Colorado Baker Case: Baker wins

I'm not sure very many people are OK with miscarriages of justice but there's not a lot we can do about them apart from trying to minimise them. The alternative to a flawed justice system as we have now is either no justice system at all (which is far worse) or a kind of vigilante justice system in which a victim gets to appoint themselves as judge and jury and, if they see fit, executioner. It's hard to see how that would be any better.

But hey, maybe we should get rid of motor vehicles too. You know, a mistake made by one driver can cost the lives of the occupants of another vehicle whose only wrongdoing was to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

 

Of course, it's all so simple. I wonder why none of us thought of doing it. Speaking of which, I wonder why the highly paid legal profession didn't think to lock up the bad guys and let the good guys go. Of course it would be so much easier if the guilty party would just put their hand up and confess. For some reason they tend not to. I can't think why that would be.

 

As he said, 'not very many people' (and even in this example, it's likely that a subset is trying to achieve a justice they wouldn't be able to prove in court (so they aren't actively pursuing something other than justice, as they see it)).

 

I think the actual stats on that are extremely minimal.

Of all the criminal cases in a year, how many are a situation such as you describe?

 

Because there are untold thousands of such people, right?

 

And this happens, what, how many times? What are the statistics?

 

1. You're trying to make a point. So make it. So far, all you've set out is hypothetical "what if's", not even any anecdotal evidence.
2. We know that there have been travesties of justice in the past where, particularly in the South and particularly with black men, people went to prison for crimes they did not commit. While there was certainly a tendency in some jurisdictions to "look the other way" or "they all look alike to me," most prosecutors are honest, hard working civil servants trying to keep bad guys in jail and innocent people out.
3. But are are trying make some argument for some systemic infection in the prosecutor's office that intentionally withholds evidence from the defense counsel. Knowing a number of prosecutors and former prosecutors, I will tell you, withholding evidence from defense counsel if the fastest way for a prosecutor to get disbarred.

 

I'm really struggling to figure where you're coming from here. Did anybody say it's OK that guilty people go free, or that innocent people go to jail? Did anybody say it's OK that crooked prosecutors seek a conviction rather than justice?

Of course it would be nice if we could have a justice system that never got it wrong. But when innocent people get caught up in the wrong place at the wrong time and when guilty people do what they can to avoid punishment it takes more than something beginning "wouldn't it be nice if...." to fix it.

 

Maybe would could just go with Minority Report or Star Chamber. Much more efficient.

 

It's also why the standard of proof in a criminal case is "beyond a reasonable doubt." You have no idea how high a standard that is. It's one of the reasons you see so many plea bargains in capital murder cases.

 

You said, "Oh, you’d be surprised at the amount of unethical prosecutors who are just fine with miscarriages of justice". That implies that there are a lot, but are you now saying there aren't, there's just a few?