It's going too far to demand incontrovertible physical evidence (multiple eyewitness accounts, DNA evidence, a videotape of the crime taking place, etc) before a conviction. I think it's because of stuff like CSI and Law and Order that we demand physical evidence. However physical evidence is a fairly new thing and it's also not foolproof. However I am not touching the death penalty thing, that's a separate issue.
For the vast majority of human history people were executed by the most fair and just legal systems with ZERO physical evidence. Why don't you show me the law or Constitutional provision that sets out the evidentary requirements for a captial conviction?
Nor should it. Their testimony was offered in a court of law and cross-examined by the defense and it failed to sway the jurors. There is no evidence that the trial was conducted improperly and the failure of multiple appeals suggests that it was, in fact, not. The recantations are not given in any detail, nor are the circumstances of them set forth. The testimony was given in the most fair circumstances possible and the jurors had the chance to ignore it, but chose not to. The defense had the chance to get the testimony dismissed but failed to do so. The convicting testimony was offered much closer to the actual occasion of the crime than the recantations, and so was much more likely to be accurate. Any number of things could have effected the witnesses, including memory diminishing or even pressure from the defense and other advocates of Davis. No one bothers to ensure AFTER the trial that witnesses and jurors are no longer tampered with or influenced.
whether or not Troy Davis was guilty, the fact that someone can be executed with ZERO physical evidence tying them to the crime is beyond the pale.
For the vast majority of human history people were executed by the most fair and just legal systems with ZERO physical evidence. Why don't you show me the law or Constitutional provision that sets out the evidentary requirements for a captial conviction?
it has long been established that eyewitness accounts are not 100% reliable as evidence, but yet not only did a jury decide that the eyewitness accounts were enough to convict, they handed down a death sentence as well. then when 7 of 9 eyewitnesses recanted their testimony, it still wasn't enough to prevent the execution.
Nor should it. Their testimony was offered in a court of law and cross-examined by the defense and it failed to sway the jurors. There is no evidence that the trial was conducted improperly and the failure of multiple appeals suggests that it was, in fact, not. The recantations are not given in any detail, nor are the circumstances of them set forth. The testimony was given in the most fair circumstances possible and the jurors had the chance to ignore it, but chose not to. The defense had the chance to get the testimony dismissed but failed to do so. The convicting testimony was offered much closer to the actual occasion of the crime than the recantations, and so was much more likely to be accurate. Any number of things could have effected the witnesses, including memory diminishing or even pressure from the defense and other advocates of Davis. No one bothers to ensure AFTER the trial that witnesses and jurors are no longer tampered with or influenced.
zero physical evidence, 7 of 9 eyewitnesses coming forward to say they were either wrong or coerced by police to give misleading testimony and yet we still put the convicted man to death for it. yay....
On what evidence do you base these "facts"? This is a one-sided article offering no support for those claims, beyond the assertions of the people paid to get him off. The supreme irony here is that you are denouncing the justice system for allowing an execution on insufficient evidence or proof of guilt, yet you offer no evidence to the contrary, beyond an article that only lists a very partial and suspect source for those claims, and headlines the article with the absurdly fallacious argument from authority, by citing famous people who supported Davis (and many of those listed are notoriously the sort who would not be remotely interested in the facts of the case, and would have supported him even with a conviction and multiple angles of video footage showing him commit the crime - they are racial advocates and opponents of the death penalty, regardless of the certainty of guilt). In other words, you are committing the exact same error you accuse the legal system of committing. Unlike you, however, the jurors actually heard the testimony of those eyewitnesses and had the opportunity to hear both sides of the case and weigh the evidence. You have a very short and factually-deficient article that offers no support for any of the claims made therein, beyond the FACT that multiple courts heard the case and upheld it, despite a system strongly weighted in favor of the defendant.
i'm proud to live in a country where you can be executed based on circumstantial evidence...
22/09/2011 04:06:07 PM
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And yet the Supreme Court didn't stop it. You're a lawyer right?
22/09/2011 04:19:05 PM
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Well, that right there was an ignorant thing to say.
22/09/2011 04:32:49 PM
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But they get all the media attention
22/09/2011 04:45:03 PM
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Cameron Todd Willingham is white, and his story is a national one since Perry is running for Pres
23/09/2011 03:41:52 PM
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those numbers are less schocking when you consider that blacks commet a lot more murders *NM*
22/09/2011 05:43:51 PM
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And this is a typically illogical argument.
