The Casey Anthony trial: thoughts?

[Trevor]

Since I've had access to Fox News, I've been both enthralled and disgusted by this trial and was seriously bummed out when the jury found her not guilty of allegedly murdering her child. There were some parts of this trial that made me go   and more that made me go   ~ any thoughts on the trial, verdict, etc?

[RCMerchant]

Personally-I thought she was guilty from day one.

[Jack]

My wife told me about that and I'm like "Huh?"   

[Mr. DS]

As mentioned in the the "random thoughts" thread, if she wasn't white and somewhat attractive no one would hardly care sadly.

[indianasmith]

I think she is probably guilty, but frankly, there was not enough evidence to convict her.  The body was too far gone when discovered.  She was guilty of acting VERY suspiciously and being a compulsive liar.  But the evidence wasn't there for a murder conviction.

[Trevor]

I think she is probably guilty, but frankly, there was not enough evidence to convict her.  The body was too far gone when discovered. 

That's the reason that I went off to sleep last night thinking "OK, not guilty" and only got the verdict this morning.

I still think that she is guilty, though.

[Flick James]

It doesn't really matter what any of us personally think. Whether she murdered her child or not, the public is always going to want a conviction. There will always be a rift between the legal presumption of innocence and the social presumption of guilt. Do I like that somebody was murdered and there is no justice? Of course not. Let's not operate under a delusion that the legal system always gets it right. However, in the big picture, I would rather 10 guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted. I also happen to believe in the death penalty, just so long as the legal presumption of innocence prevails. I don't know what that labels me. I really don't care. But, as I said at the beginning, it doesn't really matter what any of us personally think about the Casey Anthony trial.

[Flick James]

I'll add one other comment. I'm not saying that nobody should talk about it or start a thread about it. I don't want it to come across that way. I'm just saying that none of us were in the jury, and none of us saw everything that happened in the courtroom. I hope the jurors don't end up with death threats to add to their existing stress. I wouldn't want to have the responsibility that they were forced to have. I also wouldn't want to be the family of that child and have to deal with a lack of justice.

[ghouck]

I would rather 10 guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted.

For argument's sake, I always liked this response to that statement: "what about all the people those ten guilty people victimize because they were let free? You're effecting more than one innocent person negatively by letting ten guilty people free. How is that better?"

[Jack]

It really wouldn't surprise me if the news networks ran 10 - 15 of these cases past focus groups to determine which one had the most emotional impact and therefore got the go-ahead as the next national "news" story.  In fact I'd be rather surprised if they didn't.

[Flick James]

I would rather 10 guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted.

For argument's sake, I always liked this response to that statement: "what about all the people those ten guilty people victimize because they were let free? You're effecting more than one innocent person negatively by letting ten guilty people free. How is that better?"

I never claimed it didn't affect people. I simply accept as a positive the legal concept of the presumption of innocence over the presumption of guilt that the mob tends to embrace. I think all victims should have justice, but not at the expense of due process. I happen to know an entire family whose lives were turned upside down by somebody having been harassed and imprisoned for something he was not guilty of, with no due process, and that affected multiple people's lives, believe me. So yes, I believe that the imprisonment of a living innocent person to be a greater injustice than the acquittal of a guilty person. Nobody is saying you have to agree with me, but as far as my beliefs go, I will not compromise due process in favor of closure for victims. That does not make me unsympathetic.

[ghouck]

I would rather 10 guilty people go free than one innocent person be convicted.

For argument's sake, I always liked this response to that statement: "what about all the people those ten guilty people victimize because they were let free? You're effecting more than one innocent person negatively by letting ten guilty people free. How is that better?"

I never claimed it didn't affect people. I simply accept as a positive the legal concept of the presumption of innocence over the presumption of guilt that the mob tends to embrace. I think all victims should have justice, but not at the expense of due process. I happen to know an entire family whose lives were turned upside down by somebody having been harassed and imprisoned for something he was not guilty of, with no due process, and that affected multiple people's lives, believe me. So yes, I believe that the imprisonment of a living innocent person to be a greater injustice than the acquittal of a guilty person. Nobody is saying you have to agree with me, but as far as my beliefs go, I will not compromise due process in favor of closure for victims. That does not make me unsympathetic.

No need to take it personally, as I said, it's just for argument's sake, just a look on the situation from a different angle in order to spark an intelligent debate.

You say the imprisonment of an innocent person is a greater injustice than the acquittal of a guilty person, and I agree, but ten times the injustice? Still, the issue of people being victimized by those guilty people set free is often the part that is ignored. If you let 10 guilty murderers go free just to keep from putting one innocent person in prison, is that really justice? I guess that depends on your proximity to the people those 10 go and kill after going free. Do you see the point I'm getting at? There's more to it than just the guilty and innocent parties, everything else tends to get left out. So much so that you don't mention it in either of your posts. I'm not digging at you for that, it's just the ugly truth of our system, and it's generally the 'elephant in the room' that nobody talks about. I've NEVER heard anyone bring that up in a conversation/discussion until directly drilled about it, which makes me wonder if people think about it at all.

I personally feel much the same as you do, due process is paramount to a fair and just system, but am intrigued by people's positions, as the entire issue sparks emotional reactions as much as it does logic and calculated thinking. There are some places where the opposite is embraced: they would rather have ten innocent people be punished than allow one guilty person go free, and those places are in all reality laughing at us for our crime rates and recidivism. One could look at it as if our system victimizes us either way: either imprisoning us for doing nothing, or making us live in a society where criminals run amok.

[Flick James]

If you let 10 guilty murderers go free just to keep from putting one innocent person in prison, is that really justice?

Of course not. It's simply a sentiment demonstrating the absoluteness of my resolution, sort of like when Patrick Henry said "give me liberty or give me death." Clearly you see that I don't support the idea of letting bunches of criminals run free. You're just baiting me, aren't you?

[ghouck]

If you let 10 guilty murderers go free just to keep from putting one innocent person in prison, is that really justice?

Of course not. It's simply a sentiment demonstrating the absoluteness of my resolution, sort of like when Patrick Henry said "give me liberty or give me death." Clearly you see that I don't support the idea of letting bunches of criminals run free. You're just baiting me, aren't you?

No, I'm not baiting you at all, as I said, I am list looking for a discussion.

[akiratubo]

Hadn't heard of it before someone asked me what I thought of the verdict.  Looking back over the trial, the prosecution didn't have much of a case.  In fact, I'm surprised they even bothered to go to trial on the case they had.