7 ms·

The police "screwed" him by following the exact letter of the law as they questioned him, and didn't give him the "get out of jail free" card that he almost man

by wisty 5y ago

The police "screwed" him by following the exact letter of the law as they questioned him, and didn't give him the "get out of jail free" card that he almost managed to get. And while it's not totally relevant, he was hardly just some kid with a joint on the floor of his car (it was a serious violent offense). Yes, the police sailed a bit close to the wind. But maybe the law is currently too suspect-friendly in the USA (which then is compensated with extreme penalties for the tiny number of suspects who are found guilty in a trial). The US system is such a mess that the police and suspects basically conspire to avoid it (plea bargaining). And while it's easy to just blame the "law and order" crowd, they're partly just reacting to the fact that it's almost impossible to fairly convict a savvy criminal in the US without physical evidence or multiple witnesses. In most of the world, police interrogations aren't optional (if you know the cheat codes). I believe that in the UK, Canada, Australia you have the right to remain silent, but police or prosecutor can tell the jury which questions you did not answer (and then the lawyers will argue over why that was the case). The right to council is often for the trial, not telling you how to avoid answering questions during a police interview. If the purpose of legal systems is to "discover the truth of the matter", then I think the US does a poor job (making it far too easy for a smart criminal to simply shut down a case against them), and a lot of the disfunction they have seems to be an attempt to compensate for all the rights that a smarter criminal can have.

gruez 5y ago
>I believe that in the UK, Canada, Australia you have the right to remain silent, but police or prosecutor can tell the jury which questions you did not answer (and then the lawyers will argue over why that was the case). Your summary does not seem to be correct. The police/prosecutor can tell the jury that you refused to answer questions, but only in limited circumstances. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_silence_in_England_and_Wales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_silence_in_England_an...
- wisty 5y ago
  Hmm, you might be right. I still think the US system tends to be very heavily driven by the opposing forces of the constitution and the government though, and has a lot of hard rules that don't seem particularly realistic (if a defendant says some magic phrase they fall under the constitution's protection, otherwise they're in trouble - it's a little like something sovereign citizens might dream up). While most countries let governments or the courts strike what they consider to be a balance.
  - ineptech 5y ago
    > if a defendant says some magic phrase they fall under the constitution's protection, otherwise they're in trouble This is not true. Every US citizen is protected by the constitution, all the time, and has the right to a lawyer, no matter what. The "magic" in that phrase is that if you try to exercise your right to a lawyer, and the cops refuse, and in so doing break the law and defy the constitution, saying the magic phrase means that they are more likely to get in trouble for doing so.
magicalist 5y ago
> And while it's not totally relevant, he was hardly just some kid It's absolutely not relevant. Everyone has rights. This "people who seem guilty should have a harder time in the legal system" take your comment is leaning into is a self sabotaging approach to justice, I hope for obvious reasons.
- roenxi 5y ago
  People who seem guilty absolutely should have a harder time in the legal system. That is the group of people who are more likely to be guilty. Police have quite a lot of discretion in who they arrest and that is already a fairly strong "looks guilty" signal. What is important is there must be minimum standards to try and remove individual bias and push the system towards evidence based outcomes. If there is no evidence someone did something, they should not be punished. But if there is overwhelming evidence from the get go that they've committed a crime then the police can go through the motions and interpret the procedures unhelpfully. It isn't perfect (in fact, the system is terrifyingly arbitrary) but it must be acknowledged that a case looking to be open-and-shut is suggestive of guilt and should influence how procedures are applied.
  - beebeepka 5y ago
    I guess it's easy to look at things this way if you're not on the wrong end of this "how things look" situation. Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst.
    - roenxi 5y ago
      Enforcing the law is, in a sense, evil. At the end of the day enforcement is some combination of violence, coercion and thoughtfully depriving people of life/liberty/comfort. The enforcement system is wildly imperfect and a side effect of that is the people involved have to make judgement calls about how to treat the people who get caught up in the legal system. If you can think of a way around that then you'll get your name in the history books. > Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst. Hopefully the path from dishonest to evil passes through some more positive places, because there are a lot of options that seem to be missing there.
skissane 5y ago
> I believe that in the UK, Canada, Australia you have the right to remain silent In Australia, not always true. You have no right to remain silent if questioned by an Examiner of the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC), a rather Star Chamber-esque federal law enforcement agency tasked with investigating terrorism, organised crime and other “major crimes” (a rather ill-defined category; pretty much any murder investigation could be given that label if they wanted to, although most murders wouldn’t interest them.) However, while they can force you to answer questions, they aren’t directly allowed to use your answers to prosecute you (but they can use them to prosecute other people, and they may be able to use them against you indirectly, if your answer leads them to discovering new physical evidence or witnesses.) You have the right to a lawyer, and the lawyer is allowed to object to questions, but you still have to answer them-if they object, they can attempt to get a court order after the fact to stop the answers from being used, if your lawyer doesn’t object at the time a court can dismiss an application for any such order on that basis. Also, if they call you in for questioning, it is a crime for you to tell anyone except for your own lawyer that they are questioning you. > The right to council is often for the trial, not telling you how to avoid answering questions during a police interview. It is important for the interview too. One’s lawyer can object to leading questions. They can give advice on how best to answer questions-you can be telling the truth, but some ways of phrasing the truth can sound much better than others. They can give advice on when it would be best to exercise one’s right to silence, and when it might be better not to. Sometimes it even just serves to scare the police off. One guy I know was a bit of a hothead when he was younger, ended up in a fistfight, he put the other guy in hospital. He claimed self-defence, and it was one of those iffy “Who started it? Did he use excessive force in defending himself?” cases. He swears the only reason he wasn’t prosecuted, is he turned up to his official police interview with this really expensive, locally well-known criminal lawyer, and that scared the police and prosecution off, he was never charged. Who knows, but he’s probably right. Probably there’s some other guy out there who was in a similar situation, whose parents couldn’t afford that kind of lawyer (or didn’t know who they were or where to find them), and ended up being charged, going to trial, maybe even convicted, or talked into pleading guilty for a lesser sentence.
- seanhunter 5y ago
  In the UK you have the right to remain silent, but "it may harm your defence if you fail to mention, when questioned, something you later come to rely on in court" (or something like that is what the police tell anyone they arrest). So you sorta do sorta don't.
bryanrasmussen 5y ago
>didn't give him the "get out of jail free" card that he almost managed to get. no, they didn't give him the fair process card that he should have had.
HWR_14 5y ago
> The police "screwed" him by following the exact letter of the law Ironically, it's impossible for the police to screw you by following the exact letter of the law. The exact letter of the law says the request for a lawyer has to be one that a reasonable layman would assume is a request for a lawyer. Therefore, relying on a legality to disqualify the request is a paradox. Im happy to discuss the rights of suspects in various western societies. In Australia you have to answer your identity (name, address, date and place of birth) and otherwise can remain silent and nothing can be assumed from your silence. In Canada, any questions answered before you are told you can get a lawyer are considered inadmissible and the notification of your rights includes an option to call a free legal aid lawyer right then before the interrogation starts. The UK is complex, but range from a 100% right to remain silent (except for identifying themselves like in Australia) in Scotland to a more complex set of exceptions to the rights in England and Wales that needs a solicitor to explain.
ineptech 5y ago
> it's almost impossible to fairly convict a savvy criminal in the US without physical evidence or multiple witnesses. That is not true. I don't even think police or prosecutors think that. > The US system is such a mess that the police and suspects basically conspire to avoid it (plea bargaining) Also not true. The plea bargaining system is not something that suspects "conspire" to use, it is foisted upon them and sometimes causes innocent people to plead guilty. > In most of the world, police interrogations aren't optional... Nor are they in the US. It's true that the police often stop questioning someone once they ask for a lawyer, but that's not because the questioning is "optional", it's because they know the lawyer will tell the suspect to shut up. Your whole post is wildly miscalibrated. Calling legal representation a "get out of jail free" card is absurd. I don't know where you learned about the American legal system, but boy, I hope you never get arrested in the US for a crime you didn't commit, because it would not go well for you.

