4 ms·

She was found not guilty wasn't she? Why does it matter now that his initial findings were faulty against her.

by sosuke 15y ago

sesh00 15y ago
Surely it matters that the prosecution had a responsibility to pass on the information and chose not to? That, and the fact that you've got to seriously worry when a report from a piece of software that can confuse the numbers 1 and 84 is being used as evidence in court.
SoftwareMaven 15y ago
It matters because the prosecution should have said something. The prosecutor's job is not to just put somebody in jail, but rather, to put the right somebody in jail. Unfortunately, we seem to have forgotten that in the US as part of the adversarial position between law enforcement and citizens.
- matwood 15y ago
  Unfortunately, we seem to have forgotten that in the US as part of the adversarial position between law enforcement and citizens. It's sad that our system has become more about winning and less about finding the truth and laying down justice. Here's a horrifying case where police and the prosecutor worked lied to convict a man who ended up in prison for 10 years before being release: http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_18385647 http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_18385647 There was another story (not surprising in Denver again) where over 10% of the police force has been reprimanded for lying while on duty. This includes falsifying evidence, police reports and even lying on the stand. Most were still employed for some reason.
  - bradleyland 15y ago
    My girlfriend watched almost the entire trial. I sat in for some of it. After about 30 minutes, I literally said out loud, "Neither of these legal teams are interested in the truth; they're only interested in winning." Not only is your statement true, but it's become blatantly apparent.
    - gjm11 15y ago
      The aim of an adversarial court system is to get at the truth by having the people on each side working hard to expose those bits of the truth that suit their goals. The system is supposed to get at the truth, and that doesn't necessarily require that all the people involved are primarily trying to get at the truth. It may even work best when they aren't. Similarly: buyers and sellers in a market needn't individually be aiming to arrive at an efficient or socially beneficial outcome; voters in a democracy needn't individually be aiming to elect someone who will be best for everyone's interests; employees of a company needn't all be concerned solely with the company's success. The trick is to design the system so that even when individual people are motivated by self-interest the aggregate effect is a good one. Of course, none of these systems works perfectly in practice, and sometimes that's because some individual's self-interest ends up having too much influence on the outcome. Some or all of the systems might want changing to encourage participants to act less self-interested somehow. But I think it's just an error to say "Ugh, those people are acting in their own interests and not pursuing the top-level goal of the system" when the system is designed to get individuals' pursuit of their own interests to work towards that top-level goal.
      - matwood 15y ago
        Your right about the system being designed a certain way and that's how it should work. The problem is that the state has so many more resources, and if you add flat out lying to the mix, the system breaks down. I'm of the opinion that since the state has the burden of proof and virtually unlimited resources that they should also be striving for the truth above all else. When it becomes more about convictions and less about justice, the system will fail to the detriment of all of society. It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, “whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,” and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever. -John Adams
      - SoftwareMaven 15y ago
masterzora 15y ago
Because said findings were found faulty while the case was still proceeding. It would be irresponsible to let the prosecution get away with illegal behaviour just because the defendant won.
Nick_C 15y ago
I took away the message that I would need to be quite careful about being called as an expert witness, viz what exactly my brief was. He thought it was about something, the prosecutor asked him about something else. Good on him for having the moral fortitude to correct his error.
gojomo 15y ago
Huh? The outcome of any one trial matters very little. Accuracy and honesty in evidence collection matters in every trial.
evan_ 15y ago
Maybe one of the jurors found it unlikely that she visited the page about chloroform 84 times and that subtly affected his or her perception of the prosecution's case.
bugsy 15y ago
Many people still think she is guilty. It was a shared computer and her mother testified that she had done one search on chloroform. The prosecution countered that there were 84 searches, so the rest had to have been done by the daughter. But it turns out that they ran two different programs on the recovered cache data and one program said there was 1 hit total, the other program said there were 84 searches over several weeks. The company with the 1 hit wrote an analysis showing their competitor's results were wrong. The competitor, with the 84 hits, agreed, and contacted the prosecutors to let them know. The prosecutors decided not to mention that the testimony they were giving from expert witnesses was false, even though they were legally required to do so.

