If this is your first visit, be sure to check out the FAQ by clicking the link above.
You may have to register before you can post: click the register link above to proceed.
To start viewing messages, select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.
Let's concede the fact that a transcript only includes part of the information transmitted, and compare the juror's notes to the official transcript: it's clear which contains more information and which is the “official” record. Imagine, for instance, where jurors disagree on what was said and they want to settle the dispute by looking it up.
The standard advice is that you need to insert pauses where the lecturer/speaker shuts up to let people take notes and think about what you have said a little. Initially, this is quite uncomfortable for the speaker. As far as I can tell, a trial doesn't work this way where jurors can pause the events to finish taking notes. Just imagine if you held lawyers, judges and prosecutors to the same standard as jurors …
And don't forget that what's going on here is much more serious than school: jurors are deciding whether or not to convict someone, and if they get it wrong, this can have disastrous consequences (either way).
What is more important here is that all of the other people in the trial prepare with the various documents (my dad is a lawyer, and I have a good idea how much effort goes into the preparation of the various filings.
It's not just rusted parts: systems that rely on jurors deliberately want (legal) amateurs, people who don't know the details of legal procedure, law and what is and isn't important. To have a well-oiled machine you need to have experience in how to build a machine in the first place. Imagine you place this stress on top of everything else.
Sorry I let this drop!
There are certainly cases where the decision rests almost wholly on precise interpretation of testimony. The Mike Brown case was like this. Whether Wilson was going to go up on charges depended on Dorian Johnson's testimony. I would have asked for (nay, demanded) a copy of a transcript at the outset, and refused to provide a decision otherwise. It's a textbook example of what you're talking about. My interpretation is going to rely on small details there's no way I can collect by listening to live testimony and taking notes at the same time.
What I'm questioning is whether that's the default situation. I'm not convinced of it. Does not a situation where the jury deliberates for two days, comes back deadlocked, and only then asks for a transcript, indicate a different type of scenario? If the jury can't figure out they need a transcript until after they threaten a mistrial, my attitude as a judge may lean towards telling the jury to go **** themselves.
Also, while there's validity to your claim a lecturer is supposed to pause for you to take notes, why can't attorneys be held to this standard? Attorneys present a case. If they are unable to make a presentation wherein important details are understood and recalled by the jury, that's not the system's fault. If an important detail is buried in meandering testimony, it's the attorney's job to tease it out and make sure it sticks with the jury by means of further questioning the witness.
I posit the situation where this can't be done is the exception, not the rule. Even in the Michael Brown case, the reason I need the transcript is because it's a Grand Jury. An argument isn't being presented and cross examined the way it would be in a normal trial.
I agree a written transcript doesn't capture all the nuances of the testimony. Tone. Body language. Etc. So video all the proceedings and make all of it available to jurors. Problem solved.
OAW
This would be a vast improvement.
I think some day, that will be the standard, but there are technological hurdles to jump. That's a lot of unsorted data to deal with, and the system needs to be bulletproof. If the standard is jurors expect to be able to review video, a trial where the equipment breaks down is under threat of being turned over on appeal.
What I'm questioning is whether that's the default situation. I'm not convinced of it. Does not a situation where the jury deliberates for two days, comes back deadlocked, and only then asks for a transcript, indicate a different type of scenario? If the jury can't figure out they need a transcript until after they threaten a mistrial, my attitude as a judge may lean towards telling the jury to go **** themselves.
Why not give the jury access to all pieces of evidence, including testimony instead? I think it's prudent to let jurors have access to all of the evidence that has been submitted to court so that they don't have to reconstruct everything from memory (or bad notes). Moreover, I think it's quite plausible that it takes a while until it boils down to a few issues that rest on certain details, and I think there is nothing wrong with asking. I'm not sure why you, if you were the judge, would blow them off. I don't get that reasoning at all.
Originally Posted by subego
Also, while there's validity to your claim a lecturer is supposed to pause for you to take notes, why can't attorneys be held to this standard? Attorneys present a case. If they are unable to make a presentation wherein important details are understood and recalled by the jury, that's not the system's fault.
I think you underestimate how long trials can take and how much procedure and boilerplate lawyers (of both sides) have to go through. There is a reason why lectures usually last no more than 2 hours (usually 1.5 hours): that's the limit of the attention span of most humans. Secondly, one of the first things that lawyers learn is how inaccurate people's memory can be: I'm not speaking of any willful manipulation, it's how the brain works. So yes, I think it is the system's fault if they design their procedures to be more prone to error.
Originally Posted by subego
If an important detail is buried in meandering testimony, it's the attorney's job to tease it out and make sure it sticks with the jury by means of further questioning the witness.
I feel that this is an impossible standard unless you have an exceedingly simple case. Even with judges it's a crapshoot whether they are actually knowledgable in the particular area of law and fully understand the circumstances which are important when applying the laws correctly. You are rewarding people for their showmanship (which is certainly an asset if you are a lawyer) rather than the substance of their arguments.
Originally Posted by subego
I posit the situation where this can't be done is the exception, not the rule. Even in the Michael Brown case, the reason I need the transcript is because it's a Grand Jury. An argument isn't being presented and cross examined the way it would be in a normal trial.
I don't understand why in your frame of mind you differentiate between an ordinary and a grand jury. Can you elaborate?
Originally Posted by subego
I think some day, that will be the standard, but there are technological hurdles to jump. That's a lot of unsorted data to deal with, and the system needs to be bulletproof. If the standard is jurors expect to be able to review video, a trial where the equipment breaks down is under threat of being turned over on appeal.
That sounds like a completely solved problem, and in fact there are plenty of court recordings already (I'm listening to the first season of Serial, and they have at least the audio recordings from a trial in 2000/2001). You can get lots of off-the-shelf solutions nowadays (e. g. you can use special Synology NAS in conjunction with cameras from many companies to automatically record things like security cam feeds).
