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Since: 1) He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted, and 2) He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss: In

Since: 1) He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted, and 2) He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss: In his shoes, I would feel morally justified in escaping. Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. If you disagree with that, suppose Britney Griner somehow escaped from Russian "justice"? How would you feel then? Edit. Everyone talking about hypothetical burglaries and $10 thefts from poor people: please explain what, exactly, Ghosn was accused of stealing, and from whom?

Teever 4y ago
> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Can you explain this one? Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty?
- colechristensen 4y ago
  >Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty? In many cases, yes.
- prvit 4y ago
  > Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty? It’s certainly a common belief, imprisoning someone is inherently a violent penalty.
  - josefx 4y ago
    So the people stuck sorting out his mess, having to spend weeks in office going through the paperwork generated by one shell company after the other, should also file charges against him for aggravated assault?
    - prvit 4y ago
      People get paid for that, it’s a job.
      - josefx 4y ago
        So it is okay when we exchange captivity for money? So if we converted the money he stole into an hourly rate we could stick him into prison until the sun burns out and call it a job?
        prvit 4y ago
        If someone else assigns you a job, it’s called slavery.
        josefx 4y ago
        He clearly took payment in advance for it and knew spending time would be part of it if he was caught. So he basically signed up for it himself.
- legitster 4y ago
  No, but the only strong case for imprisonment as a punishment is to separate violent people from the rest of society.
  - mensetmanusman 4y ago
    That is a form of violence. Think about how many people commit suicide when they lose money for one reason or another.
- alexseman 4y ago
xbar 4y ago
Ghosn "the victim" is my favorite part of this post.
MerelyMortal 4y ago
> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. I'm not sure what you mean by it, can you please give an example? For most people, money represents the time out of their lives it took to earn it. If you steal $10 from someone, and they earned it from a job that pays $10/hour - you didn't steal $10, you stole an hour of their life.
- thatguy0900 4y ago
  That's the calculus when you are well off and secure, which is not most people. If you steal money from someone who makes 10 an hour, you have probably stolen their rent and ability to feed themselves, not their time. Worrying about time is for people who have the basics well covered.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
deleted 4y ago
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orf 4y ago
That’s ridiculous. A crime is a crime, and stealing money - be it physically or on paper - has real repercussions to real people. It deserves more than a financial penalty.
- StanislavPetrov 4y ago
  >A crime is a crime This is most certainly false. A crime is a violation of a law. Laws are passed by groups of people, not handed down by some infinitely wise and just being. For example, in many African nations, it is illegal to be gay. Would someone imprisoned for the "crime" of being gay be justified in escaping? Would Julian Assange be justified in escaping his dungeon for exposing the crimes of the US government?
  - yomkippur 4y ago
    I can't believe you would actually try this dead end argument. Let me guess, if somebody robs you tonight, they didn't commit a crime, they just violated a law that were passed by a group of people that punishes the impoverished who justified their actions.
    - StanislavPetrov 4y ago
      >I can't believe you would actually try this dead end argument. I cannot believe the stunning inability for people to understand that laws are not based on some sort of immutable, objective moral code but are invented by human beings. Do you think Harriet Tubman was a bad person because she helped those who violated the law? Would you have contacted the authorities immediately when you saw an escaped slave, due to their violation of the law?
      - yomkippur 4y ago
        What are you trying to get out of these debates you engage with yourself online? Find something better to do with your time and maybe you will be happier.
  - deleted 4y ago
LatteLazy 4y ago
I disagree about financial crimes deserving (only) financial penalties, but I think you're broadly right. It's all but impossible for a native to get a fair trial in Japan, let alone a foreigner...
deleted 4y ago
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wpietri 4y ago
> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Nah. Financial crimes cause real harm. And financial penalties frequently aren't sufficient disincentive. Imagine that I have no assets but am a good talker. So I go out an launch an "investment fund" that is just a Ponzi scheme. Let's suppose I take in $50m, pocket $10m, and spend the rest on "investment returns" and appearing to run a real business. I live high on the hog for 5 years before it all falls apart, at which point many too-trusting people have lost their lifes' savings. What is the correct penalty? There's no way a financial penalty can be correct here because all of my money was stolen. If the government just sets me back the zero I started at, what punishment is that? Where's my disincentive to do it all again? If anything, I'd argue financial crimes are more likely to deserve jail time. People who steal food may be doing it out of necessity. But nobody stealing millions through financial crimes can claim desperation. I don't think people who use suits to rob instead of ski masks are any less thieves.
- chrischen 4y ago