She was found not guilty wasn't she? Why does it matter now that his initial findings were faulty against her.

by sosuke 15y ago

She was found not guilty wasn't she? Why does it matter now that his initial findings were faulty against her.

Surely it matters that the prosecution had a responsibility to pass on the information and chose not to? That, and the fact that you've got to seriously worry when a report from a piece of software that can confuse the numbers 1 and 84 is being used as evidence in court.

SoftwareMaven 15y ago

It matters because the prosecution should have said something. The prosecutor's job is not to just put somebody in jail, but rather, to put the right somebody in jail. Unfortunately, we seem to have forgotten that in the US as part of the adversarial position between law enforcement and citizens.

matwood 15y ago
Unfortunately, we seem to have forgotten that in the US as part of the adversarial position between law enforcement and citizens. It's sad that our system has become more about winning and less about finding the truth and laying down justice. Here's a horrifying case where police and the prosecutor worked lied to convict a man who ended up in prison for 10 years before being release: http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_18385647 http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_18385647 There was another story (not surprising in Denver again) where over 10% of the police force has been reprimanded for lying while on duty. This includes falsifying evidence, police reports and even lying on the stand. Most were still employed for some reason.
- bradleyland 15y ago
  My girlfriend watched almost the entire trial. I sat in for some of it. After about 30 minutes, I literally said out loud, "Neither of these legal teams are interested in the truth; they're only interested in winning." Not only is your statement true, but it's become blatantly apparent.
  - gjm11 15y ago
    The aim of an adversarial court system is to get at the truth by having the people on each side working hard to expose those bits of the truth that suit their goals. The system is supposed to get at the truth, and that doesn't necessarily require that all the people involved are primarily trying to get at the truth. It may even work best when they aren't. Similarly: buyers and sellers in a market needn't individually be aiming to arrive at an efficient or socially beneficial outcome; voters in a democracy needn't individually be aiming to elect someone who will be best for everyone's interests; employees of a company needn't all be concerned solely with the company's success. The trick is to design the system so that even when individual people are motivated by self-interest the aggregate effect is a good one. Of course, none of these systems works perfectly in practice, and sometimes that's because some individual's self-interest ends up having too much influence on the outcome. Some or all of the systems might want changing to encourage participants to act less self-interested somehow. But I think it's just an error to say "Ugh, those people are acting in their own interests and not pursuing the top-level goal of the system" when the system is designed to get individuals' pursuit of their own interests to work towards that top-level goal.
    - matwood 15y ago
      Your right about the system being designed a certain way and that's how it should work. The problem is that the state has so many more resources, and if you add flat out lying to the mix, the system breaks down. I'm of the opinion that since the state has the burden of proof and virtually unlimited resources that they should also be striving for the truth above all else. When it becomes more about convictions and less about justice, the system will fail to the detriment of all of society. It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished. But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, “whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,” and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever. -John Adams
    - SoftwareMaven 15y ago

masterzora 15y ago

Because said findings were found faulty while the case was still proceeding. It would be irresponsible to let the prosecution get away with illegal behaviour just because the defendant won.

Nick_C 15y ago

I took away the message that I would need to be quite careful about being called as an expert witness, viz what exactly my brief was. He thought it was about something, the prosecutor asked him about something else. Good on him for having the moral fortitude to correct his error.

gojomo 15y ago

Huh? The outcome of any one trial matters very little. Accuracy and honesty in evidence collection matters in every trial.

evan_ 15y ago

Maybe one of the jurors found it unlikely that she visited the page about chloroform 84 times and that subtly affected his or her perception of the prosecution's case.

bugsy 15y ago

Many people still think she is guilty. It was a shared computer and her mother testified that she had done one search on chloroform. The prosecution countered that there were 84 searches, so the rest had to have been done by the daughter. But it turns out that they ran two different programs on the recovered cache data and one program said there was 1 hit total, the other program said there were 84 searches over several weeks. The company with the 1 hit wrote an analysis showing their competitor's results were wrong. The competitor, with the 84 hits, agreed, and contacted the prosecutors to let them know. The prosecutors decided not to mention that the testimony they were giving from expert witnesses was false, even though they were legally required to do so.