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
The "Stop & Frisk" policies of the NYPD were banned and overall crime continued to drop. You mean blatant racial profiling actually isn't necessary to keep the residents of NYC safe? Imagine that.
The warnings began even before Bill de Blasio was sworn in as New York City’s mayor in January 2014. A safe New York depended on the aggressive policing tactics that began in the 1990s and flourished under Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his police commissioner, Ray Kelly. Without those tactics, the doomsayers said, the city would be swamped by a 1970s-style crime wave.
After a federal judge ruled in 2013 that the Police Department’s “stop and frisk” policy was so sweeping that it violated the Constitution, Mr. Kelly was furious. “Violent crime will go up,” he said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “No question about it.”
That prediction has, of course, been proved wrong, as crime in the city remains at historic lows under Mayor de Blasio and his police commissioner, William Bratton, even as arrests, stops and summonses continue to plummet after a peak in 2011.
An illuminating new report released by the John Jay College of Criminal Justice provides the most comprehensive analysis yet of the numbers behind the rise and fall of police “enforcement actions” over the past decade. Between 2011 and 2014, the report found, the total number of these actions — defined as arrests for felonies and misdemeanors, criminal summonses, and stop-and-frisks — fell by more than 800,000, or 31 percent.
The biggest drop was in street stops, which had skyrocketed to more than 685,000 in 2011 from 160,000 in 2003. Some officers admitted they felt constant pressure to meet arbitrary productivity quotas, but the effect was to disproportionately target young African-American men, most of whom were doing nothing wrong. By 2014, the number of stops was under 46,000 — a 93 percent decline in only three years, with stops going down most sharply in those poorer and minority neighborhoods where they grew the fastest over the previous decade.
Why did the Police Department pull back on this behavior while Mr. Bloomberg, Mr. Kelly and their defenders were proclaiming the need for continued aggressive policing?
One factor was the growing public outcry against these tactics as they became more widely known. Another was the series of lawsuits filed by individuals against the city, which culminated in the 2013 ruling that found the department’s stop-and-frisk practices unconstitutional.
The report’s data firmly contradicts the view that crime would inevitably go up as stop-and-frisk and other enforcement actions went down. In 2014, rates of both violent and nonviolent crime in New York City continued to fall, and were almost 90 percent lower than they were in 1980.
A recent uptick in murders in New York and other big cities has received a lot of news media attention, but that small increase masks the broader drop in overall crime.
In March, Mr. Bratton predicted that police encounters with civilians would go down again this year, for a total of one million fewer encounters than at their peak just a few years ago. This is a positive and important change. But to keep crime down while also ensuring that all citizens are treated with respect, police officers must do more than end abusive practices. They need to focus on improving relations with those communities that often need the police most urgently, but whose trust has been damaged by those who failed to protect and serve them.
Why not give the jury access to all pieces of evidence, including testimony instead? I think it's prudent to let jurors have access to all of the evidence that has been submitted to court so that they don't have to reconstruct everything from memory (or bad notes). Moreover, I think it's quite plausible that it takes a while until it boils down to a few issues that rest on certain details, and I think there is nothing wrong with asking. I'm not sure why you, if you were the judge, would blow them off. I don't get that reasoning at all.
I think you underestimate how long trials can take and how much procedure and boilerplate lawyers (of both sides) have to go through. There is a reason why lectures usually last no more than 2 hours (usually 1.5 hours): that's the limit of the attention span of most humans. Secondly, one of the first things that lawyers learn is how inaccurate people's memory can be: I'm not speaking of any willful manipulation, it's how the brain works. So yes, I think it is the system's fault if they design their procedures to be more prone to error.
I feel that this is an impossible standard unless you have an exceedingly simple case. Even with judges it's a crapshoot whether they are actually knowledgable in the particular area of law and fully understand the circumstances which are important when applying the laws correctly. You are rewarding people for their showmanship (which is certainly an asset if you are a lawyer) rather than the substance of their arguments.
I don't understand why in your frame of mind you differentiate between an ordinary and a grand jury. Can you elaborate?
That sounds like a completely solved problem, and in fact there are plenty of court recordings already (I'm listening to the first season of Serial, and they have at least the audio recordings from a trial in 2000/2001). You can get lots of off-the-shelf solutions nowadays (e. g. you can use special Synology NAS in conjunction with cameras from many companies to automatically record things like security cam feeds).
I said unsorted data. The problem isn't storing hours of video, it's accessing the correct 30 seconds from 8 hours of testimony.
With a Grand Jury, at least with the testimony of Dorian Johnson, the questioning wasn't led by a defense attorney, nor was there a redirect. That's only half a case being presented.
I'll get to the other points, but I wanted to get these two out because the answers were simple.
The "Stop & Frisk" policies of the NYPD were banned and overall crime continued to drop. You mean blatant racial profiling actually isn't necessary to keep the residents of NYC safe? Imagine that.
S&F is stupid, but so is misrepresenting the facts. "Crime" didn't drop, arrests dropped, and if people don't understand the difference between the 2...
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
S&F is stupid, but so is misrepresenting the facts. "Crime" didn't drop, arrests dropped, and if people don't understand the difference between the 2...
:::::: sigh :::::::
What part of this ...
That prediction has, of course, been proved wrong, as crime in the city remains at historic lows under Mayor de Blasio and his police commissioner, William Bratton, even as arrests, stops and summonses continue to plummet after a peak in 2011.
.... do you not understand?
Here I'll help you out ...
1. Click the link of the NY Times article I cited.
2. Search for the phrase "historic lows".
3. Click that link.
Homeless encampments proliferated. Two officers, confronting armed men, were shot and killed. And many New Yorkers said they felt less safe.