  I’d imagine the penalty at least involves returning any stolen money, but a garnishment on future income and additional IRS scrutiny should do it. I actually think jail time isn’t enough a disincentive without the financial penalty because otherwise it can just be a cost of doing business. For example there was a chronic thief in SF that stole peoples’ laptops from cafes. She was jailed multiple times but because the police had no way of knowing where she hid the stolen goods they were still never recovered and presumably she kept her earnings even after jail time.
  - wpietri 4y ago
    Oh, yeah, I totally agree that there should be financial penalties larger than the ill-gotten gains. I'm just saying that isn't enough.
    - candiodari 4y ago
      There's a legal expression (it's in French originally) that says "You can't get blood from a stone" This effectively means financial crimes can never be repaid in full, and frequently only small percentages get repaid. It also means the government can never hope to actually do anything to help other than punishment. Going after financial crimes to protect victims ... just doesn't work. Somehow this is enormously at odds with people's expectation of justice, and people either just can't or refuse to believe that's really how it works.
justapassenger 4y ago
> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Financial crimes, aka crimes rich people commit, to be richer, deserve much more harsh treatment that we give them today. You can go to jail for years for shoplifting (aka crimes poor people commit) few thousand dollars worth of goods. People should be much more often sentenced to go to jail for life for committing millions of dollars worth of financial crimes.
- codedokode 4y ago
  Financial crimes are not violent and therefore should be punished lightly.
  - mpalmer 4y ago
    How light can a punishment be before it's no longer discouraging the crime?
    - picsao 4y ago
  - ahtihn 4y ago
    That makes no sense. A home burglary where no one's present is non violent. Do you think that should be punished lightly? It causes orders of magnitude less damage than a lot of financial crime.
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      Burglary carries a presumption of force.
      - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
        People steal packages off doorsteps all the time. It requires no force.
finikytou 4y ago
there are plenty of britney griner in california in jail for weed thanks to the same people that now fight for freeing britney griner.
- mikeyouse 4y ago
  Point me to a single person in California jail for 9 years for possession of under 1 gram of weed. CA legalized weed and then went the extra mile (which many states haven't) to expunge existing convictions and for people being punished currently, downgrading most felony possession counts to misdemeanors and reducing/dismissing the rest of the charges; https://www.pubdef.ocgov.com/programs/dismissal-and-re-sentencing-of-certain-marijuana-convictions https://www.pubdef.ocgov.com/programs/dismissal-and-re-sente...
  - Cupertino95014 4y ago
    So if the people Kamala Harris prosecuted got less than 9 years, that's OK? "only a few dozen people were sent to state prison for marijuana convictions under Harris’ tenure." https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecuting-marijuana-cases/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecu...
    - mikeyouse 4y ago
      Just bottomless wells of bad faith arguments. It's incredible.
      - Cupertino95014 4y ago
        We were talking about marijuana prosecutions in the US vs. Russia. How is it "bad faith" to mention prosecutions in San Francisco?
        mikeyouse 4y ago
        When was the last prosecution in California? Are there any people in jail today for the crime? What was the average sentence of the 6 people per year who went to prison while Harris was DA? What crime were those people convicted of and what quantity of drugs did it involve? Do you think Chesa was inappropriately lenient in choosing not to prosecute crimes? The tack of your supposed argument let’s me know plenty enough that I’m not remotely interesting in continuing this conversation.
themitigating 4y ago
"He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted" - So if I commit a crime it's morally acceptable to flee justice if the probability or evidence exceeds a certain threshold? In other words, the more proof there is that I committed a crime gives me more justification to avoid punishment? "He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss:" Prove it. "If you disagree with that, suppose Britney Griner somehow escaped from Russian "justice"? How would you feel then?" - They aren't related cases with completely different circumstances and crimes. It also doesn't matter. To bad Britney Griner doesn't have the $15 million~ that Ghosen needed to escape. https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/carlos-ghosn-net-worth-2020-fugitive-escape-70-million/ https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/carlos-ghosn-net-worth-2020-f...
- Cupertino95014 4y ago
  > "He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss:" Prove it. Oh, sure. Like underhanded whisper campaigns and unspoken agreements are susceptible to "proof."
- wfleming 4y ago
  > He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted I think GP was referring to the fact that Japan has an over 99% conviction rate. Even if we presume that Japan has unusually high quality prosecutors and judges, that rate is so high that I think it’s reasonable to presume a fair number of innocent people are getting convicted (which happens lots of places, of course, but Japan’s conviction rate is still unusual).
  - Nasrudith 4y ago
    There is another factor to it - not trying cases which aren't certain victories as joining that 1% of the conviction rate is an extremely shameful failure. The conviction rate is a "smell" regardless of how you slice it.
  - themitigating 4y ago
    "Scholars say the biggest reason for Japan's very high conviction rate is the country's low prosecution rate and the way Japan calculates its conviction rate is different from other countries.[2][3][4] According to them, Japanese prosecutors will prosecute only the very few cases in which they are most likely to be guilty and not many others." https://web.archive.org/web/20220712033655/https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-topics/c05401/order-in-the-court-explaining-japan%E2%80%99s-99-9-conviction-rate.html https://web.archive.org/web/20220712033655/https://www.nippo... I don't think it's reasonable to assume anything happens if there's an alternative explanation.
