At least somebody figured out the troll- I was beginning to think that the majority of people responding couldn't read. I also hit my 50 posts limit responding, so I stopped.
Your state only requires 12 weeks of police academy? You must be in Washington. In Oregon, to be certified, you need a Bachelor's in Criminal Science from Western Oregon University.
The only test for a search warrant is that there's enough evidence to justify collecting more evidence. Something fishy happening with "your" IP address certainly clears that bar: a reasonable person would conclude that the most likely explanation was that it was your computer, and therefore your computer should be searched for futher evidence.
And if no evidence was found, then that would be proof that the reasonable person was WRONG and therefore liable for any damages.
The police aren't supposed to wait for conclusive evidence of guilt before searching - how would that even work?
They have to be right, every time.
If you want to sue the police for harassing you, it's up to you to prove that the police crossed the line, knowingly or as the result of gross negligence.
Exactly. I'm saying that collecting evidence and then not finding any, is proof of gross negligence on the part of the police.
Just because you were found not guilty (not innocent) doesn't mean that you could win a civil suit for wrongful prosecution. You'd have to prove (by preponderance of evidence) that they didn't have enough grounds to take you to trial.
Yes. And since I was found innocent- I'd be naming the Grand Jury members as co-defendants in the suit.
And, if they'd gotten an indictment from a Grand Jury, you've got a snowball's chance in Hell of winning, because it's the Grand Jury's job to decide if there's enough evidence to proceed with a trial.
And since I was judged innocent, they failed to do their job.
That's on top of your unwarranted assumption that anybody who would prosecute you must be corrupt.
Only a corrupt official, Jury, and officers of the law would take an innocent man to trial. And THAT, ultimately, is the test of the system.
You misunderstand. I'd let them go ahead and search. Let them go ahead and charge me. Wait and bide my time. Wait to present my innocence before a jury and be judged not guilty.
THEN I'd sue the pants off the judge and officers involved based on the 4th Amendment, since they obviously gathered false evidence.
Police don't need to overcome reasonable doubt to get a warrant, just probable cause.
And if after the trial there was an acquittal, that's proof that there was no probable cause to begin with. That's the level I'm talking about. Not fighting the warrant to begin with- waiting until a jury finds me innocent and THEN suing the police for false arrest and breaking my 4th Amendment rights.
Is there really a problem with H/L visas if they are used as a track towards green card and eventual naturalization (it's really the easiest way at the moment, and that's what most people on them seem to strive to do)?
People who go that track have only a 1:10,000 chance of success- it's a sucker bet. I'd much rather they be on the normal I* class visa which guarantees a green card in 5 years, then have somebody take a 1:10,000 chance that they'd get a green card in the 6 years they're here on an H* or L* class visa. Problems that come up are that there are quotas against the I* class, and that even getting an I* class can take 3-6 months in the best of circumstances. I'd personally like to see a merger of police databases between countries to the point where we could reduce that to 30 minutes or less on a web form for the I* class visa, and 24 months of keeping your nose clean once you're in country for the green card.
For the record, I may be biased here, as that is an option I am considering in not-so-far future (perhaps a year or two).
Examine your options carefully- there's a reason why the H* and L* classes are called "nonimmigrant" or "indentured servant" visas. It's incredibly hard to get a green card that way.
Not what I did when it was me vs ODOT over my job- I took the "public defender" from the union, supplemented them with an Americans with Disabilities Act lawyer, and took them for four months back pay in the end.
And that was when I was feeling nice. If they had searched my house and had me arrested instead of just firing me to go on to a better job with better pay, I would have been far nastier.
Search warrants and reasonable doubt have nothing to do with one another. A search warrant is granted when there's reason to believe that the searchers will find evidence that can be used at a trial, at which time reasonable doubt becomes relevant.
And if reasonable doubt was relevant enough for a "Not Guilty" verdict, the first thing I'd do upon becoming free is turn around and file 4th Amendment lawsuits against the court and officers involved. I'm not saying it would prevent it- but I'd look at the whole mess of them taking the time and proving me innocent as an investment in the eventual civil judgment against the corrupt officials involved.
You are joking, right? because "ironclad proof" and "NO OTHER WAY than the crime for the evidence being there" are not "reasonable doubt. If you don't like it, that's ok, but good luck overturning a nearly thousand year old system of common and criminal law.
Who said anything about overturning it? I'm counting on using acquital in a criminal case in civil court and the court of public opinion to take revenge. That actually *requires* the thousand year old system of common and criminal law to be in place, as well as a right to freedom of the press.
