Why I used to support gay marriage, but no longer do.

[Cutlass]

And, guilty or not, they still deserve a fair trial and the state still has to not violate their rights to get that verdict.

Fact of the matter is, pretty much everyone charged with a crime is guilty of it, District Attorneys won't generally prosecute a case they don't think they can win, and a lot of the time the defendant is pretty obviously guilty. Does that mean that criminal defense lawyers shouldn't bother representing them, and making sure that the prosecution is doing its job right?

Our criminal justice system doesn't even begin to be that accurate. And particularly not where minorities are concerned. Just because the prosecutor thinks they can win has not much to do with whether the defendant is guilty.

 

[El_Machinae]

I find it interesting that you can write an entire paragraph like that without acknowledging that the woman in question has any part in this - as if she's entirely an inanimate object to be passed around so that other people can 'fulfil their duties'.

You know, in my society, if you threaten someone with physical violence unless they put out, that's considered rape.

The man is also being raped by God's law in this case.

his brother's widow shall go up to him in the presence of the elders, take off one of his sandals, spit in his face and say, "This is what is done to the man who will not build up his brother's family line."

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Our criminal justice system doesn't even begin to be that accurate. And particularly not where minorities are concerned. Just because the prosecutor thinks they can win has not much to do with whether the defendant is guilty.

If the prosecutor thinks they can win the person is very likely to be found guilty. That doesn't mean they committed the crime though. That's the problem.

Despite the common perception of "everyone in prison will tell you they are innocent", pretty much everyone I met freely admitted what they had done and was willing to discuss it at length. The number of people who are convicted through some sort of cheating is shacking. Not saying they are pure as snow never did anything, by any means.

You look through a guy's case and see that after months of surveillance and getting nothing the cops "got a confidential tip from a confidential informant", pulled a warrant and searched the house and found a kilo of cocaine in the refrigerator...of a guy who admits he was a trafficker who the cops never even thought before that night brought product into his house. It is hard to imagine that months of surveillance would not have netted something from a guy who is so stupid that he keeps a kilo in the fridge, so when he says it was planted you have to wonder.

Now, I tell that story to people and a surprising number say "Well, he was a drug trafficker and he did belong in prison." That misses the point. The cops got this "windfall evidence" to convict him of distribution (which he actually didn't do) and could get just as solid a windfall should for some reason they want to convict you...or you, or you, or you.

You look through another guy's case and he spent ten months in the county jail fighting his case and the case is dropped because the evidence looks like there is no way to get a conviction. He doesn't even make it out of the county jail before he is arrested again on the same charges. The evidence is the same. He immediately takes a plea deal. WTF?

When they refiled the charges every adult member of his family was indicted as a conspirator. The case was still not winnable, but the nature of the charges screamed "flight risk" so just like the first time bail was extremely unlikely. So rather than have his kids and all his nieces and nephews committed to foster care he took a plea deal that included all the false conspiracy charges being dropped. It is listed as a stipulation in his plea, so it isn't something a bitter inmate just made up.

Again, the guy was growing pot. But the fact is they never did catch him at it or in any way prove it. But they did put him in prison for it. Using a process that would have landed him in prison whether he had done it or not.

Do these or similar stories account for every inmate? Of course not. I was caught, red handed as it were, and duly convicted. Plenty of people are. So many people are that it really makes you wonder why the cops feel compelled to cheat at all. The obviously guilty seem like they really should be sufficient. But even though they don't account for every inmate, or even a large percentage of inmates, I can follow those two stories with a dozen more, easily, that would, or at least should, scare the heck out of every citizen who has, or even hasn't, committed a crime.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Do these or similar stories account for every inmate? Of course not. I was caught, red handed as it were, and duly convicted. Plenty of people are. So many people are that it really makes you wonder why the cops feel compelled to cheat at all. The obviously guilty seem like they really should be sufficient. But even though they don't account for every inmate, or even a large percentage of inmates, I can follow those two stories with a dozen more, easily, that would, or at least should, scare the heck out of every citizen who has, or even hasn't, committed a crime.

You want scary, you need only to realize what CAN be done to anybody. It would not be particularly difficult to plant "evidence" of illegal material on someone's computer and then "find" it later. You can even take your pick among material depending on how long you want to put someone away or whether it's removing them from the public scene or staining reputation that's more important. It makes you wonder what percentage of politicians that come up with dirty stuff actually had it versus had it planted (I suspect the former is larger but the latter to be non-zero, possibly significant), and what percentage of people taken in for various crimes did them for sure. Stuff like homicide is much harder to plant, but there's a wide variety of crime that could be planted/framed easily.

 

[Borachio]

In that case, if scary is what you're after, why not just plain arrange a suicide in that case? Or even a common or garden assassination if you want to remove someone from circulation, as it were.

The secret services seem to do this all the time as a matter of course.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

You want scary, you need only to realize what CAN be done to anybody. It would not be particularly difficult to plant "evidence" of illegal material on someone's computer and then "find" it later. You can even take your pick among material depending on how long you want to put someone away or whether it's removing them from the public scene or staining reputation that's more important. It makes you wonder what percentage of politicians that come up with dirty stuff actually had it versus had it planted (I suspect the former is larger but the latter to be non-zero, possibly significant), and what percentage of people taken in for various crimes did them for sure. Stuff like homicide is much harder to plant, but there's a wide variety of crime that could be planted/framed easily.

You are clearly a computer guy, so the obvious ease of planting evidence of computer crimes strikes you immediately. But the reality that should scare most people is that cops seize drugs and illegal firearms on a consistent basis, so they always have access. And the guy who goes searching for evidence and finds it is the only one who can actually say where it was found. Planting narcotics or weapons doesn't take any mad skillz at all. Literally any simple minded rookie cop could do it successfully, day two on the job.

By the way, when it comes to homicide the LAPD Rampart guys called that 'two birds with one stone'. Assassinate one undesirable, frame another by finding the murder weapon on him, get rid of both.

 

[JollyRoger]

But through out the Bible we see the consequences of people' actions when they go against God's design.

Many of the polygamists and those having relations with maids and concubines did pretty well. How many women did it take for one man to sire God's chosen people? Four?

 

[TheMeInTeam]

You are clearly a computer guy, so the obvious ease of planting evidence of computer crimes strikes you immediately. But the reality that should scare most people is that cops seize drugs and illegal firearms on a consistent basis, so they always have access. And the guy who goes searching for evidence and finds it is the only one who can actually say where it was found. Planting narcotics or weapons doesn't take any mad skillz at all. Literally any simple minded rookie cop could do it successfully, day two on the job.

By the way, when it comes to homicide the LAPD Rampart guys called that 'two birds with one stone'. Assassinate one undesirable, frame another by finding the murder weapon on him, get rid of both.

That's true too. Planting physical objects wouldn't be very hard either. Probably best not to delve too far into this because 1) I want no part in it and 2) I couldn't do anything but screw myself over even if I did. I like playing games I can possibly win.