Absolutely despicable behaviour by cops

[Jarlaxle]

It's like politicians and used-car salesmen...there ARE a few honest ones, but they acre certainly the exception.

[Andrew D]

I don't know how bigskygal conducts herself as a prosecutor. Her identity may be an open book, but if so, it is a book I have not read. Maybe I could find out about her by rummaging around here and elsewhere. I have seen no reason to do that.

All I know about her being a prosecutor is that she is new at it. If I recall correctly, she told us before that she began her career as a defense attorney with an idealistic view. Over time, that idealism faded, and she became disillusioned with that line of work.

That is a very common progression. Common on both sides of the criminal-law fence. What will she think five years from now about what prosecutors do? Only time will tell.

It bears noting that prosecutors rarely need to fabricate evidence. Most of the time, the police have done that for them. All they need to do is assume the truth of what the police say and present it as true.

But over time, most prosecutors become more and more jaded about the veracity of police testimony. That does not mean that they are actually suborning perjury; after all, they are not percipient witnesses to the underlying facts. It means that they have doubts about the truth of what the police claim, but nonetheless, they ask the court or the jury to believe that testimony.

"The court" is an important point. Most police perjury is not directed at juries. Most of it is directed at courts. The police are aware of the exclusionary rule, and they hate it. So they lie, not necessarily about the evidence itself, but about how they obtained it. They know perfectly well what their affidavits have to say to survive Fourth-Amendment challenges, so that is what they say. True? False? A consideration relevant only to tactics.

It is still true that in those instances where subornation of perjury is necessary to obtain a conviction, most prosecutors will do it. And they won't think of themselves as "lying scumbags." They are convinced that the defendant is guilty -- and they are often quite right about that -- and they conclude that a little subornation of perjury is worth it to get some creep of the streets before he rapes and murders another victim.

Not all of them. I know a (former) prosecutor who, in my judgment, never did suborn perjury and probably never even seriously considered suborning perjury. He is devoutly -- and I mean way, way devoutly -- religious. He would not have suborned perjury both because he believes, on a very deep level, that such a thing would be inexcusably wrong and because he would not imperil his immortal soul.

Several years from now, perhaps we will see what bigskygal thinks of the veracity of police testimony. Or maybe we will not. Maybe she will not be inclined to tell us; maybe she won't be posting here at all. Who knows?

But one thing we do know is that she has been a prosecutor for a very short time. It seems to me that what people who have been prosecutors for a long time have opinions that are grounded in a much greater wealth of experience.

People will believe whatever they want to believe. There is an abundance of readily accessible information about prosecutorial misconduct. I think that people should read it so that they can come to informed conclusions. But whether they do so or not is not up to me. It is up to them.

[Lord Jim]

It is still true that in those instances where subornation of perjury is necessary to obtain a conviction, most prosecutors will do it.

[Andrew D]

My assertion is obviously false.

Lord Jim has proclaimed it false. Therefore, it is false.

After all, what Lord Jim proclaims is not merely the standard by which truth is determined; it is the engine by which truth is created.

[Scooter]

As opposed to the reams of evidence you have presented supporting its truth?

[Lord Jim]

My assertion is obviously false.

Lord Jim has proclaimed it false. Therefore, it is false.

LOL

Anyone who can read can see that I never said your assertion was "false". I don't know if it's false or not; I don't have the information to know that.

And neither do you. But that doesn't stop you from tossing out that spectacular charge as though it were an established proven fact.....

What I did say, (by illustration) is that in making the charge, you are talking completely talking out your ass.

I stand by that.

[Lord Jim]

After all, what Lord Jim proclaims is not merely the standard by which truth is determined; it is the engine by which truth is created.

Once again, we see a standard Andrew tactic....

He makes an assertion he doesn't back up, gets called on it, and rather than either support the assertion, (an admittedly tall order when the assertion is that "most" prosecutors in this country suborn perjury) or retract or amend it, he instead tries to change the subject by erecting a complete straw man and trying to throw the person who called him on his ass gas on the defensive.

[Andrew D]

Of course you do.

Have you looked at the relevant information?

Have you bothered even to do something so simple as to Google "prosecutorial misconduct"?

Of course not.

And why would you?

After all, you have been perfectly happy to proclaim that the people being held in Guantamo are terrorists.

You don't know anything about them. You don't know what they are accused of. You don't know what evidence there is against them. You don't know what contrary evidence there is. You don't even know their names.

Nor do I.

The difference is that in the absence of evidence, I reserve judgment. But in the absence of evidence, you happily come to whatever conclusion suits you.

Others will have to decide for themselves which is the more rational approach.

[Andrew D]

No, I have not produced reams of evidence to support my position.

Why would I bother?

I produced bucketloads of evidence to support my position about John Yoo and his torture memos.

And what did I get in response?