But fears that New York City was slipping back to a more dangerous time contrasted with reality. As reflected in the reported levels of the most serious types of crime, the city in 2015 was as safe as it had been in its modern history. A modest decrease in reported crime is expected by year’s end.
The Police Department is reporting a 2 percent decline, as measured by seven major felonies that are tracked by the Federal Bureau of Investigation: murder, rape, robbery, serious assault, burglary, grand larceny and car theft. At the same time, arrests recorded by officers fell steeply, to 333,115 through Dec. 20, down 13 percent from 384,770 over the same period the year before. The number of criminal summonses dropped to 292,372 from 358,948.
There was a small rise in murders, to 339 as of Dec. 25, already more than last year’s historic low of 333. Still, the number is well below the 536 murders recorded five years ago.
So "crime" did drop. Even while "arrests" dropped dramatically. And if people can't be bothered to actually read the article including the supporting articles it referenced before making easily debunked statements ....
So "crime" did drop. Even while "arrests" dropped dramatically. And if people can't be bothered to actually read the article including the supporting articles it referenced before making easily debunked statements ....
It's clear, your sources don't understand the difference either (crime != reported crime != arrests). It's sad, but I don't blame you, you're just a product of the problem.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
And after dragging his feet for over a year Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty has just announced the grand jury decision he was clearly angling for ....
The fatal shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice by two Cleveland cops was a "perfect storm of human error" but not a crime, the Cuyahoga County prosecutor declared Monday.
"The death of Tamir Rice was an absolute tragedy," the prosecutor, Timothy McGinty, said after a grand jury decided not to indict the officers. "But it was not, by the law that binds us, a crime."
It was "reasonable" for the officers responding to reports of gunman in front of a recreation center to believe that they were in danger when Tamir reached for what turned out to be a pellet gun, McGinty said.
"He had reason to fear for his life," McGinty said of rookie cop Timothy Loehmann, who fired the fatal shots. It would be "unreasonable to expect an officer to wait and see if the gun was real."
Newly enhanced video shows it is "indisputable" that Tamir was removing the pellet gun from his waistband when he was shot, McGinty said.
"It is likely that Tamir ... either intended to hand it over to the officers or show them that it was not a real gun," he said. "But there was no way for the officers to know that."
While the 911 caller had told a police dispatcher that Tamir was probably a juvenile and that his weapon was likely a "fake," that information was not passed on to Loehmann or his partner, Frank Garmback, McGinty added.
Also, the airsoft-type gun Tamir was holding lacked the orange safety tip that would have indicated to Loehmann that it wasn't a real firearm, McGinty said.
"Simply put, given this perfect storm of human error, mistakes and miscommunications by all involved that day, the evidence did not indicate criminal conduct by police."
Assistant prosecutor Matt Meyer added: "To any observer, it's extremely difficult to distinguish between the real and fake gun unless you pick it up."
In addition, Tamir appeared "to be much older that he really was," Meyer said. Tamir was 5-foot-7 and 175 pounds.
But the grand jury's decision not to indict the officers was a huge disappointment to Tamir's family, and it immediately drew ire from outraged African-Americans who had been demanding justice for the boy.
"Tamir's family is saddened and disappointed by this outcome but not surprised," said one of the family's lawyers, Sasha Ginzberg.
"It has been clear for months now that Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty was abusing and manipulating the grand jury process to orchestrate a vote against indictment," Ginzberg said. "Even though video shows the police shooting Tamir in less than one second, Prosecutor McGinty hired so-called expert witnesses to try and exonerate the officers."
The Rice family is renewing its request for the Justice Department to investigate the killing and urging anyone who wants to "express their disappointment" to do so peacefully, Ginzberg added.
The Justice Department is already looking into whether there were any civil rights violations
Echoing McGinty, Ohio Gov. John Kasich called Rice's death "a heartbreaking tragedy." Kasich, a Republican presidential candidate, said he understood that many would wonder whether justice was served, but he called for unity and peace on the streets.
Meanwhile, police set up barricades outside the Cleveland courthouse as a few demonstrators holding up pictures of Tamir and other blacks killed by while police officers around the country gathered nearby.
Tamir's death on Nov. 22, 2014, was caught on choppy surveillance video that stoked public outrage and prompted fresh calls for police reform.
But while his death did not lead to violent street battles in Cleveland, like the death of Michael Brown did in Ferguson, Missouri, it further fueled the debate over policing in minority communities and what would constitute a justifiable use of force. And it became a rallying point for the "Black Lives Matter" movement.
Tamir's family demanded that both officers be charged with murder and accused McGinty of dragging his feet and siding with police.
Later, it was revealed that before joining the Cleveland Police Department, Loehmann had quit the police force in the suburb of Independence after an "emotional meltdown" at the gun range.
In a November 2012 memo, Deputy Chief Jim Polak recommended that Loehmann be dismissed and questioned his ability to follow instructions and make good decisions in stressful situations.
I've yet to find this "indisputable" enhanced video. What's aplenty are articles reporting Mr. McGinty's assertions and images of still frames from it. Regardless, what we know is that Tamir Rice was basically shot on sight. Just like John Crawford in that Walmart. The guy was so trigger happy the car hadn't even stopped moving before he jumped out and killed a 12 year old. And once again I must point out that Ohio is an open-cary state!
As for whether or not the video was "indisputable" that's clearly NOT the case as this article demonstrate ....
A 12-year-old boy shot to death by Cleveland police last year had his hands in his pockets when he was shot and wasn't reaching for the pellet gun he'd been carrying, according to an expert's review of a new video analysis of the shooting.
Tamir Rice did not have enough time to remove his hands from his pockets before being shot, and his hands weren't visible to the officer, according to the analysis released late Friday night by attorneys for Tamir's family.
The new report and two others from experts already used by the family are the latest analysis of evidence to be released as a grand jury considers whether to bring charges against the officers in Tamir's death. The boy was shot after authorities received a report of a man pointing and waving a gun outside a recreation center in November 2014.
