valuist - ah, that age old question, "how can you defend the guilty?" well, first, you have to start by believing in the principles that are at the foundation of our system - the adversary process, the jury of your peers, the presumption of innocence, and the burden of proof being placed on the state to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. if you have a fundamental difference with any of these concepts, then you probably couldn't do what i do. the presumption of innocence gives you the inalienable constitutional right to walk into court and say"not guilty" even if you are, because what you are really saying is "prove it." i mentioned in a post above some of the oppressive regimes who trial systems were based on the presuption of guilt - the star chamber, the salem witch trials, you get the picture. there simply is no reasonable alternative to giving the defendant the presumption of innocence and placing the burden of proof on the state. the adversary defense attorney's job is to suggest other reasonable interpretations of the evidence that might exclude guilt. does this mean that the defense attorney should pervert the system by placing into evidence knowing false evidence or testimony? of course not. that would be subornation of perjury, and any lawyer who does that should and would be disbarred and imprisoned. i can honestly tell you that in all my years doing this i have never allowed a witness to take the stand if i knew for a fact that he wasn't telling the truth. not that i'm patting myself on the back, i don't know any of my reputable peers that would do that either. are there shady lawyers out there who might not feel the same way? of course there are; there are corrupt people in every walk of life. believe me, the are plenty of corrupt cops, corrupt prosecutors, corrupt judges. but, as is usually the case, most are not corrupt, they are just human beings doing the best that they can under the circumstances.
i recently defended a nineteen year old for bank robbery. the prosecutor couldn't believe i was going to trial. he had a flipped codefendant fingering my man and a signed confession. piece of cake, he said. flush 'em and shoot 'em. funny thing happened on the way to the gallows. at trial the state's star witness came across as the slug he really was . turns out he had cut a deal to walk in exchange for his testimony. and the confession was signed after eight hours of holding the kid incommunicado, screaming at him, threatening him. for seven and a half hours he pleaded his innocence. at the end, after listening to the cops tell him they would help him if he just confessed or bust his balls if professed innocence, he confessed. you should of heard the tapes - i bet even you would have been appallled. after his acquittal, the cops stumbled upon the real perpetrator. they turned him over to the feds for prosecution, as their credibilty was pretty much shot. guess what, before trial everyone was sure my client was guilty. if not for the right to a jury, the adversary system, and the presumption of innocence, he would be pulling fourteen years minimum in the state pen.
yes, the majority of those convicted are indeed guity, but believe me this was not an isolated case. most court appointed attorneys would have pled my man guilty for a reduced charge. just pick up any day's paper and you can read about dna clearing someone imprisoned for rape or murder. what did you think about the teenagers imprisoned for the central park jogger case after they confessed after similar interrogation, only to find out that they could not have done the act. they were convicted because of the manner in which their confessions were taken and the fact that the state intentionally suppressed evidence of their innocence. does that not bother you at all? what is an accepable percentage of innocent men to be imprisoned or even executed by the system? is it better to let a hundred guilty men go free in order that one innocent man not be executed. i have to say that i believe that it is.
scott-atlanta - read your reply, thanks for running the spellchecker for me and looking up the big words in the dictionary. i shall continue to defer to you to make the case that you are the forum's village idiot. you do it so much better than i could.
whew! in this thread i've gone from defending the presumption of innocence to defending myself to defending the legal profession. now if i could only figure out where to send the bill.
