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Wag
 
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| I think that if you don't want a police state, then you inevitably get a system where people tend to get away with things occasionally (and it is occasional). The problem is, if you live in certain "high crime" areas, your exposure to crime is higher and so is your experience of criminals who appear to get away with it.It's bound to colour your perception of how succesful our justice system is.
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Wag
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Andy Rimmer (9/24/2009)
I think that if you don't want a police state, then you inevitably get a system where people tend to get away with things occasionally (and it is occasional).
I think it's a mistake to assume without evidence that police states actually correlate with *low* rates of crime. Which police state are you thinking of? North Korea looks pretty horrible (http://www.nationmaster.com/country/kn-korea-north/cri-crime). If anything, there seems to be a correlation between high murder rate and low civil liberties.
Marios
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Wag
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Marios (9/28/2009)
Andy Rimmer (9/24/2009)
I think that if you don't want a police state, then you inevitably get a system where people tend to get away with things occasionally (and it is occasional).I think it's a mistake to assume without evidence that police states actually correlate with *low* rates of crime. Which police state are you thinking of? North Korea looks pretty horrible ( http://www.nationmaster.com/country/kn-korea-north/cri-crime). If anything, there seems to be a correlation between high murder rate and low civil liberties. Marios Either we're having two different debates or you've misunderstood what I said- my comment relates to the suggestion by previous posters that criminals tend to get away with things because of our "liberal" legal system, when in fact very few actually "get away with it", I am in fact suggesting that removing the rights which allow this to happen can lead to an overly oppressive state adn at no point did I suggest that Police State= Low crime. So in fact I'm not making any mistake at all- I'm fully aware that extreme Police states have very high serious crime figures. I'd go so far is to say that it's inevitable, as in a Police State the police are engaged in propping up those in power and oppressing anyone who opposes the status quo, instead of fighting crime and protecting the populace.
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Wag
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There's a new BBC series 'based on' the efforts of this man to bring the adversarial system back to life in English courtrooms:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Garrow
Sadly, it's going to be horribly earnest and I fear that in every case he'll 'just know' that his guy is innocent - but it doesn't look entirely ahistorical. It's a bit of a shame it isn't set during the Bloody Assizes - that would make the same point in a more goretastic fashion.
Marios
P.S. 40 minutes in and the screenwriters still don't seem to grasp the point of adversarial system - that it's not the job of counsel to decide what the truth is, it's their job to present the best case they can. I guess it's a bit like trying to make democracy look sexy by presenting a politician who 'just knows' which party ought to be elected so he heroically persuades people to vote the right way.
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Wag
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| That looks really interesting, when's it on? I'm not sure that the court system is the issue really- it's more about what happens after a conviction. I think one of our big problems is that, as a society we aren't sure which way we should go with our criminal justice system- our hearts say hang 'em while our minds say rehabilitate- until we reconcile this conflict we're always going to have a bodge of a system. When a crime is committed we quite naturally judge it based on it's impact on us, so if it's particularly shocking or we (or ours) are the victim then we want revenge. However as a society we're able to think more objectively so we take into account factors like prison costs and overcrowding, poor rehabilitation results from punitive sentencing etc. Maybe we need a system that combines the two. Restorative justice programmes have proven very successful when used properly, though often they turn into pointless (from the criminals point of view) community projects. Pulling weeds or removing Graffiti may tidy up communities and save local authorities money, but they make little sense to someone who's been convicted of burglary or assault. There's an old saying that "the punishment should fit the crime" maybe if we replaced the word "punishment" with "programme" or "restitution" we'd get somewhere.
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Wag
Group: System Moderators
Last Login: 2 days ago @ 12:10 PM
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Wag
Group: System Moderators
Last Login: Tuesday, August 17, 2010 9:33 AM
Posts: 1,707,
Visits: 3,340
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