Justice or protection – which is higher?
Interesting issue [for some of us] here. It reminds me very much of an incident I was caught up in.
This continues on from the previous post on it. There were strong opinions that Polanski should be pursued to the end and some ladies felt no, leave it alone. Some gents were not sure on this.
I don’t think anyone here is defending Polanski – that’s a given. The question is whether we’re going soft on him. I once had a kid come to me as “first complainant” and watched it unfold as the state moved in.
Apart from the police surgeon who phoned me for my assessment [presumably he phoned psychologists and all], everyone seemed hellbent on getting the man but not so much looking out for the kid. Naturally, she just wanted it all to go away and bitterly regretted having told me. I’d asked if she’d let me break it to her mum and she grudgingly said yes. The mum called the authorities and hell broke loose.
He pleaded a lesser charge and was let off with a fine. I ran into him and he asked if I was satisfied. I said he should have been behind bars. He swore to bring me down – interesting how perpetrators turn it round 180 degrees, isn’t it? Since then, I’ve always looked at the victim first and what’s best for him/her. I don’t mean what’s best in my opinion but what the general opinion of “experts” is.
If part of that is bringing him to justice, so be it but if she is so dead against it, then another way needs to be found. On the other hand, we have the Manson type who keeps the girls under some sort of spell and he plays on that. They want him set free.
It’s no easy matter, this.
My first natural instinct is to go after the perpetrator, I think most fathers and men in general would. She may wish for this to be done or might want it all to go away. There are very good reasons for going after the perpetrator. This is what Jim Garrison did, what Eliot Ness did.
We are in a relativistic society now where everything’s turned on its head. There is no justice, the guilty are protected and the innocent left to suffer. Good people up and down the country are waiting for perpetrators to be locked up and the key thrown away. Someone has to make a stand and as my mate said, the punishment must be so severe as to be a deterrent.
That is the way to law and order and though it’s unpopular with many, it keeps the society safe for the very people who find this harsh.
On the other hand, the victim, the victim, the victim – let’s think of him or her. Too many get caught up in the pursuit – tally ho – and forget the messed up kid. Which posse would you find me in? I’d be with the pursuers, natch but one eye would be looking back to see what’s happening with her/him.
Lord Nazh said that guilt is one thing and mitigation comes into the sentencing phase. That’s not wrong either.
Professional victims
There was a post some time back [link if I can find it], on the professional victims and I had a vid of four girls who got into a taxi and then cried rape. Now I would go all out to incarcerate them to try to make the wild accusation far less palatable. Ditto the professionally offended who do the equivalent of taking a dive in football. For example, the way “racist” is flung about these days is amazing.
Against that, if the testimony of the accused really does give him away, if his history and previous is pretty bad in that area, if the things he promotes do nothing to detract from that, well, he needs to stay accused, in my book.
Against that, if there is no actual evidence, then truth will eventually prevail – character always comes out in the end and he’ll either go on to do more or else he won’t because he was never guilty. This takes time – lots of it. I was advised in 2007 to let something go and if it was true, he’d eventually trip himself up. He did.
Time is the best judge of all.
Posts and many comments around this issue
Filed under: Society & human issues
The Polanski case is a bad one for establishing principles, because the waters have been muddied. The victim accepted financial compensation and does not want the criminal case pursued (reopened, concluded, what you will) at this late stage.
The authorities let a famous man wander around the world for many years after he fled the US, and appear to have done nothing serious to bring him back. Their apparent indifference and delay colour the case with a hint of complicity.
I seem to recall reading that in the court case, a sentencing deal was agreed with the prosecution and the judge, and the judge then welched on it. Had the defendant known this beforehand, he might have pled innocent and the course of the case from then on might not have been a foregone conclusion. I understand that American judges are elected and so may have other pressures than merely deciding the merits of the case before them. But just as plaintiffs are supposed to come to court “with clean hands”, so should justice itself. Having attended a murder trial in the UK, my confidence in the system is now shaky; and the Megrahi case makes British justice stink abominably.
I think it would be better to argue the principles with reference to a different case. This one is good for nothing apart from hot-collared controversy.
BTW, on your new site, is there a way of being updated by email on comments?
Sackers – two issues in one here about the emailed comments. There is the WordPress provision itself but in many ways, that’s overrriden by the Theme, which is a private Theme and then there is my host on top of that.
I have been looking at that and Cherie seems to have a feed mechanism – shall get back to you.
