Well then I could never get convicted. Judging from my latest games, my brain isnt working at all

Smyslov_Fan wrote on 10/07/11 at 15:53:10:


I would think that this is true, and that is why witnesses are weaker than evidence, such as DNA profiling (except when evidence is planted by someone...).

Btw, I came to think of a science program I saw about a year ago, concerning a new technique that would make most of the legal yipyap obsolete. 

Basically, it's about scanning the brain while interrogating the suspect. If he/she lied you could easily see it, since the wrong part of the brain would light up. And the truth was equally easy to determine, as that would light up the parts where memories are stored...

Markovich wrote on 10/07/11 at 00:14:09:


I don't understand what you're getting at. It's OK for a judge or a jury to present a verdict of guilty or not guilty, with major implications for someone's life, but not if they explain why they reached that decision? Requiring an explanation should make both judges and juries more responsible, make miscarriages of justice less likely, decrease the chance of getting away with corruption, and point both defence lawyers and prosecutors in the right direction to focus their efforts when preparing an appeal to a higher court. All advantages if you ask me.

Why is a decision disposing over someone's liberty less horrifiying if the decider(s) don't have to explain it? And can you seriously mean that an unexplained verdict requires less trust in the state than an explained one? Sounds to me like you have it exactly backwards. Transparency leads to less corruption, not more.

Stigma wrote on 10/06/11 at 20:24:22:


Here, the explanation of a not guilty verdict is that there was not evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused was guilty; of a guilty verdict, that there was.  What more does justice, as opposed to anyone's curiosity, require?  How is justice served by the state's pretense that it has a comprehensive account of the crime in a neat little dossier, when in the preponderance of cases, that assertion will be very doubtful?  To me, the thought of a team of assiduous bureaucrats burrowing into what they suppose to be  evidence and obtaining Official Truth, and that that process should dispose over the liberty of anyone accused, is quite horrifying.  

To an American, the degree of trust that that places in the state is stunning.

Markovich wrote on 10/06/11 at 19:34:24:


http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/reactionary.html

Uh oh... spaghettio.

The U.S. judicial system does its best to prevent "trial by media," But we have freedom of speech and of the press, and unlike the British, we don't constrain these just to make the judicial system's path easier.  Most of us wouldn't have it any other way.  But these are really extra-judicial considerations and go to a country's whole constitution (small "c").

I submit, however, that Amanda Knox was tried by media -- both times.

As for judges being less "reactionary" (is that what you meant?) and susceptible to sentiment, piffle!  Who says so? 

@Stigma:  I'm not a legal expert, but in my understanding, appeals in our country are never based on evidence, only on points of law.  If the jury convicts, the assumption is that the evidence presented was sufficient.  Appeals do consider whether evidence was admitted in error, but that is a point of law,  I'm at the limit of my knowledge, but I believe that is roughly accurate.  

There is here no prosecutorial appeal of a verdict of not guilty, so at that point, everything is moot.  It would strike me, and most Americans I think, as an offense to liberty if the state, having lost a criminal case, nevertheless could issue an official report explaining that the person just found not guilty was, in fact, very likely guilty.