Previous reports concluded that officer Timothy Loehmann shot Tamir within 2 seconds of opening his car door. The new analysis determined it happened even faster, within less than a second, according to the review by California-based shooting reconstruction expert Jesse Wobrock.
With the patrol car windows rolled up, Tamir could not have heard commands to show his hands, Wobrock added.
"The scientific analysis and timing involved do not support any claim that there was a meaningful exchange between Officer Loehmann and Tamir Rice, before he was shot," Wobrock said.
Two other experts who previously reviewed the shooting for Tamir's family looked at the new frame-by-frame and also concluded Tamir wasn't reaching into his waistband when he was shot, according to the reports released Friday.
The attorneys for Tamir's family said Wobrock is available to testify before the grand jury. In response, Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Tim McGinty said an investigation is the search for the truth.
"We welcome and will review all credible relevant evidence from any source," McGinty said in a statement Saturday morning.
Tamir's family has criticized McGinty for months over the length of the investigation and has demanded charges against the officers.
McGinty has previously made public reports by three experts saying Loehmann was justified in shooting Tamir outside a Cleveland recreation center on Nov. 22, 2014.
I can't speak to whether or not Mr. McGinty presented the findings of these experts to the grand jury since it's a secret process. A grand jury is a complete one-sided process that the prosecutor controls. Regardless, this is the type of thing that a trial jury should sort out.
It's clear, your sources don't understand the difference either (crime != reported crime != arrests). It's sad, but I don't blame you, you're just a product of the problem.
True to form you persist in your semantic foolishness. So what exactly is your evidence that "crime" didn't actually drop even though "reported crime" did? Oh wait ... if it wasn't reported then it's not included in any public available crime statistics so all we have to go on is yet another outlandish CTP anecdotal opinion that he couldn't prove if his life depended upon it. Yeah. We get it.
True to form you persist in your semantic foolishness. So what exactly is your evidence that "crime" didn't actually drop even though "reported crime" did? Oh wait ... if it wasn't reported then it's not included in any public available crime statistics so all we have to go on is yet another outlandish CTP anecdotal opinion that he couldn't prove if his life depended upon it. Yeah. We get it.
No, I'm pretty certain you don't get very much of anything, but like I said before, that's not your fault (at least not entirely). You were never taught to think analytically, as an individual. S&F led to more arrests, making more people out to be criminals, even though the "crimes" they committed were largely victimless. Also, the officers of the NYPD (what a shithole) are some of the least respected, most feared in the country (next to Detroit and DC), and that's bad if you want to actually have people report crimes being committed.
But yeah, go on and believe what makes you feel better, not that rational thinking would ever change your mind, anyway.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
No, I'm pretty certain you don't get very much of anything, but like I said before, that's not your fault (at least not entirely). You were never taught to think analytically, as an individual. S&F led to more arrests, making more people out to be criminals, even though the "crimes" they committed were largely victimless. Also, the officers of the NYPD (what a shithole) are some of the least respected, most feared in the country (next to Detroit and DC), and that's bad if you want to actually have people report crimes being committed.
But yeah, go on and believe what makes you feel better, not that rational thinking would ever change your mind, anyway.
Well that went precisely as I predicted. Not a single reference anywhere just CTP asserting his opinion as fact. I've outlined detailed statistics in this very thread about the impact of S&F from actual reputable sources. I have neither the time nor the inclination to repeat myself to you. But they do outline how the overwhelming majority of those stopped and frisked on the streets of NYC were never even arrested. Just harassed on the streets. So there goes your theory huh?
So the refrain I'm hearing from those outraged about the Tamir rice non-indictment is that Ohio is an open carry state. This strikes me as a red-herring but I think is being used to illustrate hypocrisy in the system.
That said, the lawyer victim-blaming rice for looking older than 12 really needs to be mocked 24/7. Outrageous.
So the refrain I'm hearing from those outraged about the Tamir rice non-indictment is that Ohio is an open carry state. This strikes me as a red-herring but I think is being used to illustrate hypocrisy in the system.
That said, the lawyer victim-blaming rice for looking older than 12 really needs to be mocked 24/7. Outrageous.
I certainly wouldn't characterize it as a red-herring when the kid was shot on sight. As was John Crawford. Given Ohio is an "open carry" state you would think that would give reason for pause. But I definitely agree with you that the "looked older than 12" argument is complete BS. He was 12, he looked 12, and he was 5' 7". Which is pretty typical of a kid his age. It's the same BS that was done to Trayvon Martin.
So, I skimmed an article which posed the question "what do we do to make cops want to take risks?"
An example of a risk would be for the cops in Cleveland to allow the chance Rice could have shot at them.
How do we make someone willing to take this risk? What does society have to offer in return?
Ostensibly, we can make someone more willing to take the risk by heavily penalizing them for not doing so. That's a hard line to walk without making the job less desirable, and hence getting even worse foxes running the hen house.
There wasn't a better way to approach the situation than driving right up to Tamir?
I.e. Policing is risky because any mother ****er can have a gun.
But you can also go another way: policing is risky because certain people have nothing to lose. Which I make as a poverty argument. I suspect people will be no more receptive to the short term solutions available there.
There wasn't a better way to approach the situation than driving right up to Tamir?
Exactly. Because responding to the 911 call, parking at a distance, getting out of the opposite side of the car from where the kid was standing, and instructing him to put the gun down on the ground wasn't an option? In all these instances when cops shot someone holding a knife ... is taking a step back to increase the distance between the officer and the suspect instead of approaching them not an option? Is not jumping onto the hood of a moving vehicle trying to flee or stepping into its path not an option?
All too often police officers unnecessarily put themselves at risk and then use that as an excuse for their trigger-happy behavior that results in the unnecessary deaths of citizens.
