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Exactly this. A judge signing off on a warrant is essentially making a prediction that a party is guilty of something involving the target of the warrant. The
by alphazard 3y ago
Exactly this. A judge signing off on a warrant is essentially making a prediction that a party is guilty of something involving the target of the warrant. The judge should have skin in the game.
It could be tied to their salary. It could be a 3 strikes policy. Something they care about should be put on the line when they sign a warrant. If they get it wrong and the warrant was frivolous, they lose something. If they get it right, and the search produces exactly what they predicted, then they get something. Judges would very quickly turn away investigators with insufficient evidence. It would also produce some very wealthy judges who would be worthy of their title according to an objective measure. The best judges would be the wealthiest.
Needless to say, they shouldn't be presiding over the trial, which determines whether the warrant produces a guilty verdict.
- thesnide 3y agoAren't judges elected ? If they are, having their hit track record fully publicly available would help. Not in detail of course, but aggregated by crime type for example. It will be prone to abuse. But any system/solution will be. The trick is to find the one that is the least affected. Or when it is abused, doesn't come with huge side effects.
- AlgorithmicTime 3y agoSome state and local judges are elected. The Federal Judiciary is appointed by the President and confirmed by the Senate.
- giardini 3y agoSome are elected by the great unwashed masses and some others are appointed. You must examine the rules for the particular judgeship to know.
- rtkwe 3y agoNot all judges, in particular Federal judges are all appointed.
- upget_tiding 3y agoFederal judges are appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate. They serve for life unless they are impeached.
- plagiarist 3y agoI'd like it tied to their freedom. Signing off on absolute bullshit should be a trip to jail.
- gary_0 3y ago> If they get it right, and the search produces exactly what they predicted, then they get something. Good grief, I can think of a variety of ways that this incentive would result in horrific corruption. Judicial impartiality is important and all too easily sullied; for instance, see: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
- soraminazuki 3y agoThat would likely not work out because the overwhelming majority of criminal cases in the US end with a plea deal instead of going through a trial, which is another problem of its own. https://www.npr.org/2023/02/22/1158356619/plea-bargains-criminal-cases-justice https://www.npr.org/2023/02/22/1158356619/plea-bargains-crim...
- JumpCrisscross 3y ago> judge signing off on a warrant is essentially making a prediction that a party is guilty No, they are absolutely not.
- kelnos 3y ago> A judge signing off on a warrant is essentially making a prediction that a party is guilty of something involving the target of the warrant. At best that's ignoring a lot of nuance, at worst that's just flat-out incorrect. When a judge signs off on a warrant, they are only saying that they agree with law enforcement that serving the warrant would help move a particular investigation forward, and that the actions they'd need to take to serve the warrant are legally supportable. That's it.
- alphazard 3y agoI think you're taking the law as written, noticing it doesn't say anything about predictions, and then assuming that predictions aren't what judges are supposed to be doing. What I'm saying is that the system, as currently designed and implemented, reveals a judge's implicit beliefs, when they sign or veto a warrant. These beliefs paired with the result of a search directly reflect how good their "judgement" really is. And I'm suggesting that we make those beliefs explicit as predictions.