Actually, that's a large part of the reason why the current economy is broken. That and insourcing of non-immigrants, whether illegal, or on H*, L*, and F* visas.
Every criminal defense attorney will argue there is a reasonable doubt. The prisons are full of people who used this argument unsuccessfully. The most common reasons an appellate court will reverse a conviction are if there is provable jury misconduct (very rare), if the judge's instructions to the jury misinterprets the law and that likely changed the outcome, or if there is no possible way the jury could reasonably believe the evidence supports a guilty verdict.
I think you misunderstand my position. If the Jury reasonably believes the evidence supports a guilty verdict, then I would have no case for the appeal. Only if I won, would I then proceed to file several civil lawsuits against the officers involved.
What I learned in law school 40 years ago is that "reasonable doubt" is far from the same thing as "ironclad evidence." In theory, a jury should acquit if the evidence leaves them with a doubt based on a reason. But if the police officer testifies that you were doing 80 mph and you testify you were just doing 65, the jury can believe the police officer and convict you. A conflict in the evidence does not mean there is reasonable doubt if the jury decides the police officer is more believable than you are. They can legally discount your testimony completely.
Very true.
OTOH, if you can have the radar gun tested and it over-registers by 15 mph, that could be a different story. In fact, a good judge will not let the police officer's testimony be admitted if that is the case unless the evidence shows the radar gun registered 95 mph, which means you were really doing 80
Also true. The only way you'd have a case is if you pulled out your OBDII palmtop and recorded the last few minute's speed as being only 65.
The big deal lately is that many forensic labs have been shown deficient in their procedures in handling and testing evidence. The kind of scientific study needed to show this is far beyond the resources of almost any criminal defendant. I'm not sure if any convictions have actually be reversed yet because of this finding.
I very much doubt what I originally wrote would be possible if there had been a conviction. Only in the case of a complete aquittal.
If I was actually homosexual instead of a raving heterosexual sex-is-only-for-procreation advocate, that would make more sense.
I did the same thing in my recent bruhaha with the Oregon Department of Transportation- and actually got 4 months back salary out of them when the case was settled.
Best of luck. There are a great many people that would love to get in front of the Supreme Court. Something tells me that your "There is no password on my WAP - Anybody could have downloaded that. I just didn't bring it up during trial to make a point." defense, although perfectly valid, will be your last words if you really keep repeating it until either getting through to the Supreme Court or dying of old age.
No, that wouldn't be what I was repeating. What I'd be repeating until getting through to the Supreme Court or dying of old age is "I won the criminal case, and the Jurisdiction was stupid enough to let their public officials have search warrants with a presumption of innocence".
Good luck with that too. It's up to the jury to decide whether or not there's "reasonable doubt as to [your] innocence".
I'm talking about a civil lawsuit *after* a jury has already decided on innocence. Got to bide your time first for a couple of years, but the payday can be worth it.
Are you suggesting that we re-work our system so that the police can only collect evidence after conviction?
No, I'm saying that innocent people wrongly accused by stupid police processes deserve to sue the government out of existence *after* prosecution.
I'd point out that all your scenario changes is whose house gets raided. But you're right, if you're smart enough to keep the police busy with somebody else you've framed for your crime, AND done it in such a way that that you have obfuscation AND they've ended up with the logs, it's a big hole.
Note he didn't say either that most of his friends were good attorneys, nor that most attorneys were good. I'd suspect most attorneys that end up in a criminal trial to begin with are public defenders, and are trained about as well as the police are.
It occurs to me that the lesson on how police can opt to legally collect information is a huge wake-up call for some people; and the fact that the police can do so without actually formally charging you with a crime is scary to some.
Myself, since I don't make such mistakes and know my own innocence, I'd look upon such a search as winning the lottery- a chance to test the 4th Amendment in civil court *AND* maybe make a few bucks after my lawyer has been paid.
I'm both to some extent- economics is a hobby, maintaining large complex interacting computer systems is a job.
I've come to the conclusion that a capitalist economy, like a communist one, cannot work beyond two degrees of separation in the nodes, whether those nodes be individuals or nuclear family units makes no difference.
I, on the other hand, have done extensive investigation into it. I am also a programmer. I have come to the conclusion that the current economy is broken beyond debugging and repair, and really needs to be open sourced and replaced.
If this happened to me, I'd patiently wait until my trial was over. And if ironclad proof wasn't presented at the trial that there was NO OTHER WAY than the crime for the evidence being there, I wouldn't shut up until the Supreme Court had heard the case. I'd also make damned sure that every newspaper in the jurisdiction knew everything about the case, and would work to make sure every public official involved was either investigated themselves or voted out at the next election. And I'd want enough money to be set up for life from the jurisdiction that was stupid enough to let their public officials have search warrants when there was still reasonable doubt as to innocence. There would be no secrets, no way for the public officials to hide. Because I've already made damned sure that I have nothing to hide.
