Slashdot Mirror
Melbourne Trial Aborted Due To Crime Web Site
Chatz writes: "The jury in a murder trial in Melbourne was dismissed because the
details about a previous trial of the accused are available on
CrimeNet (www.crimenet.com.au). There was no evidence that any of
the jurors had seen the information and the information is publicly
available in newspaper archives. Here is a link to the story." This sets an odd precedent, to say the least. Perhaps criminals would benefit by describing their crimes in excruciating detail as soon as they're apprehended. What do y'all think down under?
and of course the notion that !Christian==Imoral.
This is fact, as substantiated in the Bible.
Uh oh! Big slip up here!
Since you seem to think that programmers are all satan worshippers, and it would take someone with programming knowledge to know what "!Christian==Immoral" means, that brings us to the conclusion that you, yourself, are a satan worshipper.
Have a nice day.
-- Dr. Eldarion --
It's not what it is, it's something else.
ROFL
Even the 80,000^H^H^H^H^H^HMillion Morons had that figure vastly inflated with their claim of 13 children per day (They include 19-year-old gang members as "children").
The real figure is much, much lower.
--
When it comes to high-profile cases that get lots of media attention how can they really find a jury who has never heard of the case? Is hearing of the case so terrible, its not like people can't dismiss information.
I'd hate to tried by a jury of shut-in's and weirdo's who think TV, Computers, and newspapers are the devil's work. I would rather have a bunch of liars.
Then again, it did seem to work out for OJ.
--
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke
With the advent of the home PC, and internet based news coming in faster than stories can be edited, perhaps this will help set a new standard for Jury Selection. I'm pretty sure similar ideas have been rolling around in US judges/attorneys heads for a while.
It is indeed, a precedent. But is it a good one? Think about it. As a citizen, you could lose your right (It's not really a duty, you know) to be considered a "peer" of the accused.
"Do you own a computer?" or "Do you have an internet connection?" could be the new basis for sequestering a jury/juror, or dismissing one entirely. So called Non-techs could wind up being the ones making decisions on increasingly technical crimes.
Another angle we should take a look at is the possibility of a law being passed amending a jurors rights and duties to include not being able to connect to the internet either at home, or at work, once notified of jury duty.
While I don't completely agree with the Melbourne decision to dismiss the jury, I understand it. The availability of knowledge on the internet IS phenomenal, and a single juror gaining knowledge of the crime ahead of time could taint the trial.
Justice, though she is blind, does not appear to be deaf, or dumb. Sometimes she sees things a bit too clearly.
krystal_blade
It will be easy to motivate our fellow man; there is hardly anything people treasure more than not being annihilated.
This internet-thingy turns law-abiding citizens and innocent youths into soul-less shells that can no longer distinguish between right and wrong.
Dang. You're right.
I'll go delete all those illegal MP3s now.
Pope
Freedom is Slavery! Ignorance is Strength! Monopolies offer Choice!
It doesn't mean much now, it's built for the future.
I can almost guarantee you that the farmhand has had a more moral upbringing and goes to Church more than the programmer
Sorry? Are you implying that programers and people who don't go to Church are immoral? I don't see how you arrived at that conclusion.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
Ignoring the obvious possibility of flaming you until you go away and stop telling me i am immoral, i shall again ask the question:
How did you arrive at the conclusion that (paraphrased) many programers are imoral?
Syllable : It's an Operating System
I sure would like someone to be on my side if I went to court. However, a board is quite predictable. Either the evidence is enough to convict me or it is not. A jury could find me guilty cause they don't like my appearance or set me free cause they feel sorry for me.
While I certainly don't like the fact that everyone except me works for the government (which is only really a problem if some official is involved in the case) uncertainty is not a good protection of my rights.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
The old testament is an intresting document indeed. Unfortunately it is more of an autobiography than a historical document. Every event is described so that the jewish people is glorified. Nothing unusual, every people has compiled history readings to show their greatness. However that is something one must consider when reading the bible (just like any other document) in a historical sense.