by wisty 5y ago

gruez 5y ago

>I believe that in the UK, Canada, Australia you have the right to remain silent, but police or prosecutor can tell the jury which questions you did not answer (and then the lawyers will argue over why that was the case). Your summary does not seem to be correct. The police/prosecutor can tell the jury that you refused to answer questions, but only in limited circumstances. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_silence_in_England_and_Wales https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_silence_in_England_an...

wisty 5y ago
Hmm, you might be right. I still think the US system tends to be very heavily driven by the opposing forces of the constitution and the government though, and has a lot of hard rules that don't seem particularly realistic (if a defendant says some magic phrase they fall under the constitution's protection, otherwise they're in trouble - it's a little like something sovereign citizens might dream up). While most countries let governments or the courts strike what they consider to be a balance.
- ineptech 5y ago
  > if a defendant says some magic phrase they fall under the constitution's protection, otherwise they're in trouble This is not true. Every US citizen is protected by the constitution, all the time, and has the right to a lawyer, no matter what. The "magic" in that phrase is that if you try to exercise your right to a lawyer, and the cops refuse, and in so doing break the law and defy the constitution, saying the magic phrase means that they are more likely to get in trouble for doing so.

magicalist 5y ago

> And while it's not totally relevant, he was hardly just some kid It's absolutely not relevant. Everyone has rights. This "people who seem guilty should have a harder time in the legal system" take your comment is leaning into is a self sabotaging approach to justice, I hope for obvious reasons.

