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It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated.

It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated.


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It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

Wrong question. The correct one is: Would you, being innocent, be willing to go to prison so that 100 guilty men didn't go free?
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

I would much rather see 100 guilty go free than start convicting innocent people in witch hunts again.
 
Blackstones formulation x 10.


"it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer"

-Benjamin Franklin.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

Absolutely agree. We have 5 amendments in the bill of rights protecting our rights in criminal proceedings. That is done for a reason.
 
Wrong question. The correct one is: Would you, being innocent, be willing to go to prison so that 100 guilty men didn't go free?

Dude, even if I was guilty as sin I still wouldn’t be particularly willing to go to prison. There’s a reason jury’s are instructed not to place themselves in the shoes of the defendant or victim for that matter. We’re not at our most objective when it involves us personally. This is an expression I’ve seen pretty routinely argued so your dodge is a little puzzling.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

I’ll put that I don’t agree. I don’t know if the number should be 100 or not but that sounds like as good of a line as any. What if it was 1,000 or 1 million or every criminal? Is it rational to expect a perfect system or no system at all? So 100 is a good a cutoff line as any. With 99% efficiency that would be much more effective that the rest of the govt. :shrug:
 
Dude, even if I was guilty as sin I still wouldn’t be particularly willing to go to prison. There’s a reason jury’s are instructed not to place themselves in the shoes of the defendant or victim for that matter. We’re not at our most objective when it involves us personally. This is an expression I’ve seen pretty routinely argued so your dodge is a little puzzling.

Exactly, I’d rather go free as a guilty person and have 100 innocent people wrongly convicted in my place
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

Such a hard and terrible question to answer. Would it be better to let 100 serial rapists or serial killers or murderous terrorists go free than to incarcerate one innocent man? Would the victims and/or their loved ones think that was a good trade off?

It was a decision that FDR had to make in the wake of the attack on Pearl Harbor. Even knowing that 99% of the Japanese people living in the U.S. were no threat to U.S. citizens, did a take a chance on 1% of them being people instructed to sabotage our shipyards or otherwise create havoc from their advantage being in the country? Even all these many decades later, that is still a controversial decision.

So given extreme situations I can say that yes, it would be better to incarcerate the innocent and make it up to him/them later than it would be to put many other innocent people at unnecessary risk.

A better question is it better to let the guilty go free than take the chance that he or she is being wrongly accused? And even there the answer is not an easy one.
 
Blackstones formulation x 10.


"it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer"

-Benjamin Franklin.

Thank you, Serenity, for real. That is the actual quote. It’s been mainly understood to apply to criminal law so I wanted to be clear that as it relates to the criminal justice is what I’m asking.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

Depends on of you are a victim of crime or that one innocent man serving 25 to life. I guess.

But, I voted yes.
 
Absolutely agree. We have 5 amendments in the bill of rights protecting our rights in criminal proceedings. That is done for a reason.

Fair enough. It’s like that quote about those who would trade personal freedom for security not deserving either (total paragraph on my part). I’m not sure I can agree entirely with that. I admit to having difficulty with the concept of letting 100 people escape the consequences of their crimes.
 
Dude, even if I was guilty as sin I still wouldn’t be particularly willing to go to prison. There’s a reason jury’s are instructed not to place themselves in the shoes of the defendant or victim for that matter. We’re not at our most objective when it involves us personally. This is an expression I’ve seen pretty routinely argued so your dodge is a little puzzling.

Okay, then different question: Would you send your innocent mother to prison so that 100 guilty men didn't go free?
 
Depends on of you are a victim of crime or that one innocent man serving 25 to life. I guess.

But, I voted yes.

Yes, perspective certainly skews things.
 
Okay, then different question: Would you send your innocent mother to prison so that 100 guilty men didn't go free?

I wouldn’t send my mom to prison even if I knew she was guilty.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

Ham sammich: neither scenario is acceptable.
 
I’ll put that I don’t agree. I don’t know if the number should be 100 or not but that sounds like as good of a line as any. What if it was 1,000 or 1 million or every criminal? Is it rational to expect a perfect system or no system at all? So 100 is a good a cutoff line as any. With 99% efficiency that would be much more effective that the rest of the govt. :shrug:

Thank you. The concept seems rather extreme to me. The only way to be sure that no innocent person is ever convicted would be to not have any convictions any more, unless maybe there's clear video evidence (and even there, there's the possibility of tampering) but I wonder how many people would really accept not prosecuting someone simply because the perpetrator managed to not get himself captured on video. It's just not as easy or obvious of a proposition for me as it seems to be for others.
 
It is better for 100 guilty men to go free than for one innocent man to be wrongly incarcerated. Do you agree or disagree? Attaching poll.

We have a system made by humans, ran by humans, and because of that mistakes HAVE to be made at some point

It is imperfect....there is no way to make it perfect that I know of

Because of that, at times mistakes get made, and an innocent man can get convicted

Faulty test results, faulty witnesses...it happens

But would I want 100 other guilty people to go free so that that one innocent guy wouldn’t be convicted?

No way in hell
 
Exactly, I’d rather go free as a guilty person and have 100 innocent people wrongly convicted in my place

I think that is attitude of most criminal defendants, hence the reason our criminal justice system is not based on the honor system. :lol:
 
Fair enough. It’s like that quote about those who would trade personal freedom for security not deserving either (total paragraph on my part). I’m not sure I can agree entirely with that. I admit to having difficulty with the concept of letting 100 people escape the consequences of their crimes.

First: the word you wanted was "paraphrase", not "paragraph". My OCD does not allow me to let that pass.

Second: all the freedoms and rights in the world come with costs. That cost is frequently security. The more rights and freedoms you have, the less secure you are. While there are times that it is worth giving up a little freedom in exchange for security, it should be rare.
 
I agree, but sadly a lot of so-called forensic experts dont....all of those lies told over so many years in court to help prosecutors get convictions......and I am so disappointed in how little upset I run across about this.
 
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