The claim that my analysis was politically biased.

Was any evidence brought forward to support that claim?

No.

I produced bucketloads of evidence to support my position about the Tenth Amendment.

And what did I get in response?

The claim that my analysis was politically biased.

Was any evidence brought forward to support that claim?

No.

I produced bucketloads of evidence to support my position about the General Welfare Clause.

And what did I get in response?

The claim that my analysis was politically biased.

Was any evidence brought forward to support that claim?

No.

How many times do you expect me to beat my head against the impervious wall of the unreasoning?

How many times do you expect me to say to myself "Well, the last time I produced bucketloads of evidence to support my position, all I got was unsubstantiated denials; but I will try it again"?

How many times do you think my head can take being smashed up against the assertions of people who refuse to engage in the process of reasoning one's way to a conclusion?

Am I supposed to be Superman?

I am not.

I am just one of us -- a poor featherless biped haplessly schlepping my way through an incomprehensible universe.

At some point, one cannot help but be exhausted by doing the work of amassing evidence, only to have it summarily disregarded by people who think that their positions do not require substantiation, but mine do.

At some point, anyone is just too tired. At some point, anyone cannot keep on piling up mountains of support for her or his positions only to have it all ignored by people who keep demanding more but refuse to provide anything themselves.

At some point, one runs out of strength. At some point, one is just weary.

One knows, of course, that that is what the I-refuse-to-support-my-position-but-you-have-to-support-yours people want. One recognizes that they are not interested in debating the merits of things; they just want to wear one down and hope that one will go away.

But one tries anyway. One keeps on bringing out the facts and the reasoning, even though one knows that it will count for nothing. One battles on despite realizing that it is an exercise in futility.

But in the end, they usually prevail.

In the end, they have strength left, because they have expended almost nothing. But you have been diligent. You have worked hard to support your positions. You have considered their positions carefully and devoted your energy to responding to them.

They haven't done any of that.

They have made clever little remarks, and they have demanded that you do even more than you have already done, even though they have done almost nothing.

So in the end, they prevail. You just run out of steam.

They have beaten you. Not by making arguments that carried the day -- they didn't even try to do that.

By wearing you down. By deceiving you into thinking that if you did the work necessary to put together a thoughtful response to what they said, they would do the same.

But they never intended to.

All they wanted was to tire you out. To get you to the point where, because you were the only one doing the real work anyway, you would give up.

And then they can claim victory.

And they're right. They did win. You have left the battlefield exhausted, unable to continue the fight.

And they won by refusing to engage at all. They won by shifting the burden to you to do everything while they did nothing.

In the end, you have done everything, and you have lost. They have done nothing, and they have won.

And you are out of options. You have no choice but to leave the battlefield or expire on it.

And they will think that they were right all along.

And you will just hope that the world that you leave to the ones you love will not be run by them.

[Lord Jim]

Have you bothered even to do something so simple as to Google "prosecutorial misconduct"?

I if do that, am I going to find proof that this:

It is still true that in those instances where subornation of perjury is necessary to obtain a conviction, most prosecutors will do it.

is a fact? If it's that simple, why don't you just provide us with a link?

in the absence of evidence, I reserve judgment.

Huh?



Do you read what you write?

In this thread, you have presented charge after charge after charge against prosecutors and police officers as though they were proven facts. You've asserted that most prosecutors suborn perjury, and that the overwhelming number of police officers regularly commit perjury, and you haven't presented a shred of proof to support either assertion. You haven't reserved any judgment.

After all, you have been perfectly happy to proclaim that the people being held in Guantamo are terrorists.

And yet another blatant attempt to change the subject rather than back up your claims...

Are you feeling alright Andrew? With all these strawmen, subject shifts, gross mischaracterizations of what's been said, ad hominem attacks, false choices, etc., etc., it seems like for the past couple of days you've been channeling the entire membership of Team Troll.... there isn't one trick in their book that you don't seem to have tried to pull....

[Andrew D]

What I actually posted was that it is rare for prosecutors actually to suborn perjury.

Yes, I posted that on the rare occasions when it is necessary to obtain a conviction, most prosecutors will do it.

But I posted -- rather emphatically, I thought -- that they rarely do.

---------------

A link?

I'm not very good at links.

I tend to read books.

Remember those?

You know, paper with print on it?

The facts about prosecutorial misconduct have been amassed in numerous books. Get your hands on copies of them. Read them. Do some serious thinking about what they have to say and the facts on which the authors base their conclusions.

Or don't.

Just keep on believing whatever you want to believe.

That's what you are accustomed to doing, and it seems to have been serving you well.

Far be it from me to disturb your contentment. Just go back to sleep.

[Rick]

Is it State law that gives prosecutors immuminty or federal law?

If this immunity is part of the problem why has it not been repealed?