Regarding the morality of Country folk and christians: Remember that both of these communities (in their traditional sense) are close knit and everyone knows everyone else. This makes the raising of children in a moral fashion quite a bit easier
That makes raising conforming children easier. Wether they are more moral or not is a different question. I dont consider xenofobia to be a moral thing...
All opinions are my own - until criticized
One of my reflections when I sat down and actually read it was how single persons are never gloryfied: It is the *people* that is. You get the notion that every people has their god(s). Jahve is by no means the only god around. The moral is that a) You should never betray your *own* god. b) Stick with Jahve, cause he's the strongest.
Exodus is a fine example. Pharao's magicians get aid from *their* gods. It is just that Mose has a stronger ally.
And, yes there are many ways to read the Torah (as well as the new testiment)
Ever tried to read Exodus as a comedy? If you don't fint it heretical, I really recomend it.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
Here in the Netherlands there is no jury-based legal system, guilt is determined by the judge. Dutch legal system is usually not seen as unfair (usually. for any legal system there will always be at least some cries about a certain verdict being unfair). A trial without a jury is not by definition unfair.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
This is a classic case for sequestering jurors from the moment they are assigned to a certain trial.
Then, the chances they are aware of previous criminal record against the defendant is the same as with common media.
In the U.S. this is common practice on high-profile cases. The only difference is that this lowers the rack for what is considered a 'high-profile case'.
-Tal
-Tal
"Ars Gratia Artis"... When will we see that on a Metalica T-shirt?
Some farmhands might have difficulty following the technical issues. E.g. they may not have enough understanding to decide whether or not the recording industry made a "reasonable effort" to make DeCSS secure. (Dunno if that decision would be neccessary for that trial, it's just an example of something hard to understand if you're not technical).
If you believe in separation of church and state, then this should count for nothing. The job of the jury is to decide whether [it's overwhelmingly likely that] the law has been broken. It is *not* to decide if the defendant has broken the Christian moral code, or the juror's own moral code.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Contemporary mainstream Christianity would say that someone who has never heard of Jesus or Church can still go to heaven (if they do, in fact, live by and with God, whether they know the word "God" or not). This is offtopic, and probably irrelevant to all programmers; I just wanted to ensure that people didn't take the above sentence to speak for Christianity as a whole.
However, I still suggest that a jury decision should be based upon the law and not Christian morals; else people will be behaving outwardly Christianly by compunction and not by choice, which is not desirable whether or not you are Christian.
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
Also, judges can set aside a conviction (but not an acquital) if they beleive that the evidence is insufficient. It's a 13-input AND gate.
And if you don't like that, in most cases you can elect to go before just a judge, no jury, and have him or her decide your fate; you're not mandated to accept a jury trial.
I ought to note that the courts, once again proving their illiteracy (what part of "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury" do they not understand?), have decided that the right to a jury trial doesn't apply to crimes carring a sentence of less than six months - even if you're facing twenty counts and could be put away for ten years. Trial by jury, another casualty of the War on (Some) Drugs.
Tom Swiss | the infamous tms | my blog
You cannot wash away blood with blood
But I do know a lot about the U.S. judicial system. I do not think this ruling will have any effect in the U.S. It probably will not spread elsewhere, either.
As a general rule, the more a law applies to, the more flexible it is made. Jury selection certainly qualifies, and it is indeed very flexible in the U.S. In the U.S., if a case draws strong passions, there is often a change of venue, to avoid selecting impassioned jurors for the panel.
The change of venue is obviously ineffective at controlling pre-trial publicity if the case makes national news, but there are other ways of dealing with this.
1) Jurors are selected from the voter registration rolls. This means that the people selected tend to have an interest in the course of government, and will take their duties seriously.
2) Potential jurors are interviewed thorougly to determine whether or not they have formed opinions about the case. Sometimes it may take 100 interviews to come up with 12 impartial jurors, but they get a jury eventually.
3) The experience of a trial, with all its formality and deliberation, is a deeply involving experience, much more so than reading a newspaper or watching the evening news or visiting a website. Jurors form very strong opinions from the facts presented at trial, and tend to ignore outside evidence.