sockaddr 4y ago
> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty Eyeball related crimes deserve an eyeball-related penalty, car crimes deserve a car penalty, gun crimes deserve a gun penalty. I mean, really. Did you even try to think of one counter-example to your claim before you wrote it?
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
PedroBatista 4y ago
> He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss: Largely agree. > Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. That's a very old aristocratic view of financial "wrong-doing", still persists somewhat these days because the idea that for "people with money" with a good reputation, being condemned in public and losing their good name is already a penalty big enough. That's... let's just say this line of thinking should stay in the past.
JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> please explain what, exactly, Ghosn was accused of stealing, and from whom? Should every company executive be free to steal millions of dollars from their companies [1][2]? Be free to "renovate homes for Ghosn in Rio de Janeiro, Beirut, Paris and Amsterdam" on pensioners' dimes? Get a free pass from investigation by multiple countries [3] because they ran a PR campaign while they were pillaging? Anyone informed defending Ghosn is essentially rejecting the rule of law, full stop. He's wanted for serious crimes in multiple countries with discordant agendas. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nissan-ghosn-allegations-factbox-idUSKBN1Z71QI https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nissan-ghosn-allegations-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ghosn#Initial_arrest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ghosn#Initial_arrest [3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-22/france-issues-arrest-warrant-for-carlos-ghosn-wsj-reports https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-22/france-is...
- Cupertino95014 4y ago
  So you just admitted that all the hypotheticals about victims in poverty and $10 thefts are nonsense. He took millions from Nissan and Renault, neither of whom are exactly widows and orphans. And they were all quite happy to go along with it, for a long, long time. Did he hold a gun to their heads and make them hire him? And couldn't their Boards just fire him?
  - JumpCrisscross 4y ago
    > hypotheticals about victims in poverty and $10 thefts are nonsense Hypotheticals, sure. I’m not familiar with his every crime. Just the big ones. > Did he hold a gun to their heads and make them hire him? And couldn't their Boards just fire him? It sounds like the answer to the above questions, for you, is yes. Fraud. Embezzlement. All okay, because the ultimate victims, the shareholders, either didn’t push back better or were further defrauded by a possibly corrupt, possibly incompetent Board. We can’t know either way because the guy up and offed to Beirut, where he sits a fugitive of multiple international arrest warrants.
    - Cupertino95014 4y ago
refurb 4y ago
Ignoring all that - if I were in his shoes I’d do the same - guilty or innocent. I mean, even if I wasn’t in his billionaire shoes I’d do the same - if facing a long imprisonment in a foreign country I’d take chance at escaping any day.
remembermylo 4y ago
1) not sure this is really relevant. If you don't trust the country's laws you are doing business in dont do business there. Part of the reason I dont plan on opening a factory in Liberia is because i wouldnt trust their legal system to protect me. Im happy working in USA even though their legal system shares suspicious statistics with Japan. The Feds in USA have a 97% guilty rate, so this same logic could be used basically saying because defendants in federal USA trials have virtually no chance of getting off scott free they can escape and we shouldnt call that injustice.
throwawaylinux 4y ago
1) Based on what? The fact that evidence against him was overwhelming(?), or this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conviction_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conviction_rate "Japan The conviction rate is 99.3%. By only stating this high conviction rate it is often misunderstood as too high—however, this high conviction rate drops significantly when accounting for the fact that Japanese prosecutors drop roughly half the cases they are given. If measured in the same way, the United States' conviction rate would be 99.8%." And he has since had to settle a massive fraud charge from the US SEC and is the subject of an arrest warrant from France now too. Bit hard to just dismiss the whole thing as being due to racist authoritarian Japan. 2) What was he a victim of? There are allegations and counter allegations, why should he have the presumption of innocence but not these "Nissan executives"? > In his shoes, I would feel morally justified in escaping. I'm guessing most CEO types would feel moral in personally deciding the punishment for their crimes is unfair and therefore they are justified in committing more crimes to get away with their earlier crimes... > If you disagree with that, suppose Britney Griner somehow escaped from Russian "justice"? How would you feel then? An emotionally charged question because of the situation now, but there are many who get "unfair" sentences for drugs all over the world including people jailed in Russia for similar crimes, people executed in South East Asia and the Middle East for drugs, and people locked away in the US for years on non violent crimes based on legislation and prosecutions orchestrated by the likes of President Biden and Vice President Harris. Not that you can't be against all of those things, but it's a pretty huge crutch that seems to be trying to equate Japan's justice system with Russia's, and harsh penalties for personal drug use with the often very lenient punishments for fraud and embezzlement. "If you aren't with Ghosn then you're with Putin" is a bridge too far. > Edit. Everyone talking about hypothetical burglaries and $10 thefts from poor people: please explain what, exactly, Ghosn was accused of stealing, and from whom? Some millions of dollars. From company shareholders.