In other words, in my defense, these "excuses" would be nothing more than simple truth, and I'd make sure every official involved would pay in some way very personal to them.
One would hope that our military wouldn't go along with dropping a nuclear weapon on Portland......
Given the number of enviro-nazis and other liberal ilk resident around here, I consider it one of the top 10 targets should a conservative military coup ever happen in the United States. New York and San Francisco would go before Portland however. Heck, it's not even the first OREGON city to go- that'd be the People's Republic of Eugene.
Well I would dispute that notion (it would matter if the Feds decided to SWAT a whole bunch of people out of existence)
Actually, it would matter even LESS in that circumstance. the Feds deciding to SWAT me, I hole up in my house and shoot through the windows until I'm out of ammo or they bring in a tank to destroy the house. The Feds deciding to SWAT the entire neighborhood out of existence, I won't even get a single round off before the 500 mile nuclear fireball that hits Portland wipes out the West Hills and Beaverton.
If this law to track citizens' movement were passed in America, we would exercise our second amendment rights. We would tell our parliamentarians: Real this law or die
Then why haven't we? The RealID Act, the Patriotism Act, the continuing war on the American Worker, the Mexican Drug War Invasion, it goes on and on and on- we've lost the liberty to earn money, do our jobs, not be robbed by a bunch of bankers living in luxury a continent away. And yet, we've yet to revolt against our own police state.
Well, actually, I know enough about the RealID act to know that it contained an interstate EDI specification. So no, "scanning" an out of state ID (assuming the scanner could actually read it) would be much better than a bouncer staring at it- potentially it would link to the main state database, which would then issue a stored procedure EDI request to the issuing state's database, and assuming everything had been set up correctly (big assumption dealing with state bureaucrats, but there you go) a little light would be glowing red on your fake ID in 30 seconds or so. Same if the fake ID couldn't be read by the scanner. The only way to get a green light would be if the out-of-state EDI transaction actually came back with a record.
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At least somebody figured out the troll- I was beginning to think that the majority of people responding couldn't read. I also hit my 50 posts limit responding, so I stopped.
Your state only requires 12 weeks of police academy? You must be in Washington. In Oregon, to be certified, you need a Bachelor's in Criminal Science from Western Oregon University.
The only test for a search warrant is that there's enough evidence to justify collecting more evidence. Something fishy happening with "your" IP address certainly clears that bar: a reasonable person would conclude that the most likely explanation was that it was your computer, and therefore your computer should be searched for futher evidence.
And if no evidence was found, then that would be proof that the reasonable person was WRONG and therefore liable for any damages.
The police aren't supposed to wait for conclusive evidence of guilt before searching - how would that even work?
They have to be right, every time.
If you want to sue the police for harassing you, it's up to you to prove that the police crossed the line, knowingly or as the result of gross negligence.
Exactly. I'm saying that collecting evidence and then not finding any, is proof of gross negligence on the part of the police.
Just because you were found not guilty (not innocent) doesn't mean that you could win a civil suit for wrongful prosecution. You'd have to prove (by preponderance of evidence) that they didn't have enough grounds to take you to trial.
Yes. And since I was found innocent- I'd be naming the Grand Jury members as co-defendants in the suit.
And, if they'd gotten an indictment from a Grand Jury, you've got a snowball's chance in Hell of winning, because it's the Grand Jury's job to decide if there's enough evidence to proceed with a trial.
And since I was judged innocent, they failed to do their job.
That's on top of your unwarranted assumption that anybody who would prosecute you must be corrupt.
Only a corrupt official, Jury, and officers of the law would take an innocent man to trial. And THAT, ultimately, is the test of the system.
You misunderstand. I'd let them go ahead and search. Let them go ahead and charge me. Wait and bide my time. Wait to present my innocence before a jury and be judged not guilty.
THEN I'd sue the pants off the judge and officers involved based on the 4th Amendment, since they obviously gathered false evidence.
Police don't need to overcome reasonable doubt to get a warrant, just probable cause.
And if after the trial there was an acquittal, that's proof that there was no probable cause to begin with. That's the level I'm talking about. Not fighting the warrant to begin with- waiting until a jury finds me innocent and THEN suing the police for false arrest and breaking my 4th Amendment rights.