In terms of risk management, there wasn't a better approach
Perhaps I'm being naive, but if there wasn't a better approach, either this situation never occurs or is never reported because I feel like we'd be hearing about a lot more teen deaths.
And in other news, this is how it's supposed to work ....
A Connecticut woman was arrested after circling a police department with a fake gun and pointing it at officers on Christmas Eve.
According to police, the woman, 66-year-old Elaine Rothenberg, pointed the fake gun at civilians and asked them if they were police officers as she was circling the Torrington police station. The civilians were unharmed and were able to get away.
Rothenberg then allegedly approached the employees-only entrance and raised the fake gun into a shooting stance to point it at officers.
“What are you doing? Shoot me!” she shouted at police. “Boom, boom, boom.”
She then threw the fake gun at the officers and was afterward taken into custody.
She has since been charged with first-degree threatening, reckless endangerment and interfering with police.
Admittedly it's anecdotal. But given the historical record it's extremely difficult not to conclude that if this woman was black there's a significantly greater chance that she'd be pushing up daisies right now. And if you bet your next three paychecks that a black male would have definitely been gunned down you are damned near guaranteed not to lose your money.
Perhaps I'm being naive, but if there wasn't a better approach, either this situation never occurs or is never reported because I feel like we'd be hearing about a lot more teen deaths.
Thankfully, not every cop is going to make risk management their first priority, otherwise things would be a whole lot worse, but I'd argue those cops are doing so despite the system, which allows them to manage risk by using lethal force in response to (very) arguably lethal threat.
To put it another way, those cops who don't put risk management as their first priority do so because they want to. Unless we can bottle that up and give it to the rest of the cops, we're going to need to change the external pressures.
I have neither the time nor the inclination to repeat myself to you
Good, because you didn't make any sense the first time.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
given the historical record it's extremely difficult not to conclude that if this woman was black there's a significantly greater chance that she'd be pushing up daisies right now. And if you bet your next three paychecks that a black male would have definitely been gunned down you are damned near guaranteed not to lose your money
given the racial demographics of the areas of most random shootings in urban areas there is also a significantly greater chance that a black person brandishing a gun would pose an immediate threat to the well being and safety of the public.
More factual than anecdotal. Since we all know Its not klan members or the Michigan militia going into englewood alleyways and shooting people or taking potshots and cop cars and running away.
Barack Obama: Four more years of the Carter Presidency
Typical deflection which has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the point that I made. But thanks for that.
OAW
PS: It never ceases to amaze me how denial can run so deep that some people refuse to see that street violence committed by criminals and excessive state violence committed against citizens are two separate issues. The presence of the former in no way excuses the other.
Subego, I finally realized why the risk management argument rings hollow to me: because the background on the guy who pulled the trigger indicates he never should have been a cop. This doesn't prove:disprove your argument; I just think it doesn't apply here.
Subego, I finally realized why the risk management argument rings hollow to me: because the background on the guy who pulled the trigger indicates he never should have been a cop. This doesn't prove:disprove your argument; I just think it doesn't apply here.
If my argument applies to a good cop, I'd say it applies more to a shitty one.
Why not give the jury access to all pieces of evidence, including testimony instead? I think it's prudent to let jurors have access to all of the evidence that has been submitted to court so that they don't have to reconstruct everything from memory (or bad notes). Moreover, I think it's quite plausible that it takes a while until it boils down to a few issues that rest on certain details, and I think there is nothing wrong with asking. I'm not sure why you, if you were the judge, would blow them off. I don't get that reasoning at all.
I think you underestimate how long trials can take and how much procedure and boilerplate lawyers (of both sides) have to go through. There is a reason why lectures usually last no more than 2 hours (usually 1.5 hours): that's the limit of the attention span of most humans. Secondly, one of the first things that lawyers learn is how inaccurate people's memory can be: I'm not speaking of any willful manipulation, it's how the brain works. So yes, I think it is the system's fault if they design their procedures to be more prone to error.
I feel that this is an impossible standard unless you have an exceedingly simple case. Even with judges it's a crapshoot whether they are actually knowledgable in the particular area of law and fully understand the circumstances which are important when applying the laws correctly. You are rewarding people for their showmanship (which is certainly an asset if you are a lawyer) rather than the substance of their arguments.
I don't understand why in your frame of mind you differentiate between an ordinary and a grand jury. Can you elaborate?
That sounds like a completely solved problem, and in fact there are plenty of court recordings already (I'm listening to the first season of Serial, and they have at least the audio recordings from a trial in 2000/2001). You can get lots of off-the-shelf solutions nowadays (e. g. you can use special Synology NAS in conjunction with cameras from many companies to automatically record things like security cam feeds).
The basic question in play is "will giving transcripts to the jury lead to better decisions?"
If it does, then the jury should get transcripts. I've given you an example (the Dorian Johnson testimony) where it would, so I'm claiming these situations exist. Likewise, I would say on the surface, said policy appears like it would help in general.
If you sort through the potential unintended consequences however, what seems clear on the surface starts to get murky.
For example, you (accurately) state how poor people's memory is, pointing out its one of the first things a lawyer learns. Presumably they learn this first in regard to eyewitness testimony.
Would not providing a transcript of said testimony (which has a high potential for unreliability) give it more weight with the jury? When deliberating, how often is a juror going to use a transcript to argue a witness is unreliable versus treating what's in the transcript as gospel?
As an academic, you are going to have certain skills when it comes to using a transcript. You'll run circles around most of the other jurors when it comes to reading speed, comprehension, and the ability to form an argument based on textual analysis. Is giving you this advantage over the other jurors going to lead to better decisions?
It will if your analysis is right, it won't if it's wrong.
For example, you (accurately) state how poor people's memory is, pointing out its one of the first things a lawyer learns. Presumably they learn this first in regard to eyewitness testimony.
