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"The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop c
by MikeAmelung 2y ago
"The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence."
https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-83934-1.html https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...
- wpm 2y agoCircumstantial. There are a 1000 different ways he could have obtained those items without committing a murder. Prove that having them is proof positive he killed someone.
- tptacek 2y agoI don't think we should have capital punishment at all, anywhere, and certainly this is a textbook example of why, but circumstantial evidence is real evidence, admissible in court cases.
- droopyEyelids 2y agoThis is true, but circumstantial evidence is seldom enough to have the DA bring a case to trial because it is weak evidence. At least, thats my impression im not a lawyer.
- tptacek 2y agoMy understanding is that the opposite is closer to the truth: most cases are made on circumstantial evidence. Jury instructions apparently tell jurors not to weight it any differently than direct evidence.
- sitkack 2y agoWhat does that mean? That they makeup spurious causal chains and believe that is reality?
- tptacek 2y agoJust search [missouri model jury instructions circumstantial evidence]. Jury instructions are written in plain English.
- mahmoudimus 2y agoThis is indeed true. Most cases are made on circumstantial evidence.
- tiahura 2y agoActually the instructions tell the jury that how much weight to give to any evidence is up to them.
- aidenn0 2y agoMultiple witnesses seeing a suspect run out of a store holding a smoking gun shortly after the store clerk was shot is both circumstantial evidence and plenty for a DA to bring to trial.
- tptacek 2y agoI don't think? this is even a real debate. One can want it to be otherwise, but criminal law does not disfavor circumstantial evidence.
- harshreality 2y agoI don't think there are 1000 different ways to get both a ruler and a laptop that belonged to the same murder victim.
- atoav 2y ago[1] Ruler is in the folded laptop, laptop gets stolen, laptop is sold, ruler inside, buyer is told he can keep the cool ruler. [2] Murderer specifically tries to pin the murder on someone else. Someone else being prosecuted is a good way to live free after, gifts his laptop and a ruler to the suspect or leaves them somewhere where they are discovered and taken. Is that unlikely? Is it more unlikely than a murderer keeping the laptop and ruler from a victim, tying him to the murder? For me this alone would be absolutely insufficient evidence, to sentence someone to death. The ease with which some here would do this shocks me.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- awb 2y agoFair, but the Innocence Project did not argue that the defendant received inadequate representation. So presumably the defense would have had to offer an explanation during the trial and the jury was apparently unconvinced. Juries can get things wrong, but we’re also just getting the cliff notes of the trial rather than the whole story.
- smsm42 2y agoDid they ask Williams how the laptop got there? If yes, what did he say? If not, why not?
- trainfromkansas 2y ago"Circumstantial" evidence is often stronger than "direct" evidence. e.g. DNA is almost always "circumstantial", yet more modernly maligned eye witness evidence is "direct".
- diogenes_atx 2y agoThe full quote from the article in justia.com states the following: "In November of 1999, University City police approached Asaro to speak with her about the murder. Asaro told the police that Williams admitted to her that he had killed Gayle. The next day, the police searched the Buick LeSabre and found the Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator belonging to Gayle. The police also recovered the laptop computer from Glenn Roberts. The laptop was identified as the one stolen from Gayle's residence." The only thing linking the laptop to Williams was the testimony of a witness. Even if the witness is telling the truth, he has no way of knowing how Williams obtained the laptop. By any reasonable standard, all this is extremely flimsy evidence: More than a year after the murder, the police found a "Post-Dispatch ruler and calculator" in the suspect's car that belonged to the victim? And someone testified that Williams had the victim's laptop. And it is on the basis of this pitifully weak evidence that you would justify the execution of Williams, the suspect? Even though, as the Innocence Project correctly observes, there is no direct physical evidence linking Williams to the crime scene, and the DNA recovered from the crime scene does not match Williams? https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-83934-1.html https://law.justia.com/cases/missouri/supreme-court/2003/sc-...
- MikeAmelung 2y agoI was just helping everyone understand that your important clarification, was in fact, wrong. Since I wasn't on the jury, I can't say whether or not I would have been ok with the death penalty in this case, although the murder was particularly heinous.
- diogenes_atx 2y ago[flagged]
- lolinder 2y agoIf the ruler and calculator in fact belonged to the victim that is an important clarification of your "the police did not find the victim's property in Williams' car", and your reaction is unnecessarily dismissive. Just acknowledge the error and move on, no need for sarcastic defensiveness.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Bnjoroge 2y agonot the same thing at all lmao