4) If there is extensive publicity and speculation during the trial, the jury may be sequestered. In the past, this has involved sheriff's deputies cutting out stories about the case from the paper, and sometimes even listening in on phone calls. Having a deputy nearby while they are using the internet would not be an innovative measure. Sure, this is hard on the jurors, but that's a discussion for another time.
5) In the U.S., at least, it takes a unanimous verdict to end a trial. If the jurors cannot agree, the judge will declare a mistrial and a new one will begin. It is extremely unlikely that one jurors, influenced by an outside source, will convince the rest to change their verdict. In addition, since it is unlikely that an influenced juror to get on the panel in the first place, it is very unlikely that you'd ever have more than a couple make it on, even in extreme cases.
So, I know the U.S. system is safe. I would imagine that many countries already have similar systems in place. Maybe even Australia does, but this was a bad ruling. I'm not worried about bad precedents hitting me. Australians, you've got to take your courts back.
WARNING: there is a trojan on your
Does that answer your question?
Not really, because you seem to have based your argument on presumption, imagination, a limited experience with programers, and of course the notion that !Christian==Imoral.
I'm an atheist, and i am certain i am not imoral. I don't steal, cheat, engage in violence, i love my mother and the rest of my family etc. etc.
By all means, practise a religion. Just don't tell me i am wrong because i don't practise your religion too. That way do wars lie.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
In Sweden, cases are decided by a board instead of a jury (except in freedom of press cases) While that system also has its problems it avoids the uncertainity of jury trials.
Now as a law abiding non-lawyer citizen, I don't have much experience with our courts, and my "knowledge" of american courts come mostly from TV and slashdot, so I don't feel very qualified comparing the systems.
What do you say. Is the whole concept of an uninformed peer jury flawed or is it worh preserving?
All opinions are my own - until criticized
Judge Hampel is, of course, correct. Justice in Australia, the U.S., and the U.K. must rely on the ignorance of the jury to function properly.
Why is it unacceptable to let the jury in a murder trial know that the defendant has been convicted of murder before, for example? Shouldn't a jury know all the facts? If we trust a jury to make the decision of guilt or innocence, shouldn't we also be able to trust them with the truth?
Geeky modern art T-shirts
Yknow that the abortion rate in Kansas is fast approaching 1 per woman-lifetime?
perl -e 'fork||print for split//,"hahahaha"'
I think, more importantly than love thy neighbour, would be the passage "judge not, lest ye be judged." Isn't that in the bible somewhere? It seems to me that our fine Christian disciple has taken it upon himself to encroach upon two of the bible's most basic ideals. Open heart - open mind.
I love the hypocrisy that seems to follow Christianity. Having attended private Christian school for a good portion of my upbringing, it is that mindset alone which has kept me 'out of God's grace'. I don't want to associate myself with a group that is so adept at preaching something, yet so ill-adept at following their own preachings.
I do not find Christians immoral, nor do I find atheists immoral. I judge not, lest I be judged. I do tend to find more hypocrites acting on God's behalf than the other way around, however. I have some VERY righteous family members, who wholly believe in God, and are very active in the church, but it's not Christianity that makes them good people.
For the record, I DO believe that a religion that teaches love thy neighbour, do not steal, etc. is a good thing for people willing to accept that. However, I don't feel that excluding yourself from said group, for WHATEVER reason, makes you any more immoral than anyone else, including members of the church.
Damnit, i post as an AC because i think it'll get moderated down, and it gains 4 points! Now this one will get moderated down because it's OT and redundunt. Whats a Karma whore to do? ;)
Syllable : It's an Operating System
Turning your argument on it's head, what right does a Christian have to decide if say, a Muslim, a Jew, an atheist etc. has commited a crime?
Syllable : It's an Operating System
And, next time you troll, you might want to stay with the good ol' "stupid opinion" method, and not mix it up with incorrect statistics. I mean at least not dead wrong numbers.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
...contempt of court for publishing stuff about pending court cases (would at least move sites to another country)
Or not disclosing the names of any people in the court case (defendant, witnesses), including to the jury, until after the case...