22/09/2011 11:11:48 PM
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You're kidding, right?
23/09/2011 02:55:44 PM
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Re: You're kidding, right?
23/09/2011 07:36:38 PM
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Juror bias. *NM*
23/09/2011 08:35:10 PM
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Your evidence for that? *NM*
23/09/2011 11:33:58 PM
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Twenty-one years of life in the American South.
24/09/2011 12:40:10 AM
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Of course I'm interested
24/09/2011 04:03:51 AM
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From me being too involved with the subject material. I apologize.
24/09/2011 11:16:06 AM
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While I largely agree with your argument, I agree more with Cannoli on the NAACP.
23/09/2011 07:46:06 PM
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Huh.
22/09/2011 04:47:20 PM
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That jumped out at me too.
22/09/2011 04:50:52 PM
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What really confuses me
22/09/2011 04:58:32 PM
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That's a good question and I really wish it would be addressed.
22/09/2011 05:05:40 PM
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Re: That's a good question and I really wish it would be addressed.
22/09/2011 05:21:59 PM
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If the original trial is shown to be flawed that's supposed to require a new trial.
22/09/2011 08:25:51 PM
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Well...
22/09/2011 05:18:54 PM
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So if I understand you correctly...
22/09/2011 05:23:00 PM
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Yes, that is correct. And proving witness coercion is likely to be difficult if not impossible. *NM*
22/09/2011 05:30:37 PM
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it is only confusing because the evidence isn't really that shaky
22/09/2011 08:54:21 PM
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If I understand the Supreme Court correctly, the reason they denied the stay of execution was
22/09/2011 08:25:14 PM
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I completely support the Death Penalty without question.....
22/09/2011 08:27:54 PM
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Unreasonable doubt is impossible to eliminate.
22/09/2011 09:54:43 PM
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Doubt can be eliminated.....any question about Dalmer?
23/09/2011 01:00:52 PM
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Maybe he was framed by an enemy, government conspiracy or aliens.
23/09/2011 01:54:21 PM
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Jigga what? *NM*
23/09/2011 03:36:07 PM
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"I do not know if I was then a man dreaming I was a butterfly or am now a butterfly..."
23/09/2011 06:50:34 PM
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Circumstantial evidence is not, I believe, a bar to conviction.
22/09/2011 09:43:56 PM
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Regarding the salvation thing, that is an argument FOR the death penalty, in my mind.
22/09/2011 11:37:16 PM
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That motive is seflish and thus fatal.
23/09/2011 01:17:00 AM
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Bullshit
25/09/2011 03:53:05 AM
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Where do YOU get the idea that imperfect contrition is good enough?
25/09/2011 02:29:18 PM
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Thank God you're not an evangelist.
23/09/2011 02:59:06 PM
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And I pity the souls you have ministered to. They're in for a rude shock at their judgement
25/09/2011 04:01:05 AM
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lol roman catholicism *NM*
25/09/2011 04:39:55 AM
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Not just Roman Catholics, y'know, everyone who thinks God was not BSing about judgement.
25/09/2011 09:47:12 PM
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lol hellfire and brimstone *NM*
26/09/2011 12:12:28 AM
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I suppose in a consequences free world everything is a source of amusement.
26/09/2011 12:33:14 AM
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You really don't understand irony, do you? Particularly as it applies to your post about this case.
22/09/2011 11:26:49 PM
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.
23/09/2011 08:21:38 AM
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A list of anecdotal wrongs does not prove anything. If convictions can be wrong, so can exonerations *NM*
25/09/2011 04:03:26 AM
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sorry if i don't have time to link to every thing i've read on the subject
23/09/2011 02:54:50 PM
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Well I would think you would have picked an article that offers some iota of proof of his innocence.
25/09/2011 04:14:45 AM
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I kind of agree.
24/09/2011 12:05:27 AM
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Well, I wouldn't call eyewitness accounts circumstancial evidence.
23/09/2011 11:45:48 PM
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Nor would I, but I've heard that lawyers say, "an eye witness is the worst witness you can have."
25/09/2011 03:23:53 PM
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