At least then it would be part of the record of the case, and you would have an opportunity to appeal to a higher court and argue that the science was not settled and that the lower court erred by preventing your defense team from challenging it.
Fat lot of good that does you.
But if a juror can just look something up in Wikipedia on their cell phone and nobody knows, then its NOT part of the record of the case and you might not even know about it. That completely bypasses the "due process" that is essential for a fair trial, and the cornerstone of the modern justice system.
I agree! The problem is that prohibition never works. People will research anyway and not tell anyone. Legitimize the research and at least you'll hear about it.
I sure as HELL do not want jurors having access to information that they are only 'encouraged' to reveal to the prosecution/defense. I want that information on-the-record, no 'ifs', 'ands', or 'buts'.
Then you're going to have to sequester every jury. Jurors are going to do their own research. The only question is how much of it do the attorneys get to address. If you punish them for admitting to do research, that's none.
That can't work. It creates a police state. Here is why:
Failure to prosecute the police for their crimes creates a police state.
1) Manipulating evidence is a criminal act. So guess who decides whether or not to prosecute? The police. Specifically, the federal/state/local prosecutor. So they would basically have to prosecute themselves.
Obviously we need special prosecutors to avoid this obvious conflict of interest.
2) Assume they do prosecute the police. What evidence will be used against them? The evidence held by... the police. Doh! So that evidence will also be manipulated. The cycle continues.
The evidence in question is already held by the court.
3) Assume they do succeed anyway. Who enforces the sentence? The police. Doh! They will get off for good behavior very easily. 4) But! Let's say this does all work out - it will still happen, because it is worth it. What officer/prosecutor wouldn't be willing to do that if it was the right cause? It is all about the convictions for them.
So you're basically saying here that we should never prosecute police for crimes of any sort because the system is stacked in their favor anyway.
Ultimately, denying the evidence in court is the only real penalty that works to deter the police and prosecutors from abusing their power.
As I've said elsewhere, denying the evidence is no deterrent at all. If you don't do an illegal search you have no evidence. If you do the illegal search, there's a chance that it will get admitted. So you're better off doing the illegal search than not. Without real negative consequences to the person breaking the law, there is no deterrent at all.
a prosecutor will not bite the hand that feeds it.
Which is why we need special prosecutors to prosecute the police. Prosecuting the police in the same justice system they work for is an obvious conflict of interest.
It's called sovereign immunity and decisions to charge and not charge are absolutely immune.
Sovereign immunity is one of many legal principles that should be abolished.
It happens all the time with things that the legal system considers settled matters.
That's the problem. It shouldn't be up to the "legal system" to determine what settled science is. It should be up to the jury. Fingerprints for instance are not settled science. Ask any two fingerprint experts what the false positive rate for fingerprinting is. You'll get two different answers, if you can even get an answer out of them.
Also consider Breathalyzers(TM). The output of a Breathalyzer is dependent on a partition coefficient that varies from person to person. Try bringing that issue up in court. A judge won't even let you bring that question to the table.
This is standard practice for the legal system. These kinds of abuses cannot even be described as corruption, it's business as usual. This is why we need a dramatic rebalancing of the power relationships in the legal system.
You seem to forget the opposite can also happen - the jury can find a tinfoil hat site that claims that recovered memories are valid and base their verdict on that.
This is why we should encourage juries to bring the material they are considering to court for discussion. Keep in mind that nothing is stopping juries from doing their own research today, the rules only stop the jurors from talking about it.
If you can't do the time, don't do the crime. I have no sympathy for officers who try to see how close to the line they can get, and end up stepping over it. They are criminals.
If you're going to be tough on crime, you have to be even tougher on criminals in uniform. Their position entails trust and power that the average citizen does not have. When that's abused, it's a much worse infraction. Allowing criminals to work the police force because otherwise we'd have more criminals on the street is a cure that's worse than the disease.
Allowing information collected that violated ones constitutional rights REWARDS the state with evidence that shouldn't have even existed.
The state is not an entity you can reward or punish. Only individuals respond to incentives. By providing a deterrent (criminal charges) to the people who would otherwise collect evidence illegally you protect constitutional rights.
The exclusionary rule on the other hand is corrosive to our constitutional rights. It provides no real deterrent, since there are no consequences to an officer who provides illegal evidence. An investigator might as well try to see what he can get admitted. When the exclusionary rule is applied, you're letting 2 criminals off the hook. The person on trial, and the cop who broke the law. This does not encourage people to value their 4th amendment rights.
