[Ramius]

At least the son was convicted. Looks like a good pre-emption of somebody up to bad things.

If all they had on this father was making false statements during the investigation of his son... I'm not so worked up about that. Expecting parents and children to be willing to send each other up the river is perhaps not very realistic. That's essentially why spouses can't be forced to testify against each other.

I've never been very keen about this business of "making false statements" to police being a crime all on its own. Either nab somebody for a crime or not, but merely getting them for lying about whether they did it seems a bit petty to me. I understand about obstruction of justice, but it seems to me that there's some threshold for obstruction thats a little higher.

[Enchante]

"I've never been very keen about this business of "making false statements" to police being a crime all on its own"

I agree with you on matters outside of some of the worst areas such a terrorism and organized crime. But when fighting the scourge of terrorism, especially, we have to grasp every available tool and throw the book at scumbags whenever we can. Anyone connected with terrorism, even in the most limited ways, must be hammered because we have to fragment and dissect these networks anywhere and everywhere we can.