Would not providing a transcript of said testimony (which has a high potential for unreliability) give it more weight with the jury? When deliberating, how often is a juror going to use a transcript to argue a witness is unreliable versus treating what's in the transcript as gospel?
I think you are making two major mistakes here: First of all, you are saying that because witness testimony is unreliable, the jury should stick to the testimony they have “witnessed” rather than look at transcripts which accurately reflects the testimony of the witness (as opposed to what has “really” happened). In other words, you ask the jury to play a game of telephone and hope that the right thing comes out at the other end. Not giving access to transcripts or videos of the testimony (which I agree could be very helpful) makes things less accurate, not more accurate. Secondly, not all witnesses are witnesses of the crime. You could have expert testimony who shares his or her interpretation of physical evidence. If there is anything that allows jurors to make a more informed decision, then I would argue for it.
Originally Posted by subego
As an academic, you are going to have certain skills when it comes to using a transcript. You'll run circles around most of the other jurors when it comes to reading speed, comprehension, and the ability to form an argument based on textual analysis. Is giving you this advantage over the other jurors going to lead to better decisions?
Yes, I think you are right, but (unfortunately) this is exactly what the “jury of peers” idea is meant to be (there are so many things wrong with this idea IMHO). And it is the reason why I think it is flawed. Humans respond much more readily to emotions rather than facts, and if you look at trial testimony, a lot of it is a show for the jury that amplifies certain aspects and de-emphasizes others. Not allowing jurors to be able to look facts up (by default rather than exception) puts further emphasis on the emotional part of the argument.
I don't suffer from insanity, I enjoy every minute of it.
Typical deflection which has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the point that I made. But thanks for that.
Only in your small myopic mind.
The relevance relates as to why police are more likely to percieve armed black people as a threat: because statistically and in the areas those officers patrol the reality is that the black person is more likely to be armed with the intent to harm others.
Why don't police draw their weapon for drunk white frat guys fighting or asian immigrant selling fake handbags.... because the real world probability of those people turning around and pulling out a handgun to shoot them is dramatically lower.
That old woman wasn't shot because they saw she clearly had ample opportunity to use the fake gun and did not all the while actually asking to be shot. The behavior was more inline with an insane person than someone trying to harm others. Furthermore this was in the middle of nowhere CT full of Mayberry type crime not East St Louis.
Barack Obama: Four more years of the Carter Presidency
The relevance relates as to why police are more likely to percieve armed black people as a threat: because statistically and in the areas those officers patrol the reality is that the black person is more likely to be armed with the intent to harm others.
Why don't police draw their weapon for drunk white frat guys fighting or asian immigrant selling fake handbags.... because the real world probability of those people turning around and pulling out a handgun to shoot them is dramatically lower.
Again. You are arguing scenarios that have nothing whatsoever to do with the point that I made. We weren't discussing a situation where someone might pull out a gun. The scenario at hand was the situation where someone already has a gun pointed at police officers and made a shooting motion VS someone who didn't have a weapon in their hand and just moved his arm. Furthermore ... as the Stop & Frisk stats in NYC prove black people were less likely to be found with illegal contraband ... drugs or weapons ... than their white counterparts.
But hey ... if you truly think that a 12 year old kid that is reported to have a weapon that isn't even visible is more of a threat to police officers than a grown ass white woman who is actually pointing a weapon at them then with your own words you are epitomizing my point.
That old woman wasn't shot because they saw she clearly had ample opportunity to use the fake gun and did not all the while actually asking to be shot. The behavior was more inline with an insane person than someone trying to harm others. Furthermore this was in the middle of nowhere CT full of Mayberry type crime not East St Louis.
Ok. And when that guy I posted about in STL earlier in this thread who was known to have mental issues (like this woman likely does) and had a KNIFE ... not a gun ... in his hand and was also asking to be shot how did that work out? He was obliged by the "officers" whereas she who potentially had a deadlier weapon pointed at them was not. Real talk ... the double standard is obvious. I really shouldn't have to explain it to you.
Yeah, let's look at a "scenario" without even giving it location or context. You do that, sport.
"I have a dream, that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin,
but by the content of their character." - M.L.King Jr
And the worst part is that the discrepancy between the dash cam footage and his police report about how/why he pulled Ms. Bland out of her car wouldn't have even been questioned had she not come up dead and generated all the scrutiny ...
A Waller County grand jury has indicted Texas Department of Public Safety Trooper Brian Encinia - the trooper who arrested Sandra Bland - on perjury charges.
Darrell Jordan, a special prosecutor, said the charge is a Class A misdemeanor, which is punishable by up to a year in jail and a $4,000 fine.
The charge stemmed from a statement Encinia made in his report of the incident, which said he pulled Bland out of her car to continue the investigation.
"They just didn't believe it ... a warrant will be issued and we'll go from there," he said.
A lawyer for Encinia was not yet listed online.
In December, special prosecutors announced that a grand jury convened to review the circumstances surrounding Bland's detention and death had declined to issue any indictments to jail staff or any members of the Waller County Sheriff's Office.
The 28-year-old African-American woman was arrested during a traffic stop in July. Three days later, jail staff found her hanging from a noose in her Waller County jail cell. Her death, ruled a suicide by medical examiners, sparked disbelief from her family and outraged civil rights activists across the country, who called for greater accountability on the part of law enforcement.
The subsequent outcry led state lawmakers to call for hearings on jail procedures and safety and for state regulators to change how inmates are evaluated for mental health issues after they are arrested.
Encinia stopped Bland for an improper lane change near Prairie View A&M University on July 10. Dashcam video showed an increasingly confrontational encounter between the two, with Encinia at one point brandishing a stun gun and yelling at Bland, "I will light you up!"
After the video surfaced, DPS Director Steve McCraw said Encinia violated department standards and placed him on administrative duty.
