The Law is an ass.

[pete]

It's up to the police to prove an offence has been committed.

We are luck to have a legal system that allows us to stay silent where an answer might incriminate ourselves. The alternative is a step closer to a state where interrogation and torture are the primary tools for crime solving. Extreme example maybe, but I'd rather not go there. It's better to let 100 guilty people off than convict one innocent person on the basis of hearsay, or a poorly worded answer. Just my opinion though.

Good point.

Although cna't have been that hard, can it?

[BigD]

It said in the report that the car was hired and sub hired so there were multiple hirers which confused things. It wasn't just a normal car hire situation.

"Nottinghamshire Police said the investigating officer established the car was a hire vehicle that had been sub-leased through a number of different companies"

[robin]

Maybe so, but you cannot tell me that whoever got stuck with the 6 points and £150 fine for failing to reveal the identity of the driver did so because they didn't know who the driver was. Put another way, in a parallel universe where we lock people up without charge, torture them for information and eventually release them if it turns out they knew nothing, could you imagine the outcome would have been the same? I rather suspect the identity of the driver would have been established very quickly and beyond reasonable doubt, m'lud.

[mckeann]

It's up to the police to prove an offence has been committed.

We are luck to have a legal system that allows us to stay silent where an answer might incriminate ourselves. The alternative is a step closer to a state where interrogation and torture are the primary tools for crime solving. Extreme example maybe, but I'd rather not go there. It's better to let 100 guilty people off than convict one innocent person on the basis of hearsay, or a poorly worded answer. Just my opinion though.

This is a great attitude to have. I hope you can stick to you guns if it was your son that was knocked over or killed in a hit and run. c'est la vie.

[robin]

Neil, I think David is just saying it how it is - i.e. that the prosecution do actually have to prove their case to whatever standard is required. There can be no argument about that. You could argue that the police/prosecution/whoever could have put more effort in and perhaps they could have proved their case, but they didn't (and none of us know for a fact that it would have resulted in a conviction, amusing though it is to speculate from behind the keyboard ).

The other part is of course personal opinion, as he says, but if you consider the alternates, you run out of choices quite quickly. If you allow convictions without proper evidence, then sooner or later all sorts of innocent people are going to end up in jail, and perhaps some of them will be there because of a mistake, but perhaps some will be there because of a malicious prosecution. Put more simply, if it's easier to convict the guilty it's also easier to frame the innocent - good luck if you're an innocent thorn in the side of the state

[Kelvin]

It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.

/Blackstone

When I did jury service this got trotted out a fair bit; ok, twice. However, it's a principle that's right and just in the grand scheme of things. Not easy when you are the victim of a crime and justice isn't seen to be done but I'd prefer to live under that kind of law than one where folk get locked up on the whim of the authorities.

ETA In both cases where this was said the defence was pretty thin. We found them both guilty. I was lead juror in both trials and it felt odd deciding the fate of a stranger.

[tut]

If they are in Court then they are guilty.

No problem.

tut

ps:- unless they were speeding in a Lotus.

[j2 lot]

If they are in Court then they are guilty.

No problem.

.

If they aren't guilty of the offence they're being tried for they are probably guilty of something else so lock em up anyway.

P.s. Joking!! ( well sort of.....)

[David]

It's up to the police to prove an offence has been committed.

We are lucky to have a legal system that allows us to stay silent where an answer might incriminate ourselves. The alternative is a step closer to a state where interrogation and torture are the primary tools for crime solving. Extreme example maybe, but I'd rather not go there. It's better to let 100 guilty people off than convict one innocent person on the basis of hearsay, or a poorly worded answer. Just my opinion though.

As said, just an opinion. But it's based on an experiences from 20 year ago when I foolishly agreed to give evidence in the high court . As a broadcast engineer, I was ask to examine a video recording and give a technical opinion. Well, one thing lead to an other, and over the next five years I was in court on numerous occasions. Usually a witness for the defense, which added an interesting twist. And what became apparent very quickly was that video evidence is only a poor facsimile of both time and information.

One case that springs to mind - a bank fraud that involved forged cheques at various banks. First impression was that the CCTV all looked like the same person and they looked like someone the police happened to have on record. But analysis told a very different story and there was enough evidence to dismiss the case. I felt good about that one - mainly because someone had attempted to use CCTV for their own deceptive purpose. I would never use video as evidence on its own.