Is there really a problem with H/L visas if they are used as a track towards green card and eventual naturalization (it's really the easiest way at the moment, and that's what most people on them seem to strive to do)?
People who go that track have only a 1:10,000 chance of success- it's a sucker bet. I'd much rather they be on the normal I* class visa which guarantees a green card in 5 years, then have somebody take a 1:10,000 chance that they'd get a green card in the 6 years they're here on an H* or L* class visa. Problems that come up are that there are quotas against the I* class, and that even getting an I* class can take 3-6 months in the best of circumstances. I'd personally like to see a merger of police databases between countries to the point where we could reduce that to 30 minutes or less on a web form for the I* class visa, and 24 months of keeping your nose clean once you're in country for the green card.
For the record, I may be biased here, as that is an option I am considering in not-so-far future (perhaps a year or two).
Examine your options carefully- there's a reason why the H* and L* classes are called "nonimmigrant" or "indentured servant" visas. It's incredibly hard to get a green card that way.
Not what I did when it was me vs ODOT over my job- I took the "public defender" from the union, supplemented them with an Americans with Disabilities Act lawyer, and took them for four months back pay in the end.
And that was when I was feeling nice. If they had searched my house and had me arrested instead of just firing me to go on to a better job with better pay, I would have been far nastier.
Search warrants and reasonable doubt have nothing to do with one another. A search warrant is granted when there's reason to believe that the searchers will find evidence that can be used at a trial, at which time reasonable doubt becomes relevant.
And if reasonable doubt was relevant enough for a "Not Guilty" verdict, the first thing I'd do upon becoming free is turn around and file 4th Amendment lawsuits against the court and officers involved. I'm not saying it would prevent it- but I'd look at the whole mess of them taking the time and proving me innocent as an investment in the eventual civil judgment against the corrupt officials involved.
You are joking, right? because "ironclad proof" and "NO OTHER WAY than the crime for the evidence being there" are not "reasonable doubt. If you don't like it, that's ok, but good luck overturning a nearly thousand year old system of common and criminal law.
Who said anything about overturning it? I'm counting on using acquital in a criminal case in civil court and the court of public opinion to take revenge. That actually *requires* the thousand year old system of common and criminal law to be in place, as well as a right to freedom of the press.
Actually, that's a large part of the reason why the current economy is broken. That and insourcing of non-immigrants, whether illegal, or on H*, L*, and F* visas.
Every criminal defense attorney will argue there is a reasonable doubt. The prisons are full of people who used this argument unsuccessfully. The most common reasons an appellate court will reverse a conviction are if there is provable jury misconduct (very rare), if the judge's instructions to the jury misinterprets the law and that likely changed the outcome, or if there is no possible way the jury could reasonably believe the evidence supports a guilty verdict.
I think you misunderstand my position. If the Jury reasonably believes the evidence supports a guilty verdict, then I would have no case for the appeal. Only if I won, would I then proceed to file several civil lawsuits against the officers involved.
What I learned in law school 40 years ago is that "reasonable doubt" is far from the same thing as "ironclad evidence." In theory, a jury should acquit if the evidence leaves them with a doubt based on a reason. But if the police officer testifies that you were doing 80 mph and you testify you were just doing 65, the jury can believe the police officer and convict you. A conflict in the evidence does not mean there is reasonable doubt if the jury decides the police officer is more believable than you are. They can legally discount your testimony completely.
Very true.
OTOH, if you can have the radar gun tested and it over-registers by 15 mph, that could be a different story. In fact, a good judge will not let the police officer's testimony be admitted if that is the case unless the evidence shows the radar gun registered 95 mph, which means you were really doing 80
Also true. The only way you'd have a case is if you pulled out your OBDII palmtop and recorded the last few minute's speed as being only 65.
The big deal lately is that many forensic labs have been shown deficient in their procedures in handling and testing evidence. The kind of scientific study needed to show this is far beyond the resources of almost any criminal defendant. I'm not sure if any convictions have actually be reversed yet because of this finding.
I very much doubt what I originally wrote would be possible if there had been a conviction. Only in the case of a complete aquittal.
If I was actually homosexual instead of a raving heterosexual sex-is-only-for-procreation advocate, that would make more sense.
I did the same thing in my recent bruhaha with the Oregon Department of Transportation- and actually got 4 months back salary out of them when the case was settled.
Exactly right. Bring up *everything* for your defense during trial- and before trial make sure the papers have your side of the story as well.
Best of luck. There are a great many people that would love to get in front of the Supreme Court. Something tells me that your "There is no password on my WAP - Anybody could have downloaded that. I just didn't bring it up during trial to make a point." defense, although perfectly valid, will be your last words if you really keep repeating it until either getting through to the Supreme Court or dying of old age.
