. That's not fair either. I don't see a good solution to this, other than maybe additional separation of powers - for example, forcing the police and legal system to work further apart and not be rewarded perversely.
- MichaelSalib 16y ago
  Imagine if you took a job where, 30 years after you quit, someone could come after you because of something that might not have been your fault. If you railroaded an innocent man, tainted evidence, or otherwise brought about a false conviction with massive incompetence, I don't see any problem with people coming after you 30 years later.
  - zdw 16y ago
    The problem is collateral damage. Determining who in the hundreds of people who may have touched upon the case, is at fault and was intentionally distorting evidence is difficult. The majority of people, given the knowledge they had at the time, were likely just doing their job. We, the public, would have to pay for the enormous investigation, which likely would be inconclusive (it's not obvious DNA evidence like exonerated him). You could, for example, tie certain people to this standard (say the district attorney) but that would cause other consequences - every case that wasn't a complete slam-dunk guilty might get ignored, even if there was sufficient evidence. (edit: formatting/clarity)
    - sharpneli 16y ago
      "The majority of people, given the knowledge they had at the time, were likely just doing their job." Please do not take this as an example of Godwin's Law but I think Nuremberg trials made it clear that 'just doing their job' is not an applicable defense. Of course the magnitude of the acts is way different but the precedent exists.
  - wisty 16y ago
    You forgot - halted the search for the real monster, because you already found a guy who looks kinda similar. Sloppy convictions are only good for the guilty.
  - lutorm 16y ago
    Incompetence isn't criminal. I think the core problem is the incentives, like someone said. It's even in the design of the system, the DA is supposed to try to convict the suspect. What about the jury that convicted him? I know that's not criminal, but they're supposed to be the last stand of justice. I find it incredible that they would unanimously discount what his family said and find him guilty. It's a pretty sad evidence of the prejudices of members of society.
    - gabrielroth 16y ago
      I think the core problem is the incentives, like someone said. Agreed. It's even in the design of the system, the DA is supposed to try to convict the suspect. In and of itself that's not a perverse incentive. The system is adversarial: the DA is supposed to try to convict, and the defense is supposed to try to acquit. Plus the defense has a huge advantage, because the burden of proof rests with the prosecution; the defense only has to establish reasonable doubt about the suspect's guilt. You could argue with it, but it's not an obviously terrible design. The problems are with the implementation, chiefly: (a) the prosecution almost always has vastly better resources than the defense; and (b) judges and juries totally ignore the burden-of-proof rule.
haberman 16y ago
> Better 100 guilty men go free than for an innocent man be jailed. This is an awful story, but I'm wary of setting up incentives in such a way that acquittal is the CYA move. People should be held accountable for preventable errors in either direction, but you don't want to make a prosecutor personally afraid to pursue prosecution for a case just because of the possibility that they might be wrong.
- gfunk911 16y ago
  Yes, you do
- locopati 16y ago
  The possibility of not having sufficient proof is the underlying bedrock of 'innocent until proven guilty'.
Confusion 16y ago
The trade-off that everyone is conveniently forgetting is that a multitude of criminals are also being convicted based on insufficient evidence. Any thorough skeptic is unpleasantly surprised when he applies the same standards to which he holds, say, psychological research, to what happens in the court of law and concludes that a great many convictions do not stand up to close scrutiny. This becomes obvious in cases of high-profile criminals: when all eyes are on a case, it gets much harder to convict someone.
sliverstorm 16y ago
Better 100 guilty men go free than for an innocent man be jailed I can't agree with that. I don't feel I can comment on imprisoned for life, but I would go to prison myself for 5 years if that was the price of locking up 100 dangerous criminals for a similar 5 years, assuming they committed relatively serious crimes. I know the moral high ground is never convict an innocent no matter what the cost, but I personally suspect releasing 100 guilty men poses a huge potential for harm, and I'm kind of a utilitarian.
- nitrogen 16y ago
  Three semi-related points: It's easy to be utilitarian until it's your own life at stake or that of someone you love. Also, a lot of decent, innocent people wouldn't survive five years in prison with their personality and decency intact. If 1 in 101 prisoners is actually innocent, that would mean there are close to 23000 innocent people currently in US prisons. I'm not prepared to throw 23000 innocent people in prison without some very good evidence that it truly is worth it in exchange for punishing the guilty.

by maeon3 16y ago

zdw 16y ago

The problem is our legal system is full of perverse rewards - for example, the DA's office and police force probably gets compensated depending on how much "crime" they "control". Thus, putting away people unjustly is rewarded, and they've externalized the negative consequences. They also get to see a parade of people who actually committed the crimes they're accused of, so making the generalization that "everyone who is accused is guilty" is fairly easy. Plus, the problem with trying to go after all those people is that, in cases like this, many are probably not in the same line of work, have retired or died. Imagine if you took a job where, 30 years after you quit, someone could come after you because of something that might not have been your fault. That's not fair either. I don't see a good solution to this, other than maybe additional separation of powers - for example, forcing the police and legal system to work further apart and not be rewarded perversely.