Separately, Bland's relatives have filed a wrongful death lawsuit in federal court against Trooper Encinia, DPS, Waller County and county jailers Elsa Magnus and Oscar Prudente. A trial date is set for January 2017.
Ok. And when that guy I posted about in STL earlier in this thread who was known to have mental issues (like this woman likely does) and had a KNIFE ... not a gun ... in his hand and was also asking to be shot how did that work out? He was obliged by the "officers" whereas she who potentially had a deadlier weapon pointed at them was not. Real talk ... the double standard is obvious. I really shouldn't have to explain it to you.
Real talk?
I don't believe I said that in the situation in CT the police would not have been justified in shooting the woman. I said they wouldn't perceive her as the same type of threat as police in East St Louis would an armed black person because the experience and history each department encounters on a daily basis is different and some threats are more realistic than others in those areas.
And in real world America black people shoot strangers randomly by a much larger margin than any other ethnic or racial demographic. So yes, its an understandable position for police in urban areas with high rates of violent crimes perpetrated by african americans to perceive any visibly armed black person as an immediate danger.
If it makes you feel better while people have the patterened serial killer profile cornered.
Barack Obama: Four more years of the Carter Presidency
FACT: The vast majority of white people that are murdered are killed by white people. About 85% IIRC. So if you want to play that game and "racialize" the threat level then do try to realize that DESPITE the disproportionate homicide rate in the black community ... the people that ANYONE really needs to worry about look just like them. Including white people.
That being said ... despite the cop's clear justification to shoot her ... they didn't. Which is my point. And if you had substituted a black person in that exact same scenario they most likely would have. Which is also my point. And if you think those cops were comparing the "relative threat" to their lives while she had a gun pointed at them to what some cop in East Boogie faces then you are kidding yourself.
And FTR .... black people don't "shoot strangers randomly by a much larger margin than any other ethnic or racial demographic". White dudes have the "mass shooter" profile cornered as well.
The "officer" shot and killed a naked, unarmed man. WTF do you need a grand jury for? Just charge him already ...
A prosecutor here said Thursday that he would seek a felony murder indictment against a white police officer who last year shot and killed Anthony Hill, a black man who was naked and unarmed at the time of the fatal encounter.
“Our position is that the facts and the circumstances surrounding the shooting death of Anthony Hill warrant a charge for felony murder,” District Attorney Robert D. James Jr. of DeKalb County said at a news conference.
Mr. James’s decision to pursue a criminal case against Officer Robert Olsen does not guarantee an indictment, in part because Georgia offers law enforcement officers special protections when their on-duty behavior is being reviewed by a grand jury.
Mr. James said that prosecutors would ask grand jurors, when they meet on Jan. 21, to charge Officer Olsen with felony murder, aggravated assault, violation of oath of office and making a false statement.
Officer Olsen could not be reached for comment on Thursday. Neither a lawyer who has represented him, nor the DeKalb County Police Department, immediately responded to messages on Thursday, one day after Mr. James said Officer Olsen was notified of the government’s intention to request an indictment.
Officer Olsen’s conduct has been scrutinized since last March, when he was called to an apartment complex in Chamblee, northeast of Atlanta, and Mr. Hill approached and behaved erratically. Witnesses said that Mr. Hill, whose family said he had post-traumatic stress disorder after an Air Force deployment to Afghanistan, had raised his hands or placed them at his sides and that he did not obey Officer Olsen’s instructions to halt.
Regarding the Laquan McDonald case in Chicago, more allegations of shenanigans ....
At least three witnesses to the Laquan McDonald police killing were questioned for hours, threatened by officers and ordered to change their accounts to match the official Chicago police version of the shooting, the attorneys for the teen's estate say.
The allegations are contained in more than 3,000 pages of recently released documents related to the case. The attorneys also allege that police officers up the chain of command fabricated witness accounts to support the way officers at the scene described the October 20, 2014, shooting as justified.
"It's not just the officers on the street," attorney Jeffrey Neslund told CNN. "It's a lieutenant, a sergeant and detectives -- and the lengths they went to justify what simply was not true."
CNN contacted Neslund and Michael Robbins after the city released the documents to the news media in response to multiple Freedom of Information Act requests.
Asked if they stood by the accusations they made in letters to the city's corporation counsel last March, Robbins said, "Absolutely."
"You have a false narrative put out by police," he said, "outright lies to cover up an illegal shooting, corroborated by other officers."
CNN asked the Chicago Police Department for a reaction to the allegations. "This is the first time I'm hearing of that allegation," spokesman Anthony Guglielmi said. "But this is why we want an independent investigation to look at every fact. But unfortunately, we're not able to comment on any specific incident."
CNN legal analyst Joey Jackson said the allegations made by Neslund and Robbins are a significant development.
"In the event that it's true, you have multiple underlying charges: intimidating witnesses, falsifying public records and you have a conspiracy that more than one person was involved," Jackson said. "This has the potential of taking down a lot of people in that police department."
"The issue then becomes how high of a level does this go: Who knew about this?"
Police officer Jason Van Dyke, 37, was charged with first-degree murder in late November in the killing of 17-year-old McDonald. The officer pleaded not guilty in December and is free on bail. His attorney has said he feared for his life before he opened fire, shooting the teen 16 times.
At least five officers at the scene, including Van Dyke's partner, backed up his account that McDonald lunged at him. "When McDonald got to within 12 to 15 feet of the officers, he swung the knife toward the officers in an aggressive manner," Van Dyke's partner said in an official police report.
But a police dashcam video shows McDonald walking down South Pulaski Road with a knife in his hand, heading away from officers. The city fought against the video's release for 13 months. Van Dyke was charged just hours before it was made public.