It would seem that judges know about this and would be a little more vigilant...

[Sue U]

I have only anecdotal evidence to report from 10+ years as a cops & crime reporter for both big- and small-city dailies and now 18 years' experience in the legal trenches, on the civil side, where several of my friends and colleagues do 1983 claims. From personal knowledge, I will attest that civil rights violations by police and prison officers are frequent, if not routine. The overwhelming majority appear to go completely unremarked upon, let alone punished. I will give you one typical story from last week; I was in the car with a lawyer friend when he received the following call on a potential case:

A local yahoo was picked up by police on a failure-to-appear warrant for a traffic violation. He was transported to the county jail, where he had the bad manners to mouth off with some obscenities directed toward a female CO -- no physical violence, no threats, just some foul language. Several of her co-workers then proceeded to rough up our hero, tie him down to a chair and then repeatedly pepper-spray him in his eyes and mouth over a period of 30 minutes to an hour. He was denied any medical attention and released the following day (after family members scraped up some bail), his head swelled up like a pumpkin. Although the abuse here is clear, this case would be a loser in court for a variety of both procedural and substantive reasons, including the "non-permanence" of the injuries -- and so these perps will face no civil action, nor is it even remotely likely that they would be subject to criminal prosecution.

I know from my newspaper experience that it is not especially rare for police to plant evidence, although it is much more common that they conduct a warrantless and unnecessary search and then claim to have discovered evidence "in plain view" (particularly drugs). It is not an every-day occurrence, but it happens regularly. I am not saying the innocent are being framed, only that it is not unusual for the cops to take shortcuts with the guilty. And that is a fundamenally dangerous approach.

From what I have seen, prosecutors don't have much if any need to suborn perjury; the great majority of criminal defendants will plead to a reduced charge rather than go to trial on the most serious offenses. I cannot say whether most prosecutors would refuse to use evidence of questionable provenance, but I do think most would say it is defendant's job to object if there is such an objection to be raised.

[Andrew D]

From what I have seen, prosecutors don't have much if any need to suborn perjury; the great majority of criminal defendants will plead to a reduced charge rather than go to trial on the most serious offenses.

Besides which, the police have already lied to the prosecutor. It's not as if the police come to the prosecutor and say "We kicked in his door and ransacked his house without a warrant, and we found these drugs, so how about we go into court and testify that we entered because we heard what we thought were gunshots, and these drugs were in plain view?"

The police come to the prosecutor and say "We entered because we heard what we thought were gunshots, and these drugs were in plain view." And that's what they say to the jury when the prosecutor puts them on the stand.

Why would the prosecutor bother to suborn perjury? Why would the prosecutor bother to investigate whether what the police are saying it true?

The police are saying what they are saying, the prosecutor -- even if she knows perfectly well that they are full of shit -- wasn't on the scene, so she is not aware of any evidence that the police are lying, the testimony of the police is what she needs to get a conviction, and the defendant is guilty anyway. The wheels of "justice" grind smoothly on, and the prosecutor can pretend, even to herself, pure cherubic innocence.

[Rick]

If it is that clear to you two it should also be as transparent to the bench.

So I'm failed by our legal system...

[Sue U]

What do you expect judges to do? As our latest Chief Justice said, the judge's role is to call balls and strikes, not to pitch or bat. It is the jury's job to determine who and what to believe (hence the asserted "testilying"). If an objection to admissibility of evidence is raised at trial, the judge rules on it. But admissibility is not the same as truthfulness. And if a case never comes to trial, there is not even an argument as to admissibility of evidence.

[Guinevere]

Keld, "clear" to observers, and "provable" to a judge or jury are often two different things.

I can only speak in the civil context, which is a wholly different standard, with different rights at issue -- but in the majority of cases a judge is going to tend to let evidence in, unless there arereally clear, solid reasons to leave it out. The judge isn't just considering the immediate dispute but is also thinking about the ultimate resolution of the case, and the appeal. If a party fails to prove their case, but got the benefit of every doubt and had every reasonable opportunity to present evidence to support that case, its less likely there could be grounds for appeal down the road. (although Sue, working more often from the plaintiff's side of the courtroom than I, typically on the defense side, might have a different perspective).

[Guinevere]

Yup, what Sue said . . .

[Sue U]

in the majority of cases a judge is going to tend to let evidence in, unless there arereally clear, solid reasons to leave it out. The judge isn't just considering the immediate dispute but is also thinking about the ultimate resolution of the case, and the appeal. If a party fails to prove their case, but got the benefit of every doubt and had every reasonable opportunity to present evidence to support that case, its less likely there could be grounds for appeal down the road. (although Sue, working more often from the plaintiff's side of the courtroom than I, typically on the defense side, might have a different perspective).

That is my experience as well.

[Guinevere]

Two blondes walked into a bar . . .