Theres already too much stuff in the press...Craig Charles was accused of rape, held on remand (in prison) for months, eventually found not guilty, but its not like the doctrine of `innocent until proven guilty` was uphelp there, was it?! Plus you get vigilante type idiots who believe anything the police say as an excuse to get all hot and bothered about stuff...
Do you wish to pay with your reputation of others entertainment. CrimeNet is propably mostly entertaining, but how about privacy... the article noted that people on CrimeNets 'blacklist' had had a hard time getting jobs etc.
I admit that the ciminals must be punished but not with eternal mark on their foreheads.
Parents Against Kuro5hin
This is just another excuse for Austalia (its government) to censor the Net down under.
There was no evidence that any of the jurors had seen the information, so why dismiss the jury?
Answer: to scare the public that the Internet will make it so crimes go unpunished. Thus, to further scare the public into accepting Net censorship.
--
He lives in a world where those who do not run the client software of the omnipresent meme are unacceptable.
or get rid of juries in trials, which is probably too much of a hassle legally.
//rdj
No one can understand the truth until he drinks of coffee's frothy goodness.
--Sheikh Abd-Al-Kadir, 1587
I thought the difference between Jews and Christians was that the Christians think that Jesus is the Son of God and Jews think Jesus was a false profit.
putting aside any financial jokes for the time being, the difference is that Christians now think Jesus was the One True Savior (tm) Son of God (c), etc. Jews instead see Jesus as a wise prophet, but not The Savior.
Lea
Timothy - I don't think it's an odd precedent at all. I think the judge has acted in the spirit of the law. Due process necessitates that you will have a fair and unbiased jury. While there will always be bias, while jurors are human, we are still better off in trying to consciously overcome our own shortcomings.
Secondly, you seem to be under the impression that CrimeNet is police-operated. The fact is that CrimeNet gathers its material from publically available sources - newspapers, what information police will provide, and so forth.
Thirdly, the criminal's decision to describe his crime would - should other evidence support the case - likely have him found guilty by trial.
I believe that there are two critical items here:
Taken together, these mean that there is a real chance that jurors will hold pre-judgement - prejudice, in other words. And there is stacks of research that shows you that prejudices have tangible affects on trial outcomes.
The judge has set a good precedent here. Let's not tear him down for it.
be well;
JC.
ps - Timothy: some of us may find "y'all down under" just a teensie bit patronising. Not all. Some.
--
"Don't declare a revolution unless you are prepared to be guillotined." - Anon.
Classical Liberalism: All your base are belong to you.
isn't there some lion you should be providing sustanence for?
US Citizen living abroad? Register to vote!
This is fact, as substantiated in the Bible.
I have never read the bible, nor do i believe a word of it. Your argument holds no weight for me there.
therefore you, knowingly or not, worship Satan. You are immoral.
I should take this personally. But i won't. Because a) I don't believe in Satan, so why should that worry me in the slightest? b) If i am a glowing example of a Satan worshiper, i think there should be more of us in the world.
Christians have an obligation to set right the wrongs of the world
Translation "I am better than you. I shall stick my nose into other peoples business and tell them what to do. I do not beleive in individuality."
and if this leads to violence
Yeah, violence is great in the name of God, perfectly alright. Oh, doesn't the Bible say something about "Love thy neighbour", or are you allowed to ignore that bit if it suits you?
Syllable : It's an Operating System
O.K, you've got to be Trolling now.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
www.eFax.com are spammers
O.K, so even if one of the jurors did read the website, i'm sure the court could have found a replacement. After all, if a US court could manage to find an entire jury for the OJ Simpson trial, i'm sure it would have been many orders of magnitude easier to find a jury who hadn't even heard of the website.
Reporting crime in the media is nothing new at all, it just seems that the court took a knee-jerk action because the details were on the internet this time.
