(January 13, 2017 at 3:23 pm)Shell B Wrote:(January 13, 2017 at 3:13 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: The standard is beyond a reasonable doubt here in America, not airtight, as you seem to imply here.
We can and do convict people on less-than-perfect evidence, and occasionally (surprise!) those convictions turn out to be wrong.
Why is no one reading my posts and only responding to snippets of one or the other?
Because the particular snippet I singled out was what I wanted to reply to. I didn't want to reply to every point you've raised, and I'm not going to.
(January 13, 2017 at 3:23 pm)Shell B Wrote: I did not ever say that our system only hands out the death penalty in airtight cases. I didn't imply it. Not even a little.
Nor did I say you did. I was correcting the quote I answered, and nothing more. Here's what you wrote: "If we thought it was impossible to have no doubt of a person's guilt, we couldn't put anyone in jail ever." The insinuation is that we have to accept imperfection in the process of administering justice -- and I agree with that. Our system recognizes it in using the term beyond a reasonable doubt. We clearly have the possibility of doubting a conviction while still meting it out; this is why the qualifier "reasonable" s used, this is why we have appellate courts, and so on. Those are a testament to this imperfection ... even as we continue to jail people.