Teever 4y ago

> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Can you explain this one? Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty?

colechristensen 4y ago
>Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty? In many cases, yes.
prvit 4y ago
> Do you believe violent crimes require a violent penalty? It’s certainly a common belief, imprisoning someone is inherently a violent penalty.
- josefx 4y ago
  So the people stuck sorting out his mess, having to spend weeks in office going through the paperwork generated by one shell company after the other, should also file charges against him for aggravated assault?
  - prvit 4y ago
    People get paid for that, it’s a job.
    - josefx 4y ago
      So it is okay when we exchange captivity for money? So if we converted the money he stole into an hourly rate we could stick him into prison until the sun burns out and call it a job?
      - prvit 4y ago
        If someone else assigns you a job, it’s called slavery.
        josefx 4y ago
        He clearly took payment in advance for it and knew spending time would be part of it if he was caught. So he basically signed up for it himself.
legitster 4y ago
No, but the only strong case for imprisonment as a punishment is to separate violent people from the rest of society.
- mensetmanusman 4y ago
  That is a form of violence. Think about how many people commit suicide when they lose money for one reason or another.
alexseman 4y ago

xbar 4y ago

Ghosn "the victim" is my favorite part of this post.

MerelyMortal 4y ago

> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. I'm not sure what you mean by it, can you please give an example? For most people, money represents the time out of their lives it took to earn it. If you steal $10 from someone, and they earned it from a job that pays $10/hour - you didn't steal $10, you stole an hour of their life.

thatguy0900 4y ago
That's the calculus when you are well off and secure, which is not most people. If you steal money from someone who makes 10 an hour, you have probably stolen their rent and ability to feed themselves, not their time. Worrying about time is for people who have the basics well covered.
deleted 4y ago
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deleted 4y ago

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orf 4y ago

That’s ridiculous. A crime is a crime, and stealing money - be it physically or on paper - has real repercussions to real people. It deserves more than a financial penalty.