Given how often cops are put on paid leave for infractions, this give the PD a way to illegally get information and then give the officer a vacation for doing so.
This is another issue. Prosecuting law enforcement in the same system that they work in is an obvious conflict of interest. We need an independent legal system to police the police.
So that means it should be okay for cops to torture suspects, and evidence acquired that way should be admissible as long as the cop doesn't mind being tried for assault afterwards?
If I were on a jury in a case where the state had tortured the defendant, I would definitely want to know about it. I don't think you could have a fair trial without the jury knowing that.
Better yet, let's just give the police the ability to make that threat,
Cops routinely make threats. Where do you think the phrase "good cop, bad cop" comes from?
The state's attorney will probably be willing to plead that down
Plea bargains are nothing but a way to punish people for exercising their constitutionally guaranteed right to a trial. They should be abolished. I'd further suggest an independent branch of the justice system solely for the purpose of prosecuting police. This would cut down on the conflict of interest you are rightly concerned about.
The problem with this sort of internet research arises because the parties may not have the opportunity to rebut this sort of 'evidence' or even to put it into context.
Instead of prohibiting independent research, how about a rule that requires independent research to be presented to the court? That would allow both sides a chance to provide context, rebuttal, etc. Jurors should also be encouraged to ask questions, and even call witnesses if that's what they need to make a well informed decision.
The fear of having evidence excluded is probably a lot more effective as a deterrent for bad cops than the (non)risk of eventual prosecution if caught doing something illegal.
The fear of having evidence excluded is no deterrent at all. If you don't do an illegal search there is only one possibility, you will have no evidence. If you do the illegal search, there's at least a chance of getting the evidence admitted. Without a real punishment for cops when they break the law, there is no deterrent for illegal searches.
The problem with prosecute the cops is we don't have the notion of an investigating judges. Judges can't initiate prosecutions in the USA. They only thing they can do is thwart the cops / prosecutors
I agree. We need much stronger checks on police power in the US.
As exclusionary rule, it would often be worth it to get the information. For example if I'm involved in a lawsuit it might be worth it for me to go to jail for B & E to break into my opposition's lawyer's office and steal the notes to my case.
The exclusionary rule only applies to evidence presented by the police. As a private citizen, you can break the law to get evidence and give it to the police. Then you get prosecuted for B&E and the evidence is still valid in court. We should do the same thing for cops.
Impractical solutions are not solutions. Consider that only one federal judge has been impeached in the last 20 years, and it had nothing to do with his work in court. Look at the world around you, do you really think that not one judge has abused his authority in court in the last 20 years? You really can't expect the State to punish a judge for biasing a case in favor of the State, can you?
No, because they're just as likely to come up with inaccurate information as accurate.
The solution to this is to encourage juries to bring in the information they find. Then they can be addressed by lawyers from both sides. Encourage jurors to discuss, present evidence, and ask questions. An active and engaged researcher is more likely to get the right answer.
I'd prefer my lawyer do their job and get the judge removed due to bias.
I'd prefer my lawyer do their job and convince the jury of my innocence regardless of the judge's bias.
Would you like a pony too?
I'd prefer the legal system to allow for the fact that judges are human as well, and have built-in safeguards to accommodate same.
I would like that too. Currently there are almost no checks on a judge's power. That's more than a single human should have.
In other words, in this particular case I'd prefer to trust in the system.
It's easier if you do that, yes. But if you actually look at the justice system, it's impossible to justify.
Flawed as it is - as you point out - it's a lot better than trusting in random chance. Which is what the jury doing their own research amounts to.
A good process with random elements will at least average out close to the right answer. A biased process will always lead to the wrong conclusions.
Judges are looking out for the integrity of the trial.
And what if they aren't? What if they're deliberately manipulating the jury through instructions in order to affect the outcome of the case? Remember, judges are just really good lawyers. Lawyers are just really good liars. So judges are really really good liars.
Imagine you've been falsely accused of child molestation based on the fault science of "recovered memories". The judge considers this settled science, so your defense team cannot question the scientific basis of the evidence. (This happens all the time with fingerprints). Wouldn't you want the jury to be able to do some research on their own to discover that recovered memories are a load of shit?
Why should the jury trust that the court is giving them correct information? If I'm on a jury my number one concern is that I'm being used as a pawn to rubber stamp a conviction. If that's the case, I can't trust the judge at all.