MichaelSalib 16y ago
Imagine if you took a job where, 30 years after you quit, someone could come after you because of something that might not have been your fault. If you railroaded an innocent man, tainted evidence, or otherwise brought about a false conviction with massive incompetence, I don't see any problem with people coming after you 30 years later.
- zdw 16y ago
  The problem is collateral damage. Determining who in the hundreds of people who may have touched upon the case, is at fault and was intentionally distorting evidence is difficult. The majority of people, given the knowledge they had at the time, were likely just doing their job. We, the public, would have to pay for the enormous investigation, which likely would be inconclusive (it's not obvious DNA evidence like exonerated him). You could, for example, tie certain people to this standard (say the district attorney) but that would cause other consequences - every case that wasn't a complete slam-dunk guilty might get ignored, even if there was sufficient evidence. (edit: formatting/clarity)
  - sharpneli 16y ago
    "The majority of people, given the knowledge they had at the time, were likely just doing their job." Please do not take this as an example of Godwin's Law but I think Nuremberg trials made it clear that 'just doing their job' is not an applicable defense. Of course the magnitude of the acts is way different but the precedent exists.
- wisty 16y ago
  You forgot - halted the search for the real monster, because you already found a guy who looks kinda similar. Sloppy convictions are only good for the guilty.
- lutorm 16y ago
  Incompetence isn't criminal. I think the core problem is the incentives, like someone said. It's even in the design of the system, the DA is supposed to try to convict the suspect. What about the jury that convicted him? I know that's not criminal, but they're supposed to be the last stand of justice. I find it incredible that they would unanimously discount what his family said and find him guilty. It's a pretty sad evidence of the prejudices of members of society.
  - gabrielroth 16y ago
    I think the core problem is the incentives, like someone said. Agreed. It's even in the design of the system, the DA is supposed to try to convict the suspect. In and of itself that's not a perverse incentive. The system is adversarial: the DA is supposed to try to convict, and the defense is supposed to try to acquit. Plus the defense has a huge advantage, because the burden of proof rests with the prosecution; the defense only has to establish reasonable doubt about the suspect's guilt. You could argue with it, but it's not an obviously terrible design. The problems are with the implementation, chiefly: (a) the prosecution almost always has vastly better resources than the defense; and (b) judges and juries totally ignore the burden-of-proof rule.

haberman 16y ago

> Better 100 guilty men go free than for an innocent man be jailed. This is an awful story, but I'm wary of setting up incentives in such a way that acquittal is the CYA move. People should be held accountable for preventable errors in either direction, but you don't want to make a prosecutor personally afraid to pursue prosecution for a case just because of the possibility that they might be wrong.

gfunk911 16y ago
Yes, you do
locopati 16y ago
The possibility of not having sufficient proof is the underlying bedrock of 'innocent until proven guilty'.

Confusion 16y ago

The trade-off that everyone is conveniently forgetting is that a multitude of criminals are also being convicted based on insufficient evidence. Any thorough skeptic is unpleasantly surprised when he applies the same standards to which he holds, say, psychological research, to what happens in the court of law and concludes that a great many convictions do not stand up to close scrutiny. This becomes obvious in cases of high-profile criminals: when all eyes are on a case, it gets much harder to convict someone.

sliverstorm 16y ago

Better 100 guilty men go free than for an innocent man be jailed I can't agree with that. I don't feel I can comment on imprisoned for life, but I would go to prison myself for 5 years if that was the price of locking up 100 dangerous criminals for a similar 5 years, assuming they committed relatively serious crimes. I know the moral high ground is never convict an innocent no matter what the cost, but I personally suspect releasing 100 guilty men poses a huge potential for harm, and I'm kind of a utilitarian.

nitrogen 16y ago
Three semi-related points: It's easy to be utilitarian until it's your own life at stake or that of someone you love. Also, a lot of decent, innocent people wouldn't survive five years in prison with their personality and decency intact. If 1 in 101 prisoners is actually innocent, that would mean there are close to 23000 innocent people currently in US prisons. I'm not prepared to throw 23000 innocent people in prison without some very good evidence that it truly is worth it in exchange for punishing the guilty.