StanislavPetrov 4y ago
>A crime is a crime This is most certainly false. A crime is a violation of a law. Laws are passed by groups of people, not handed down by some infinitely wise and just being. For example, in many African nations, it is illegal to be gay. Would someone imprisoned for the "crime" of being gay be justified in escaping? Would Julian Assange be justified in escaping his dungeon for exposing the crimes of the US government?
- yomkippur 4y ago
  I can't believe you would actually try this dead end argument. Let me guess, if somebody robs you tonight, they didn't commit a crime, they just violated a law that were passed by a group of people that punishes the impoverished who justified their actions.
  - StanislavPetrov 4y ago
    >I can't believe you would actually try this dead end argument. I cannot believe the stunning inability for people to understand that laws are not based on some sort of immutable, objective moral code but are invented by human beings. Do you think Harriet Tubman was a bad person because she helped those who violated the law? Would you have contacted the authorities immediately when you saw an escaped slave, due to their violation of the law?
    - yomkippur 4y ago
      What are you trying to get out of these debates you engage with yourself online? Find something better to do with your time and maybe you will be happier.
- deleted 4y ago

LatteLazy 4y ago

I disagree about financial crimes deserving (only) financial penalties, but I think you're broadly right. It's all but impossible for a native to get a fair trial in Japan, let alone a foreigner...

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

wpietri 4y ago

> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Nah. Financial crimes cause real harm. And financial penalties frequently aren't sufficient disincentive. Imagine that I have no assets but am a good talker. So I go out an launch an "investment fund" that is just a Ponzi scheme. Let's suppose I take in $50m, pocket $10m, and spend the rest on "investment returns" and appearing to run a real business. I live high on the hog for 5 years before it all falls apart, at which point many too-trusting people have lost their lifes' savings. What is the correct penalty? There's no way a financial penalty can be correct here because all of my money was stolen. If the government just sets me back the zero I started at, what punishment is that? Where's my disincentive to do it all again? If anything, I'd argue financial crimes are more likely to deserve jail time. People who steal food may be doing it out of necessity. But nobody stealing millions through financial crimes can claim desperation. I don't think people who use suits to rob instead of ski masks are any less thieves.

chrischen 4y ago
I’d imagine the penalty at least involves returning any stolen money, but a garnishment on future income and additional IRS scrutiny should do it. I actually think jail time isn’t enough a disincentive without the financial penalty because otherwise it can just be a cost of doing business. For example there was a chronic thief in SF that stole peoples’ laptops from cafes. She was jailed multiple times but because the police had no way of knowing where she hid the stolen goods they were still never recovered and presumably she kept her earnings even after jail time.
- wpietri 4y ago
  Oh, yeah, I totally agree that there should be financial penalties larger than the ill-gotten gains. I'm just saying that isn't enough.
  - candiodari 4y ago
    There's a legal expression (it's in French originally) that says "You can't get blood from a stone" This effectively means financial crimes can never be repaid in full, and frequently only small percentages get repaid. It also means the government can never hope to actually do anything to help other than punishment. Going after financial crimes to protect victims ... just doesn't work. Somehow this is enormously at odds with people's expectation of justice, and people either just can't or refuse to believe that's really how it works.

justapassenger 4y ago

> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. Financial crimes, aka crimes rich people commit, to be richer, deserve much more harsh treatment that we give them today. You can go to jail for years for shoplifting (aka crimes poor people commit) few thousand dollars worth of goods. People should be much more often sentenced to go to jail for life for committing millions of dollars worth of financial crimes.

codedokode 4y ago
Financial crimes are not violent and therefore should be punished lightly.
- mpalmer 4y ago
  How light can a punishment be before it's no longer discouraging the crime?
  - picsao 4y ago
- ahtihn 4y ago
  That makes no sense. A home burglary where no one's present is non violent. Do you think that should be punished lightly? It causes orders of magnitude less damage than a lot of financial crime.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    Burglary carries a presumption of force.
    - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
      People steal packages off doorsteps all the time. It requires no force.

finikytou 4y ago

there are plenty of britney griner in california in jail for weed thanks to the same people that now fight for freeing britney griner.