Sack: Judges are NOT involved in plea deals
Lawyers (for and against) come up with a deal and then the judge will approve or deny it in the sentencing phase. There is no ‘squelch’ by a judge on a plea deal as it is not in his perview.
The prosecutor will make a recommendation (based on a plea) to the judge and then it is up to him/her to accept it or to sentence based on crime (or to deny completely and goto trial in some cases).
Thanks for the clarification, Lord Nazh – perhaps I’ve watched too many American police series. But there was also this, from the Scotsman newspaper:
“Earlier this year, the director’s legal team asked a US appeals court in California to overturn a judge’s refusal to throw out his case. He claims misconduct by the now-deceased judge who had arranged a plea bargain and then reneged on it.”
http://news.scotsman.com/world/Polanski-could-face-50year-jail.5682615.jp
I’m under the impression that in the US, as in the UK, the prosecutor and the defence counsel come to an arrangement, a guilty plea for a reduced sentence which they think will be acceptable to the judge. This is presented to the judge but the judge can reject it. From my understanding the judge had indicated that he would accept a plea but then reneged when he heard the actual plea agreed but accepted the guilty plea. So he basically got away with it when he ran because no way will he serve the time he deserves.
T has the process correct, but until the actual sentencing of the guilty, the judge can (and sometimes does) change his/her mind.
This happened in this case because after 40-odd days in mental, Polanski got out for a trip to Europe and was supposed to come back for 40-odd more days (the number escapes me).
He was photographed having an extremely good/inappropriate time and the judge saw it. Since Polanski never actually finished the sentencing phase, he cannot claim that the judge went back on anything; he fled because he thought the judge would sentence him based on the actual crimes he committed (after seeing the photos et al) and not the plea he made with lawyers.
Whether the judge was going to do that will never actually be known. But it is in the perview of the judge.
T: the guilty plea and the plea deal (afaik) are separate issues, so one could conceivably take one without the other (that’s why the plea agreement is given to the judge for approval before you actually enter a guilty plea).
And no, he will never serve the time he deserves.
Reading and noting in my case.
My Lord,
That makes sense. Although I have heard of cases where the two were done together and the judge rejected the sentence and imposed oneof his own. Maybe of course that was in a movie or something.
No T, that can also happen
the judge accepts the guilty plea on the charge given and then imposes the max sentence he can on said charge.
The only people ‘bound’ by a plea are the lawyers and the defendent. So you could get a deal from the prosecutor for 10 years on charge A then the judge could give you 50 years (or whatever) for your guilty plea on charge A.
It doesn’t happen much, but his cavorting with the ‘young’ women of france probably pissed off the judge that was about to give him 45 more days of ‘eval’ and then probation
Roman Polanski did not do a runner over 45 days. He would ahve had to have been an idiot to have done so given the costs to his livelihood alone.
This is not civil law. The DA AND the judge work for the state and the DA in reality pretty much has carte blanche to agree plea deals which are normally rubberstamped by the judge. The judge in this case agreed to the plea deal and only renaged due to his own political ambitions and resultant publicity of imprisoning some like Polanski.
And if one agrees to plead guilty under a plea bargain obviously the plea is conditional otherwise someone would be out of their mind to plead guilty with the risk of the deal ,yet not the plea, being withdrawn.When they did so, they infringed upon Polanski’s due process and right to a fair trial. No better than a railroading.
And what people don’t get is THAT affects every American when that is permitted[because we denounce Polanski's crimes] wheras Polanski only affected ONE person. So we have to look beyond the obvious crime tothe miscarriage of justice which Polanski was the victim of and sets a dangerous precedent in American procedural law and justice.
In Canada a judge is not elected to the bench and can only be debenched under very strict conditions,almost impossible.He has no conviction quotas to fill to remain on the bench unlike American judges. Canada’s system differs from America’s precisely to keep judges from having any political motivations to meet quotas to ensure his bench being secure.
Last year Polanski applied to be allowed to return to USA[no sanctions] and that is the only reason they felt pressured to act. They had multiple opportunities to nab him,despite lame excuses, and they chose not to. Therefore, he was not outside the strong arm of the law, and emotions aside, a statute began to run the minute he fled and should have now expired.
Canada never goes back on it’s agreed pleas because they would taint the whole process’ credibility and prevent the assisted convictions they get through pleas.
Politics should not be apart of justice-the two arediametrically opposed mutually exclusive concepts.
I’d piss off too rather than face any charge in an American court of law.
* a statute of limitations began to run[ I meant]…
You may now attempt to eat me alive Lord Nahz.