3 ms·
yes, it may technically be illegal, but that is why we have trial by jury. unless the story sounded made up, i can't really imagine anyone convicting someone t
by there 15y ago
yes, it may technically be illegal, but that is why we have trial by jury. unless the story sounded made up, i can't really imagine anyone convicting someone that smashed a window or broke down an apartment door to save someone's life.
but really, who would vote this guy guilty of illegal access to a computer system when he was clearly helping phishing victims? and who would press charges against him in the first place, the hosting company where the phishing site was hosted?
- dmm 15y agoOften times details surrounding an act will be kept from the jury. That's how you get juries that send a husband who was growing pot for his cancer-stricken wife to jail. The context was kept from the jury.
- bluedanieru 15y agoJury nullification (basically what you're referring to here) was a major justification of juries in the first place as it was thought to be a check on state power, but of course the state has neutered it over the last century along with most other checks on its power. Jury nullification is mostly a memory at this point and juries are generally instructed only to consider whether the defendant actually broke the law as such - not whether the law itself is just.
- derleth 15y agoRemember that jury nullification was often used to acquit whites of killing blacks in a time and place when killing a given black could often have been seen as something akin to shooting a raccoon or other vermin. (This is why violating someone's civil rights is a Federal offense in modern American law: Homicide is a state offense, and the juries in the relevant state courts of that era would not convict for certain kinds of homicide. Federal courts were not nearly as prejudiced.)