mikeyouse 4y ago
Point me to a single person in California jail for 9 years for possession of under 1 gram of weed. CA legalized weed and then went the extra mile (which many states haven't) to expunge existing convictions and for people being punished currently, downgrading most felony possession counts to misdemeanors and reducing/dismissing the rest of the charges; https://www.pubdef.ocgov.com/programs/dismissal-and-re-sentencing-of-certain-marijuana-convictions https://www.pubdef.ocgov.com/programs/dismissal-and-re-sente...
- Cupertino95014 4y ago
  So if the people Kamala Harris prosecuted got less than 9 years, that's OK? "only a few dozen people were sent to state prison for marijuana convictions under Harris’ tenure." https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecuting-marijuana-cases/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2019/09/11/kamala-harris-prosecu...
  - mikeyouse 4y ago
    Just bottomless wells of bad faith arguments. It's incredible.
    - Cupertino95014 4y ago
      We were talking about marijuana prosecutions in the US vs. Russia. How is it "bad faith" to mention prosecutions in San Francisco?
      - mikeyouse 4y ago
        When was the last prosecution in California? Are there any people in jail today for the crime? What was the average sentence of the 6 people per year who went to prison while Harris was DA? What crime were those people convicted of and what quantity of drugs did it involve? Do you think Chesa was inappropriately lenient in choosing not to prosecute crimes? The tack of your supposed argument let’s me know plenty enough that I’m not remotely interesting in continuing this conversation.

themitigating 4y ago

"He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted" - So if I commit a crime it's morally acceptable to flee justice if the probability or evidence exceeds a certain threshold? In other words, the more proof there is that I committed a crime gives me more justification to avoid punishment? "He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss:" Prove it. "If you disagree with that, suppose Britney Griner somehow escaped from Russian "justice"? How would you feel then?" - They aren't related cases with completely different circumstances and crimes. It also doesn't matter. To bad Britney Griner doesn't have the $15 million~ that Ghosen needed to escape. https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/carlos-ghosn-net-worth-2020-fugitive-escape-70-million/ https://fortune.com/2020/01/10/carlos-ghosn-net-worth-2020-f...

Cupertino95014 4y ago
> "He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss:" Prove it. Oh, sure. Like underhanded whisper campaigns and unspoken agreements are susceptible to "proof."
wfleming 4y ago
> He had essentially zero chance of being acquitted I think GP was referring to the fact that Japan has an over 99% conviction rate. Even if we presume that Japan has unusually high quality prosecutors and judges, that rate is so high that I think it’s reasonable to presume a fair number of innocent people are getting convicted (which happens lots of places, of course, but Japan’s conviction rate is still unusual).
- Nasrudith 4y ago
  There is another factor to it - not trying cases which aren't certain victories as joining that 1% of the conviction rate is an extremely shameful failure. The conviction rate is a "smell" regardless of how you slice it.
- themitigating 4y ago
  "Scholars say the biggest reason for Japan's very high conviction rate is the country's low prosecution rate and the way Japan calculates its conviction rate is different from other countries.[2][3][4] According to them, Japanese prosecutors will prosecute only the very few cases in which they are most likely to be guilty and not many others." https://web.archive.org/web/20220712033655/https://www.nippon.com/en/japan-topics/c05401/order-in-the-court-explaining-japan%E2%80%99s-99-9-conviction-rate.html https://web.archive.org/web/20220712033655/https://www.nippo... I don't think it's reasonable to assume anything happens if there's an alternative explanation.

sockaddr 4y ago

> Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty Eyeball related crimes deserve an eyeball-related penalty, car crimes deserve a car penalty, gun crimes deserve a gun penalty. I mean, really. Did you even try to think of one counter-example to your claim before you wrote it?

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

PedroBatista 4y ago

> He was the victim of Nissan executives who didn't like having a gaijin be their boss: Largely agree. > Financial crimes deserve a financial penalty. That's a very old aristocratic view of financial "wrong-doing", still persists somewhat these days because the idea that for "people with money" with a good reputation, being condemned in public and losing their good name is already a penalty big enough. That's... let's just say this line of thinking should stay in the past.