Syllable : It's an Operating System
If a jury are dismissed just for the possibility of having seen the site... surely this means that there are no valid jurors, worldwide? Or do we now resort to jurors from countries with no widespread internet access? Or do we just let them go now, since there's apparently no way to try them...?
Personally, I'd say string 'em up... but that's just me...
Considering that the material was available in newspapers, which the jurors are much more likely to have seen, this all seems too much like the typical panic of the ignorant - "The Internet's going to take over the world!!!" I think not...
Fortunately Jesus does not agree with you.
I could post a number of bible quotes here, but if you are really a christian I wont have to.
All opinions are my own - until criticized
most people that are Christians are not true Christians. They do not attend Church twice a week and pray every night
A 'true Christian' (your term, not mine) would go to Church more frequently than twice a week (how about twice a day?), and would pray more regularly than every night. A true Christian would praise God with everything he says and does.
A place where Christianity is taboo has a much larger proportion of programmers than almost any other website I know of.
Christianity is not a taboo on Slashdot, what rubbish. However, Slashdot is a Linux website and discussions of Christianity would be off-topic. In fact, Slashdot gives a free platform from which Christians (such as myself) are able to air our views. Try Advogato and The Stile Project for even less coverage of Christian issues. You will then realise how tolerant Slashdot is to the discussion of Christianity and Christian issues.
Fourth: a farmhand is likely to have grown up in Middle America, a place of strong moral fiber, and to be free from many of the evil influences that the city brings.
Utter nonsense, trollboy. Middle America is a place of very poor moral fibre - it is an inherently racist region and a region ruled by violence. Guns (the tools Satan uses to turn man against his fellow man) are widespread in America, and the majority of Americans worship the ideals of consumerism rather than God. It is down to individual choice whether or not to follow Evil, and in this respect no region is better than any other. As far as "evil influences" of cities, surely cities have more churches per area than small less densely populated villages, therefore cities are intrinsically holy?
Most people with a Computer Science degree are lucky to remain with the slightest few sheds of religion that have not been indoctrinated out of them.
Hello? Computer Science degrees make no attempts influence people's religious views. While they may indoctrinate people that Python is better than Perl, Solaris is better than BSD, vi is better than EMACS and Microsoft is better than everything put together, these are not religous arguments. They are trivial.
Please, think before you post next time.
It's a good job it wasn't Larry Flint on trial. Try finding a jury who hadn't seen a porn website...
Last time I was on Jury duty, we were on the honor system to not discuss or research our case in the intrest of a fair trial. From the article I gather this is virtually the only concern aborting this retrial. When screened for jury duty last time I was asked a series of questions to determine my bias. I was also asked on the honor system to not do any research, visit crime scenes, or discuss the case...
// Zarf //
I assume that the Aussies also have a similar convention. So, my confusion is over why it is okay for me to say... "no, I've never heard of this case nor will I go look it up in the library." Yet my disavowing any readership of CrimeNet is not just as valid a claim. Is my verbal agreement to not read any websites dealing with the case somehow inherently less believable than my word to not research the case at the library?
Shouldn't I still be honor bound and even under some sort of threat of perjury to not research the case? If something is published on the internet, does this make it inherently more dangerous than something published in a periodical?
I am very suspect of this Judge's reasoning. Jurors are supposed to operate under instruction from the judge anyway. If a juror does violate thier agreement to not research, ect... then the juror should be penalized. This course of action seems to punish the defendant.
As for the bit about CrimeNet ruining lives... That's another article isn't it? You can seek legal action against a site defaming you right? CrimeNet might be getting a law suit or two eh?
-
[signature]
I'll start this post with a quote from the article:
:)
"CrimeNet offers details on 4000 convicted criminals gleaned from newspapers and court records"
It says it all right here, the info on CrimeNet isn't to blame. It's not like they are the only ones to have had the information publisized. The problem is that this is just bad judgement from the Judge and his/her consorts.
Problem is that most people are not going to see it "the right way" and are going to scream hell on earth and down with the internet. It's just too easy to blame internet (and computers in general) for the things that go wrong.
What could have been done different?