roenxi 5y ago
People who seem guilty absolutely should have a harder time in the legal system. That is the group of people who are more likely to be guilty. Police have quite a lot of discretion in who they arrest and that is already a fairly strong "looks guilty" signal. What is important is there must be minimum standards to try and remove individual bias and push the system towards evidence based outcomes. If there is no evidence someone did something, they should not be punished. But if there is overwhelming evidence from the get go that they've committed a crime then the police can go through the motions and interpret the procedures unhelpfully. It isn't perfect (in fact, the system is terrifyingly arbitrary) but it must be acknowledged that a case looking to be open-and-shut is suggestive of guilt and should influence how procedures are applied.
- beebeepka 5y ago
  I guess it's easy to look at things this way if you're not on the wrong end of this "how things look" situation. Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst.
  - roenxi 5y ago
    Enforcing the law is, in a sense, evil. At the end of the day enforcement is some combination of violence, coercion and thoughtfully depriving people of life/liberty/comfort. The enforcement system is wildly imperfect and a side effect of that is the people involved have to make judgement calls about how to treat the people who get caught up in the legal system. If you can think of a way around that then you'll get your name in the history books. > Your argument strikes me as incredibly dishonest at best, and just plain evil at worst. Hopefully the path from dishonest to evil passes through some more positive places, because there are a lot of options that seem to be missing there.

skissane 5y ago

> I believe that in the UK, Canada, Australia you have the right to remain silent In Australia, not always true. You have no right to remain silent if questioned by an Examiner of the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC), a rather Star Chamber-esque federal law enforcement agency tasked with investigating terrorism, organised crime and other “major crimes” (a rather ill-defined category; pretty much any murder investigation could be given that label if they wanted to, although most murders wouldn’t interest them.) However, while they can force you to answer questions, they aren’t directly allowed to use your answers to prosecute you (but they can use them to prosecute other people, and they may be able to use them against you indirectly, if your answer leads them to discovering new physical evidence or witnesses.) You have the right to a lawyer, and the lawyer is allowed to object to questions, but you still have to answer them-if they object, they can attempt to get a court order after the fact to stop the answers from being used, if your lawyer doesn’t object at the time a court can dismiss an application for any such order on that basis. Also, if they call you in for questioning, it is a crime for you to tell anyone except for your own lawyer that they are questioning you. > The right to council is often for the trial, not telling you how to avoid answering questions during a police interview. It is important for the interview too. One’s lawyer can object to leading questions. They can give advice on how best to answer questions-you can be telling the truth, but some ways of phrasing the truth can sound much better than others. They can give advice on when it would be best to exercise one’s right to silence, and when it might be better not to. Sometimes it even just serves to scare the police off. One guy I know was a bit of a hothead when he was younger, ended up in a fistfight, he put the other guy in hospital. He claimed self-defence, and it was one of those iffy “Who started it? Did he use excessive force in defending himself?” cases. He swears the only reason he wasn’t prosecuted, is he turned up to his official police interview with this really expensive, locally well-known criminal lawyer, and that scared the police and prosecution off, he was never charged. Who knows, but he’s probably right. Probably there’s some other guy out there who was in a similar situation, whose parents couldn’t afford that kind of lawyer (or didn’t know who they were or where to find them), and ended up being charged, going to trial, maybe even convicted, or talked into pleading guilty for a lesser sentence.

seanhunter 5y ago
In the UK you have the right to remain silent, but "it may harm your defence if you fail to mention, when questioned, something you later come to rely on in court" (or something like that is what the police tell anyone they arrest). So you sorta do sorta don't.

bryanrasmussen 5y ago

>didn't give him the "get out of jail free" card that he almost managed to get. no, they didn't give him the fair process card that he should have had.

HWR_14 5y ago

> The police "screwed" him by following the exact letter of the law Ironically, it's impossible for the police to screw you by following the exact letter of the law. The exact letter of the law says the request for a lawyer has to be one that a reasonable layman would assume is a request for a lawyer. Therefore, relying on a legality to disqualify the request is a paradox. Im happy to discuss the rights of suspects in various western societies. In Australia you have to answer your identity (name, address, date and place of birth) and otherwise can remain silent and nothing can be assumed from your silence. In Canada, any questions answered before you are told you can get a lawyer are considered inadmissible and the notification of your rights includes an option to call a free legal aid lawyer right then before the interrogation starts. The UK is complex, but range from a 100% right to remain silent (except for identifying themselves like in Australia) in Scotland to a more complex set of exceptions to the rights in England and Wales that needs a solicitor to explain.

ineptech 5y ago

> it's almost impossible to fairly convict a savvy criminal in the US without physical evidence or multiple witnesses. That is not true. I don't even think police or prosecutors think that. > The US system is such a mess that the police and suspects basically conspire to avoid it (plea bargaining) Also not true. The plea bargaining system is not something that suspects "conspire" to use, it is foisted upon them and sometimes causes innocent people to plead guilty. > In most of the world, police interrogations aren't optional... Nor are they in the US. It's true that the police often stop questioning someone once they ask for a lawyer, but that's not because the questioning is "optional", it's because they know the lawyer will tell the suspect to shut up. Your whole post is wildly miscalibrated. Calling legal representation a "get out of jail free" card is absurd. I don't know where you learned about the American legal system, but boy, I hope you never get arrested in the US for a crime you didn't commit, because it would not go well for you.