Your suggestion that limiting sources of facts and information to those that can be verified encourages ignorance boggles my mind.
How would you cope day to day if you limited your sources of facts and information to those that could be verified? Most sources of information in the world are flawed. That's OK, we understand that, and we can interpolate between them to get a picture of the truth. Someone who does that is going to have a much better idea of what is really happening in the world than someone whose knowledge is limited to road signs and tables of physical constants.
This way, the only things that the jury learns are things that both sides agree are facts. Or, if it is something that is in disagreement, the jury learns that something is not a fact, but a point that one side says is true while the other side says it is false.
Isn't the entire point of a jury to decide what is fact and what is not? A juror that has the wherewithal to do his own research is going to be better prepared to do that.
The real reason juries aren't allowed to do their own research is because controlling the fact presented to the jury is one of the few ways the judge can control the jury. Judges will even exclude fact, that both sides agree are facts, because it might lead the jury to make a decision the judge disapproves of.
Sure, they dress it up as fairness. As if the truth could be prejudicial. If that were actually the case, we'd have judges ruling on what sort of evidence scientists can consider before they make their conclusions. No, the only way to make correct decisions is to weigh *all* the evidence.
Consider the "Exclusionary rule". It's intended as a deterrent to keep cops from presenting evidence illegally obtained. But to enforce this rule you must have tight control over what the jury knows. But we already have a deterrent for when people break the law. Prosecute the cops who broke the law to obtain evidence and you no longer need the exclusionary rule, and so you no longer need to control what the jury knows. So you have better behaved cops, and better informed juries. It's a win for everyone.
All of those events have one thing in common. Whether the government in question was left or right, they were all extremely nationalistic. Nationalism is the enemy, not socialism. As Bakunin said, "Freedom without Socialism is privilege and injustice and that Socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality".
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At least then it would be part of the record of the case, and you would have an opportunity to appeal to a higher court and argue that the science was not settled and that the lower court erred by preventing your defense team from challenging it.
Fat lot of good that does you.
But if a juror can just look something up in Wikipedia on their cell phone and nobody knows, then its NOT part of the record of the case and you might not even know about it. That completely bypasses the "due process" that is essential for a fair trial, and the cornerstone of the modern justice system.
I agree! The problem is that prohibition never works. People will research anyway and not tell anyone. Legitimize the research and at least you'll hear about it.
I sure as HELL do not want jurors having access to information that they are only 'encouraged' to reveal to the prosecution/defense. I want that information on-the-record, no 'ifs', 'ands', or 'buts'.
Then you're going to have to sequester every jury. Jurors are going to do their own research. The only question is how much of it do the attorneys get to address. If you punish them for admitting to do research, that's none.
That can't work. It creates a police state. Here is why:
Failure to prosecute the police for their crimes creates a police state.
1) Manipulating evidence is a criminal act. So guess who decides whether or not to prosecute? The police. Specifically, the federal/state/local prosecutor. So they would basically have to prosecute themselves.
Obviously we need special prosecutors to avoid this obvious conflict of interest.
2) Assume they do prosecute the police. What evidence will be used against them? The evidence held by... the police. Doh! So that evidence will also be manipulated. The cycle continues.
The evidence in question is already held by the court.
3) Assume they do succeed anyway. Who enforces the sentence? The police. Doh! They will get off for good behavior very easily.
4) But! Let's say this does all work out - it will still happen, because it is worth it. What officer/prosecutor wouldn't be willing to do that if it was the right cause? It is all about the convictions for them.
So you're basically saying here that we should never prosecute police for crimes of any sort because the system is stacked in their favor anyway.
Ultimately, denying the evidence in court is the only real penalty that works to deter the police and prosecutors from abusing their power.
As I've said elsewhere, denying the evidence is no deterrent at all. If you don't do an illegal search you have no evidence. If you do the illegal search, there's a chance that it will get admitted. So you're better off doing the illegal search than not. Without real negative consequences to the person breaking the law, there is no deterrent at all.
a prosecutor will not bite the hand that feeds it.
Which is why we need special prosecutors to prosecute the police. Prosecuting the police in the same justice system they work for is an obvious conflict of interest.
It's called sovereign immunity and decisions to charge and not charge are absolutely immune.
Sovereign immunity is one of many legal principles that should be abolished.