JumpCrisscross 4y ago

> please explain what, exactly, Ghosn was accused of stealing, and from whom? Should every company executive be free to steal millions of dollars from their companies [1][2]? Be free to "renovate homes for Ghosn in Rio de Janeiro, Beirut, Paris and Amsterdam" on pensioners' dimes? Get a free pass from investigation by multiple countries [3] because they ran a PR campaign while they were pillaging? Anyone informed defending Ghosn is essentially rejecting the rule of law, full stop. He's wanted for serious crimes in multiple countries with discordant agendas. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nissan-ghosn-allegations-factbox-idUSKBN1Z71QI https://www.reuters.com/article/us-nissan-ghosn-allegations-... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ghosn#Initial_arrest https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carlos_Ghosn#Initial_arrest [3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-22/france-issues-arrest-warrant-for-carlos-ghosn-wsj-reports https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-22/france-is...

Cupertino95014 4y ago
So you just admitted that all the hypotheticals about victims in poverty and $10 thefts are nonsense. He took millions from Nissan and Renault, neither of whom are exactly widows and orphans. And they were all quite happy to go along with it, for a long, long time. Did he hold a gun to their heads and make them hire him? And couldn't their Boards just fire him?
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > hypotheticals about victims in poverty and $10 thefts are nonsense Hypotheticals, sure. I’m not familiar with his every crime. Just the big ones. > Did he hold a gun to their heads and make them hire him? And couldn't their Boards just fire him? It sounds like the answer to the above questions, for you, is yes. Fraud. Embezzlement. All okay, because the ultimate victims, the shareholders, either didn’t push back better or were further defrauded by a possibly corrupt, possibly incompetent Board. We can’t know either way because the guy up and offed to Beirut, where he sits a fugitive of multiple international arrest warrants.
  - Cupertino95014 4y ago

refurb 4y ago

Ignoring all that - if I were in his shoes I’d do the same - guilty or innocent. I mean, even if I wasn’t in his billionaire shoes I’d do the same - if facing a long imprisonment in a foreign country I’d take chance at escaping any day.

remembermylo 4y ago

1) not sure this is really relevant. If you don't trust the country's laws you are doing business in dont do business there. Part of the reason I dont plan on opening a factory in Liberia is because i wouldnt trust their legal system to protect me. Im happy working in USA even though their legal system shares suspicious statistics with Japan. The Feds in USA have a 97% guilty rate, so this same logic could be used basically saying because defendants in federal USA trials have virtually no chance of getting off scott free they can escape and we shouldnt call that injustice.

throwawaylinux 4y ago

1) Based on what? The fact that evidence against him was overwhelming(?), or this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conviction_rate https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conviction_rate "Japan The conviction rate is 99.3%. By only stating this high conviction rate it is often misunderstood as too high—however, this high conviction rate drops significantly when accounting for the fact that Japanese prosecutors drop roughly half the cases they are given. If measured in the same way, the United States' conviction rate would be 99.8%." And he has since had to settle a massive fraud charge from the US SEC and is the subject of an arrest warrant from France now too. Bit hard to just dismiss the whole thing as being due to racist authoritarian Japan. 2) What was he a victim of? There are allegations and counter allegations, why should he have the presumption of innocence but not these "Nissan executives"? > In his shoes, I would feel morally justified in escaping. I'm guessing most CEO types would feel moral in personally deciding the punishment for their crimes is unfair and therefore they are justified in committing more crimes to get away with their earlier crimes... > If you disagree with that, suppose Britney Griner somehow escaped from Russian "justice"? How would you feel then? An emotionally charged question because of the situation now, but there are many who get "unfair" sentences for drugs all over the world including people jailed in Russia for similar crimes, people executed in South East Asia and the Middle East for drugs, and people locked away in the US for years on non violent crimes based on legislation and prosecutions orchestrated by the likes of President Biden and Vice President Harris. Not that you can't be against all of those things, but it's a pretty huge crutch that seems to be trying to equate Japan's justice system with Russia's, and harsh penalties for personal drug use with the often very lenient punishments for fraud and embezzlement. "If you aren't with Ghosn then you're with Putin" is a bridge too far. > Edit. Everyone talking about hypothetical burglaries and $10 thefts from poor people: please explain what, exactly, Ghosn was accused of stealing, and from whom? Some millions of dollars. From company shareholders.