FACT: The vast majority of white people that are murdered are killed by white people. About 85% IIRC. So if you want to play that game and "racialize" the threat level then do try to realize that DESPITE the disproportionate homicide rate in the black community ... the people that ANYONE really needs to worry about look just like them. Including white people.
We're talking about cops who patrol those high crime areas and why they see black people as a threat more so other racial groups. What you just went off on was not even remotely about the material discussed above it.
FACT: In every major US city with the exception of maybe L.A. (where it may be off set by higher level drug trade and central american gangs) the majority of purposeful shootings OVERALL happens in black communities and are perpetrated by members of that same community.
That results in a larger police presence in those areas and the racial make up of the perpetrators logically calls for greater caution and suspicion when police have to interact with potential suspects.
That being said ... despite the cop's clear justification to shoot her ... they didn't. Which is my point. And if you had substituted a black person in that exact same scenario they most likely would have. Which is also my point.
Maybe or maybe not. You're just guessing what the police in CT would have done without any evidence that the officers in that department had any signs of history of racial bias.
And FTR .... black people don't [i]"shoot strangers randomly by a much larger margin than any other ethnic or racial demographic
You just finished saying how homicides are disproportionate in black areas so that's just a bold face lie or you're bad at math. When a demographic is only 13% of the population but make up three times the number of shooting deaths, committed by and large by the same group, it means you're responsible for a much larger margin than the rest of the population.
Barack Obama: Four more years of the Carter Presidency
And FTR .... black people don't "shoot strangers randomly by a much larger margin than any other ethnic or racial demographic. White dudes have the "mass shooter" profile cornered as well.
You just finished saying how homicides are disproportionate in black areas so that's just a bold face lie or you're bad at math. When a demographic is only 13% of the population but make up three times the number of shooting deaths, committed by and large by the same group, it means you're responsible for a much larger margin than the rest of the population.
Actually I was responding to what you wrote and I highlighted the key word which was "randomly". I'm not disputing the disproportionate level of gun violence in the black community in general. What I disputed was that such violence was "random".
The exceedingly rare instance when an out-of-control police "officer" gets his comeuppance ....
On Friday, Prince George’s County Police Officer Jenchesky Santiago was sentenced to five years in prison for an incident in 2014 in which he put a gun to a black suspect’s head and shoved it down the suspect’s mouth.
Santiago was sentenced after being convicted in December of misconduct in office and of first- and second-degree assault.
However, Santiago seems not to have any remorse for his actions, if a recording of a call he made from the jailhouse to his mother is to be believed.
“If anything, they should be saying ‘Sorry’ to me, because all he wanted was a payday,” he said during the call, and it was this conversation that prosecutors pointed to in order to show that Santiago was not remorseful and was in fact dangerous.
The incident for which Santiago was sentenced occurred in May of 2014. Santiago pulled William Cunningham over outside his own house, insisting that Cunningham was illegally parked. Although Cunningham explained that he lived in the house and attempted to go inside, Santiago ordered him back to the car, pointed his gun at Cunningham’s head and mouth.
“I dare you to [expletive] fight me, son,” Santiago said.
Prince George’s County Circuit Court Judge Dwight D. Jackson said of Santiago’s actions that they were harmful to police everywhere.
“Perhaps you were bored or perhaps you wanted to show off,” Jackson said. “You degraded that man.”
Can't link on mobile but a new story is basically showing the Tamir Rice grand jury to have been a sham.
Indeed.
An Ohio grand jury determined last month that the police shooting of 12-year-old Tamir Rice was justified and therefore never voted on criminal charges against the officers involved.
A report published Wednesday suggested the grand jury improperly concluded its deliberations by never voting on the charges, but prosecutor's spokesman told NBC News his office handles all police use-of-force cases the same.
"The first question the grand jury has to decide after concluding their investigation is whether the officer's use of deadly force was justified under the law," Joseph Frolik said. "If they decide it was justified, they don't vote on criminal charges. If they decide it's not justified, they then vote on possible criminal charges."
The article, published in Cleveland-based The Scene magazine, reported that the grand jury impaneled by McGinty did not vote when it decided not to bring criminal charges against Timothy Loehmann, the officer who killed Rice, and that there was no record of the decision.
In a statement, a lawyer for Rice's family said that they were promised that there would be a vote.
"We were assured throughout this process that a recommendation regarding criminal charges would be made and that a vote would be taken by the grand jury," read the statement from attorney Jonathan S. Abady..
In a statement provided to NBC News, the prosecutor's office said that the question of justification — like the question of criminal charges — would be voted on by the grand jury first.
"If the Grand Jury decides that the fatal use of force was justified under the circumstances, then the Grand Jury investigation is concluded," the statement said.
That is to say, the grand jury wouldn't bother voting on criminal charges if they already voted that the officer's actions were justified.
On Dec. 28, the day that the grand jury concluded its deliberations and declined to indict Loehmann, a document was filed with Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas stating that the "grand jurors have concluded the investigation into the November 22, 2014 death of Tamir Rice and have declined to issue criminal charges."
Rice was shot to death by Cleveland Police Officer Loehmann on Nov. 22, 2014. His death sparked protests that called for a federal investigation and for the resignation of the prosecutor, Timothy McGinty.
Various reports showed that Loehmann shot Tamir within two seconds of encountering him, and that the boy was not reaching for a toy gun, as was initially claimed.
As has been noted numerous times the old adage is true. "A grand jury will indict a ham sandwich if a prosecutor asks them to." Apparently, after dragging his feet for over a year while conducting this so-called "investigation" that didn't reveal anything we didn't already know a mere months after the shooting took place .... Mr. McGinty never even bothered to ask the jury for an indictment after assuring Tamir Rice's family that he would do just that. A 12 year old kid was shot on sight by an "officer" whose former chief at another police department said he "lacked judgment" and "shouldn't be trusted with a gun" ... and as is all too often the case the local prosecutor used his power to protect to police.
Top