It happens all the time with things that the legal system considers settled matters.
That's the problem. It shouldn't be up to the "legal system" to determine what settled science is. It should be up to the jury. Fingerprints for instance are not settled science. Ask any two fingerprint experts what the false positive rate for fingerprinting is. You'll get two different answers, if you can even get an answer out of them.
Also consider Breathalyzers(TM). The output of a Breathalyzer is dependent on a partition coefficient that varies from person to person. Try bringing that issue up in court. A judge won't even let you bring that question to the table.
This is standard practice for the legal system. These kinds of abuses cannot even be described as corruption, it's business as usual. This is why we need a dramatic rebalancing of the power relationships in the legal system.
You seem to forget the opposite can also happen - the jury can find a tinfoil hat site that claims that recovered memories are valid and base their verdict on that.
This is why we should encourage juries to bring the material they are considering to court for discussion. Keep in mind that nothing is stopping juries from doing their own research today, the rules only stop the jurors from talking about it.
Got something other than an ad hominem? Why should we expect any more integrity from the judiciary than any other part of the government?
If you can't do the time, don't do the crime. I have no sympathy for officers who try to see how close to the line they can get, and end up stepping over it. They are criminals.
If you're going to be tough on crime, you have to be even tougher on criminals in uniform. Their position entails trust and power that the average citizen does not have. When that's abused, it's a much worse infraction. Allowing criminals to work the police force because otherwise we'd have more criminals on the street is a cure that's worse than the disease.
Allowing information collected that violated ones constitutional rights REWARDS the state with evidence that shouldn't have even existed.
The state is not an entity you can reward or punish. Only individuals respond to incentives. By providing a deterrent (criminal charges) to the people who would otherwise collect evidence illegally you protect constitutional rights.
The exclusionary rule on the other hand is corrosive to our constitutional rights. It provides no real deterrent, since there are no consequences to an officer who provides illegal evidence. An investigator might as well try to see what he can get admitted. When the exclusionary rule is applied, you're letting 2 criminals off the hook. The person on trial, and the cop who broke the law. This does not encourage people to value their 4th amendment rights.
Given how often cops are put on paid leave for infractions, this give the PD a way to illegally get information and then give the officer a vacation for doing so.
This is another issue. Prosecuting law enforcement in the same system that they work in is an obvious conflict of interest. We need an independent legal system to police the police.
No, I'm not. I'm thinking that if the means are bad, you should punish the person who used those means. That means the cop who broke the law.
So that means it should be okay for cops to torture suspects, and evidence acquired that way should be admissible as long as the cop doesn't mind being tried for assault afterwards?
If I were on a jury in a case where the state had tortured the defendant, I would definitely want to know about it. I don't think you could have a fair trial without the jury knowing that.
Better yet, let's just give the police the ability to make that threat,
Cops routinely make threats. Where do you think the phrase "good cop, bad cop" comes from?
The state's attorney will probably be willing to plead that down
Plea bargains are nothing but a way to punish people for exercising their constitutionally guaranteed right to a trial. They should be abolished. I'd further suggest an independent branch of the justice system solely for the purpose of prosecuting police. This would cut down on the conflict of interest you are rightly concerned about.
The problem with this sort of internet research arises because the parties may not have the opportunity to rebut this sort of 'evidence' or even to put it into context.
Instead of prohibiting independent research, how about a rule that requires independent research to be presented to the court? That would allow both sides a chance to provide context, rebuttal, etc. Jurors should also be encouraged to ask questions, and even call witnesses if that's what they need to make a well informed decision.
The fear of having evidence excluded is probably a lot more effective as a deterrent for bad cops than the (non)risk of eventual prosecution if caught doing something illegal.
The fear of having evidence excluded is no deterrent at all. If you don't do an illegal search there is only one possibility, you will have no evidence. If you do the illegal search, there's at least a chance of getting the evidence admitted. Without a real punishment for cops when they break the law, there is no deterrent for illegal searches.
The problem with prosecute the cops is we don't have the notion of an investigating judges. Judges can't initiate prosecutions in the USA. They only thing they can do is thwart the cops / prosecutors
I agree. We need much stronger checks on police power in the US.
As exclusionary rule, it would often be worth it to get the information. For example if I'm involved in a lawsuit it might be worth it for me to go to jail for B & E to break into my opposition's lawyer's office and steal the notes to my case.
