random thoughts is right. - Edit 1
Before modification by Joel at 14/01/2011 02:43:05 AM
And those familiar with our past and current debates will know how rarely I say that. 
That we agree here argues for more caution than you're displaying. So do the words of John Adams:
That AZ has capital punishment drives it home, as it did following the Boston Massacre. Adams won the acquittal of all but two of his clients (who escaped death via the archaic and since abolished "clergy benefit" ) in a trial that is said to have recorded the first instance of the phrase "reasonable doubt".
Law is not a game, though some treat it as such; criminal law is very serious and that involving death, as either charge or sentence, quite literally as somber as the grave. The Bill of Rights entitles all accused to the best possible defence; so does common sense and self preservation, because the simple fact is that mistakes happen: Any of us could find ourselves falsely accused and wrongfully imprisoned tomorrow. Should such a state befall you, you will be very grateful for just the kind of defence attorney you so disparage here (for the record I have no more respect than you for lawyers who accept large retainers to await inevitable frequent charges against clients they know to be guilty, but it happens far more often in the corporate than the mafia world; whose "trial lawyers" do you condemn then...?
)
Without a sincere and robust defence, even of the guilty, especially for capital crimes, the entire justice system is a facade. Not only must the innocent face the real risk of wrongful conviction, but, as Adams notes, the guilty have no deterrent, for they are as likely to be convicted for legal as illegal conduct. Most people like to treat that as mere rhetoric, yet it's increasingly treated as a truism in inner city areas: Law enforcement, lawyers, judges and juries assume everyone there is a criminal, and they will inevitably be arrested and convicted as one even if innocent. Why not strike out against a system oppressing them, commit the very acts of which they are "presumed guilty" and benefit from that as best they can for as long as they can until the arrest and conviction that was inevitable from birth finds them? The end result is the same whether or not they obey the law, but the interim gains are quite different. There, in a real palpable form, is your end to security. It applies to the Kandahar goatherder who finds himself in Gitmo for reasons never explained and the Bellaire, TX youth paralyzed by a police bullet in his own drive while his parents watch simply for being a suspicious color and quite possibly to you if you successfully argue for presumption of guilt. There's a reason why we enshrined presumption of INNOCENCE in the Constitution; if you don't like it you're welcome to try passing an amendment reversing it, but I, and I think the majority of Americans, will oppose you.
That we agree here argues for more caution than you're displaying. So do the words of John Adams:I am for the prisoners at the bar, and shall apologize for it only in the words of the Marquis Beccaria: ‘If I can but be the instrument of preserving one life, his blessings and tears of transport, shall be a sufficient consolation to me, for the contempt of all mankind....
We find in the rules laid down by the greatest English judges, who have been the brightest of mankind, [that] we are to look upon it as more beneficial that many guilty persons should escape unpunished than one innocent person should suffer. The reason is because it is of more importance to [the] community that innocence should be protected than it is that guilt should be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in the world that all of them cannot be punished, and many times they happen in such a manner that it is not of much consequence to the public whether they are punished or not. But when innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, especially to die, the subject will exclaim, "It is immaterial to me whether I behave well or ill, for virtue itself is no security. " And if such a sentiment as this should take place in the mind of the subject there would be an end to all security whatsoever.
--John Adams, in defense of British soldiers accused of murders at the Boston Massacre.
We find in the rules laid down by the greatest English judges, who have been the brightest of mankind, [that] we are to look upon it as more beneficial that many guilty persons should escape unpunished than one innocent person should suffer. The reason is because it is of more importance to [the] community that innocence should be protected than it is that guilt should be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in the world that all of them cannot be punished, and many times they happen in such a manner that it is not of much consequence to the public whether they are punished or not. But when innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, especially to die, the subject will exclaim, "It is immaterial to me whether I behave well or ill, for virtue itself is no security. " And if such a sentiment as this should take place in the mind of the subject there would be an end to all security whatsoever.
--John Adams, in defense of British soldiers accused of murders at the Boston Massacre.
That AZ has capital punishment drives it home, as it did following the Boston Massacre. Adams won the acquittal of all but two of his clients (who escaped death via the archaic and since abolished "clergy benefit" ) in a trial that is said to have recorded the first instance of the phrase "reasonable doubt".
Law is not a game, though some treat it as such; criminal law is very serious and that involving death, as either charge or sentence, quite literally as somber as the grave. The Bill of Rights entitles all accused to the best possible defence; so does common sense and self preservation, because the simple fact is that mistakes happen: Any of us could find ourselves falsely accused and wrongfully imprisoned tomorrow. Should such a state befall you, you will be very grateful for just the kind of defence attorney you so disparage here (for the record I have no more respect than you for lawyers who accept large retainers to await inevitable frequent charges against clients they know to be guilty, but it happens far more often in the corporate than the mafia world; whose "trial lawyers" do you condemn then...?
) Without a sincere and robust defence, even of the guilty, especially for capital crimes, the entire justice system is a facade. Not only must the innocent face the real risk of wrongful conviction, but, as Adams notes, the guilty have no deterrent, for they are as likely to be convicted for legal as illegal conduct. Most people like to treat that as mere rhetoric, yet it's increasingly treated as a truism in inner city areas: Law enforcement, lawyers, judges and juries assume everyone there is a criminal, and they will inevitably be arrested and convicted as one even if innocent. Why not strike out against a system oppressing them, commit the very acts of which they are "presumed guilty" and benefit from that as best they can for as long as they can until the arrest and conviction that was inevitable from birth finds them? The end result is the same whether or not they obey the law, but the interim gains are quite different. There, in a real palpable form, is your end to security. It applies to the Kandahar goatherder who finds himself in Gitmo for reasons never explained and the Bellaire, TX youth paralyzed by a police bullet in his own drive while his parents watch simply for being a suspicious color and quite possibly to you if you successfully argue for presumption of guilt. There's a reason why we enshrined presumption of INNOCENCE in the Constitution; if you don't like it you're welcome to try passing an amendment reversing it, but I, and I think the majority of Americans, will oppose you.