No, that wouldn't be what I was repeating. What I'd be repeating until getting through to the Supreme Court or dying of old age is "I won the criminal case, and the Jurisdiction was stupid enough to let their public officials have search warrants with a presumption of innocence".
Good luck with that too. It's up to the jury to decide whether or not there's "reasonable doubt as to [your] innocence".
I'm talking about a civil lawsuit *after* a jury has already decided on innocence. Got to bide your time first for a couple of years, but the payday can be worth it.
Are you suggesting that we re-work our system so that the police can only collect evidence after conviction?
No, I'm saying that innocent people wrongly accused by stupid police processes deserve to sue the government out of existence *after* prosecution.
I'd point out that all your scenario changes is whose house gets raided. But you're right, if you're smart enough to keep the police busy with somebody else you've framed for your crime, AND done it in such a way that that you have obfuscation AND they've ended up with the logs, it's a big hole.
Note he didn't say either that most of his friends were good attorneys, nor that most attorneys were good. I'd suspect most attorneys that end up in a criminal trial to begin with are public defenders, and are trained about as well as the police are.
It occurs to me that the lesson on how police can opt to legally collect information is a huge wake-up call for some people; and the fact that the police can do so without actually formally charging you with a crime is scary to some.
Myself, since I don't make such mistakes and know my own innocence, I'd look upon such a search as winning the lottery- a chance to test the 4th Amendment in civil court *AND* maybe make a few bucks after my lawyer has been paid.
I'm both to some extent- economics is a hobby, maintaining large complex interacting computer systems is a job.
I've come to the conclusion that a capitalist economy, like a communist one, cannot work beyond two degrees of separation in the nodes, whether those nodes be individuals or nuclear family units makes no difference.
I, on the other hand, have done extensive investigation into it. I am also a programmer. I have come to the conclusion that the current economy is broken beyond debugging and repair, and really needs to be open sourced and replaced.
If this happened to me, I'd patiently wait until my trial was over. And if ironclad proof wasn't presented at the trial that there was NO OTHER WAY than the crime for the evidence being there, I wouldn't shut up until the Supreme Court had heard the case. I'd also make damned sure that every newspaper in the jurisdiction knew everything about the case, and would work to make sure every public official involved was either investigated themselves or voted out at the next election. And I'd want enough money to be set up for life from the jurisdiction that was stupid enough to let their public officials have search warrants when there was still reasonable doubt as to innocence. There would be no secrets, no way for the public officials to hide. Because I've already made damned sure that I have nothing to hide.
In other words, in my defense, these "excuses" would be nothing more than simple truth, and I'd make sure every official involved would pay in some way very personal to them.
One would hope that our military wouldn't go along with dropping a nuclear weapon on Portland......
Given the number of enviro-nazis and other liberal ilk resident around here, I consider it one of the top 10 targets should a conservative military coup ever happen in the United States. New York and San Francisco would go before Portland however. Heck, it's not even the first OREGON city to go- that'd be the People's Republic of Eugene.
Well I would dispute that notion (it would matter if the Feds decided to SWAT a whole bunch of people out of existence)
Actually, it would matter even LESS in that circumstance. the Feds deciding to SWAT me, I hole up in my house and shoot through the windows until I'm out of ammo or they bring in a tank to destroy the house. The Feds deciding to SWAT the entire neighborhood out of existence, I won't even get a single round off before the 500 mile nuclear fireball that hits Portland wipes out the West Hills and Beaverton.
If this law to track citizens' movement were passed in America, we would exercise our second amendment rights. We would tell our parliamentarians: Real this law or die
Then why haven't we? The RealID Act, the Patriotism Act, the continuing war on the American Worker, the Mexican Drug War Invasion, it goes on and on and on- we've lost the liberty to earn money, do our jobs, not be robbed by a bunch of bankers living in luxury a continent away. And yet, we've yet to revolt against our own police state.
Well, actually, I know enough about the RealID act to know that it contained an interstate EDI specification. So no, "scanning" an out of state ID (assuming the scanner could actually read it) would be much better than a bouncer staring at it- potentially it would link to the main state database, which would then issue a stored procedure EDI request to the issuing state's database, and assuming everything had been set up correctly (big assumption dealing with state bureaucrats, but there you go) a little light would be glowing red on your fake ID in 30 seconds or so. Same if the fake ID couldn't be read by the scanner. The only way to get a green light would be if the out-of-state EDI transaction actually came back with a record.