Before trial the judge tells the jurors what to do and what not to do. I think a judge says something like "thou shalt not investigate in prior offenses of this person" at the jury selection. Why should a website be anything different?
Reading the article I couldn't help but feeling like the judge thought the same thing, therefore he refused to abort the trial at first. Problem is that other people got wind of the case and started meddling, after which the judge suddenly did abort the trial.
<disclaimer>
Ahwell, as you can guess, this is just IMHO so don't blame me if I'm wrong...
</disclaimer>
Socrates
When you look at the details of the trial issues, at the end of the article, it makes a lot of sense.
Beyond that, the article raises a lot of intersting AND frightening point. What if an offender has the same name as *you*? Shit, I know there was another guy with the same name AND same age as I in my university, although I never met him -- I discovered that when I applied for a library card: "oh you are already registered". Not me!
Even more crazy, when I was 10 or something, I was living in an appartment, and in the same building there was two married women of the same age and same names!
So this is quite a common situation. Now what happens if one those people is convicted? The legal system sometimes fucks up. But ... if it's a sex-related offense (rape?), it's not even a problem with the legal system, but also with well-thinking vigilante ...
IANAL and my experience is UK based.
.oO0Oo.
It is only really since people became estranged from each other that this sort of thing became important.
As justice evolved the accused and accusers would often be known to each other. This, like everything, was both good and bad and the legacy of that system still lives with us.
A defence and prosecution try to establish either the good character or evil nature of an accused person in order to colour the jury's or judge's opinion of the accused. Indeed these days "a man of good character" is one who has no previous criminal convictions.
In times gone by your actual reputation would follow you in to the courtroom. Revenge might be taken for your previous behaviour in the community or you might be let off for being an otherwise good person who just let off steam or behave out of character due to external pressure.
Nowadays because people are estranged from each other, the mitigating circumstances are written in to our statute. The law decides in advance why you might be let off for something and it is up to you to prove it, if that is your course of action.
This case seems to highlight a flaw in human nature. Negativity seems to linger longer than positivity (is that a word?). It's hard to imagine a way of balancing. How does someone with a previous killing under their belt gain any sort of positive reputation? Nothing in the world seems as positive as murder is negative so such revelations obviously bias opinion. There is no GoodDeedNet where a list of people who have made positive contributions can be searched.
To attempt to be fair society must err on the side of caution. That is why trials can be dismissed in this way. Information might want to be free but some information manages to get publicity for itself too.
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
IANAL
The past history of a defendant cannot (and should not) be used as evidence. You try someone on the facts, not on their reputation or record.
Jurors are forbidden from looking up details of a defendant in public records etc, but that is not the point. Going to your local library and doing a newspaper article search to see if a defendant has a dubious past is:
1. Time consuming
2. Requires reasonable knowledge of how records offices work, how to use microfiche properly etc.
3. Involves a physical element that makes it easier to trace you, make it more apparent you're doing something wrong.
4. Essentially impractical since you'll be in court all day.
Doing the same on the internet, especially on a site that has been created for just such a purpose is:
1. Fast
2. Can be done at night/evening
3. Does not involve verifiable records - depending on the site it could be pure rumour that you're looking up.
4. Doesn't "feel" like you're doing anything wrong.
Overall, I think there's a good argument that such sites seriously impact the jury process, especially as they become better known.
Currently it is quite practical to stop jurors having access to this sort of information. The internet makes it harder, and while for high profile trials jurors are kept in hotels without access to t.v / newspapers etc no-one can afford to do that for every trial of every local criminal.
It would be a bad world indeed where a juror on a case of, say burglary and assault in their local town when home after the first day of the trial and read on www.tastelesscrimesite.com that the defendant had been 'implicated in a number of fraud cases involving pensioners in the area'. That would surely start to bias the average juror into thinking 'this person is wicked' despite the claim being 1. dubious and 2. irrelevant.
To do the same without the Internet the juror would have had to search maybe three years of the local free paper to find the two inch column that says 'local man implicated in recent pensioner scams'. Something that is unlikely to happen.
-----