From: Kent Crispin <kent@songbird.com>
Date: Sat, 31 May 1997 01:49:41 +0800
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of
In-Reply-To: <199705291623.KAA00762@wombat.sk.sympatico.ca>
Message-ID: <19970530102450.17269@bywater.songbird.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


On Fri, May 30, 1997 at 11:49:19AM -0400, Rabid Wombat wrote:
> > 
> >   A major nail in the coffin of Justice for any accused in the U.S.
> > 
> > was when the justice system promoted the concept of guilt by virtue
> > 
> > of "circumstantial" evidence to the point where people can now be
> > 
> > convicted as a result of speculation rather than evidence. Prosecutors
> > 
> > now seem to need only to convince the sheeple that it was "possible"
> > 
> > for the defendant to have commited the crime and that circumstantial
> > 
> > evidence points *only* to the accused.
> > 
> 
> Yeah, right. Must be how O.J. got convicted in criminal court. Ooops - 
> just remembered that he walked. Maybe Bell can beat the wrap with a good 
> stiff-arm and a few Hertz commercials ...

I don't understand the animus against circumstantial evidence, 
frankly.  Some circumstantial evidence is extremely good evidence.  
If anything, eyewitness accounts are vastly overrated.

-- 
Kent Crispin				"No reason to get excited",
kent@songbird.com			the thief he kindly spoke...
PGP fingerprint:   B1 8B 72 ED 55 21 5E 44  61 F4 58 0F 72 10 65 55
http://songbird.com/kent/pgp_key.html