The exclusionary rule only applies to evidence presented by the police. As a private citizen, you can break the law to get evidence and give it to the police. Then you get prosecuted for B&E and the evidence is still valid in court. We should do the same thing for cops.
Impractical solutions are not solutions. Consider that only one federal judge has been impeached in the last 20 years, and it had nothing to do with his work in court. Look at the world around you, do you really think that not one judge has abused his authority in court in the last 20 years? You really can't expect the State to punish a judge for biasing a case in favor of the State, can you?
No, because they're just as likely to come up with inaccurate information as accurate.
The solution to this is to encourage juries to bring in the information they find. Then they can be addressed by lawyers from both sides. Encourage jurors to discuss, present evidence, and ask questions. An active and engaged researcher is more likely to get the right answer.
I'd prefer my lawyer do their job and get the judge removed due to bias.
I'd prefer my lawyer do their job and convince the jury of my innocence regardless of the judge's bias.
Would you like a pony too?
I'd prefer the legal system to allow for the fact that judges are human as well, and have built-in safeguards to accommodate same.
I would like that too. Currently there are almost no checks on a judge's power. That's more than a single human should have.
In other words, in this particular case I'd prefer to trust in the system.
It's easier if you do that, yes. But if you actually look at the justice system, it's impossible to justify.
Flawed as it is - as you point out - it's a lot better than trusting in random chance. Which is what the jury doing their own research amounts to.
A good process with random elements will at least average out close to the right answer. A biased process will always lead to the wrong conclusions.
By appealing to who? Another judge.
Judges are looking out for the integrity of the trial.
And what if they aren't? What if they're deliberately manipulating the jury through instructions in order to affect the outcome of the case? Remember, judges are just really good lawyers. Lawyers are just really good liars. So judges are really really good liars.
Imagine you've been falsely accused of child molestation based on the fault science of "recovered memories". The judge considers this settled science, so your defense team cannot question the scientific basis of the evidence. (This happens all the time with fingerprints). Wouldn't you want the jury to be able to do some research on their own to discover that recovered memories are a load of shit?
The jurors job is to determine if the evidence presented shows that the defendant violated specific laws.
That's what the judge tells you. Your real job is to see that justice is carried out. This is not always the same thing.
Why should the jury trust that the court is giving them correct information? If I'm on a jury my number one concern is that I'm being used as a pawn to rubber stamp a conviction. If that's the case, I can't trust the judge at all.
Your suggestion that limiting sources of facts and information to those that can be verified encourages ignorance boggles my mind.
How would you cope day to day if you limited your sources of facts and information to those that could be verified? Most sources of information in the world are flawed. That's OK, we understand that, and we can interpolate between them to get a picture of the truth. Someone who does that is going to have a much better idea of what is really happening in the world than someone whose knowledge is limited to road signs and tables of physical constants.
This way, the only things that the jury learns are things that both sides agree are facts. Or, if it is something that is in disagreement, the jury learns that something is not a fact, but a point that one side says is true while the other side says it is false.
Isn't the entire point of a jury to decide what is fact and what is not? A juror that has the wherewithal to do his own research is going to be better prepared to do that.
The real reason juries aren't allowed to do their own research is because controlling the fact presented to the jury is one of the few ways the judge can control the jury. Judges will even exclude fact, that both sides agree are facts, because it might lead the jury to make a decision the judge disapproves of.
Sure, they dress it up as fairness. As if the truth could be prejudicial. If that were actually the case, we'd have judges ruling on what sort of evidence scientists can consider before they make their conclusions. No, the only way to make correct decisions is to weigh *all* the evidence.
Consider the "Exclusionary rule". It's intended as a deterrent to keep cops from presenting evidence illegally obtained. But to enforce this rule you must have tight control over what the jury knows. But we already have a deterrent for when people break the law. Prosecute the cops who broke the law to obtain evidence and you no longer need the exclusionary rule, and so you no longer need to control what the jury knows. So you have better behaved cops, and better informed juries. It's a win for everyone.
Everything? What if you want to burn a CD? Or an EEPROM for that matter?
I think you haven't heard of Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. The US has had universal health care for decades, in its worst possible form.
This would be awesome if they could get MIDIMaze running on it.
All of those events have one thing in common. Whether the government in question was left or right, they were all extremely nationalistic. Nationalism is the enemy, not socialism. As Bakunin said, "Freedom without Socialism is privilege and injustice and that Socialism without freedom is slavery and brutality".