Posted on 04/16/2008 7:28:06 PM PDT by Strategerist
/johnny
If that's the ONLY evidence in a stranger rape, I'd never convict were I on a jury.
(I have been aon a jury and convicted someone of child molestation with no physical evidence and the testimony of the victim; perp was the boyfriend of the girl's grandmother. Turns out he had numerous priors for child molestation, and died of a heart attack two days after the conviction)
The basic problem here is eyewitness testimony is TERRIBLE, this has been proven again and again by psychological experiments; but the only knowledge people have of the legal system are movies and TV dramas - you NEVER see shows where an eyewitness makes a simple mistake.
You are absolutely right. This is not something new. People in law enforcement and even in civil law know well, and have known well for a long time, that eyewitness testimony is both the weakest from a reliability standpoint, but the strongest in influencing a jury.
It is a bit counterintuitive, but eyewitness testimony is not nearly as credible as most think. The courts, judges, and lawyers, including prosecutors, know it too. They also know that juries are heavily influenced by such testimony.
Why the deference to such inherently unreliable testimony?
Well, courts (i.e., government) make money out it, judges cravenly defer to the jury, criminal defense lawyers scream about it, but no one listens, and prosecutors use it to advance what are often political careers thereby violating their oath of office.
In cases like this in Florida, the state usually approves about $50K per year in prison payment to a wrongly convicted person. I have no problem with this at all, but I think whoever is responsible for delaying a DNA test should pick up the tab from the date they first declined to test the evidence.
What most people don’t think about when they complain about “defendant’s rights” (”What about victim’s rights?”, they say), is that when you convict the wrong person of the crime, you simultaneously let the guilty party go free.
DNA has convicted tens of thousands more than it’s freed.
That is correct. And it tends to turn the alleged perp's life into a great big $h!t sandwich. And he'll have to eat on it for the rest of his life. Even if exonerated.
/johnny
There is no such thing as an "innocent" man. He may not have been guilty of this crime, but we're all guilty of doing things or at least thinking things that are wrong.
Maybe he just wasn't punished for the right wrong, but it still might be right that he was punished. At least it wasn't wrong in that sense.
We at least this isn’t the UK. When they find someone innocent on DNA and release them after 15 years, they charge them room and board.
Wow. You know, probably 90% or more of all crimes have no DNA evidence. Using your requirements, there’s gonna be an awful lot of criminals running free.
Anything Barry Scheck is attached to has ten foot pole marks all over it..
You are insane. He was JAILED. He didn’t do it. Having impure thoughts of a girl he saw from a distance DOESN’T JUSTIFY SOCIETY LOCKING HIM UP FOR 23 YEARS!!!.
No offence meant to regular criminals....
/johnny
im glad DNA freed man instead of the other way around.
I think it's highly unlikely that this was the ONLY girl about which he had impure thoughts.
These things have a way of balancing out in the long run.
You're correct. I mean, he must be guilty of something. Speeding, leering at little boys, peering in the neighbor's pre-teen bedroom.
What if a woman meets a guy at a crowded party. They go back to her place and talk for eight hours. Then he rapes her. She then positively identifies the guy a week later. You’re saying that identification shouldn’t count if there is no DNA evidence?
For every criminal convicted in which DNA played a part, guilty or innocent, it's now a shot at getting out. DNA evidence lost or degraded so no positive match? Judge orders a new trial, witnesses are dead or have been threatened or don't want to testify, the prosecution has no case and they decline to prosecute. "Wrongly convicted inmate freed".
Remember the Central Park Rapists? They bragged about what they had done and confessed with parents and guardians present. When the only DNA that could be tested showed another rapist was also involved they claimed that they were just innocent choirboys.
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