Alec Baldwin Kills Cinematographer

[Sue U]

Case dismissed with prejudice due to Brady/Giglio violations!!

I never thought it was a very good case to begin with, but for the state to fuck up like that on such a high-profile prosecution is bonkers. If ever there was a case where you reaaaaaallllyy want to dot your i's and cross your t's, this was it.

[ex-khobar Andy]

Is this yet another case where the prosecution errors would not have been uncovered except by high priced and very competent defense attorneys? It seems to me that Brady - if I understand correctly = turning over all evidence to the defense - must be prosecutorial 101 and if they fuck up that badly on a very high profile and closely examined case, who knows what they get away with routinely on the day-to-day stuff?

[BoSoxGal]

Is this yet another case where the prosecution errors would not have been uncovered except by high priced and very competent defense attorneys? It seems to me that Brady - if I understand correctly = turning over all evidence to the defense - must be prosecutorial 101 and if they fuck up that badly on a very high profile and closely examined case, who knows what they get away with routinely on the day-to-day stuff?

Yes, that is the state of American prosecution. It's a hard line of work if you have a strong moral core - unless you wear filters on your lenses that assist you in living in delusion.

Some here will recall that years ago when I decided to move from the public defender's office to the prosecutor's, our dearly departed Andrew D made some disparaging remarks toward me and we got into a big row over it. (We did reconcile later by PM, wherein I conceded many of his points about the state of American prosecution - which I didn't know and didn't want to believe until I saw them firsthand.)

I have always been a naive person and as a consequence my entire life has been a painful awakening as to the true nature of people and institutions. I am no saint and certainly have many flaws, but craven ambition and a capacity for dishonesty that harms others has never been among them. I made the mistake for many years of meeting people with the expectation that they all operated in their heads like I did in mine - and even now at midlife I struggle to keep the chainmail on and typically just avoid meeting new people, because I have been kicked in the teeth by the reality over and over again that the world is full of despicable types and they aren't all wearing stripes, many of them are the ones in power and control.

So the vicarious trauma I experienced over the years as a prosecutor of viewing bodies obliterated by bullets fired by loved ones and very little girls being raped by adult men and all other manner of human depravity was one of the horrors that drove me from the work, but it was actually more painful to grapple with the deep imperfections in the system and the people who make the system.

If the system was always striving to be the best it could be and the actors in it were honest and fair and only occasionally made honest mistakes, a person could deal with the pain of all the ugly things broken people do to break other people in this world. But to realize that the system itself is sick and broken and full of many bad actors - that was too much for my brain to bear.

In my heart I still hold the ideal that most cops are good and most prosecutors are good and just trying to do their jobs and be the line between depravity and the good people they love, their neighbors and communities. I still want to believe it. It's easier to believe it from the outside looking in.

Was it Plato who said - quoting Socrates? - that the only people who should hold power are those who don't want it? It would be a good thing to live in such a world, I think.

[Big RR]

Sad but true BSG. When I was in private practice, I was offered an opportunity to become a municipal prosecutor; it's a much lower echelon court, but because it is, the abuses are worse. People are immediately presumed guilty and the push is to get a plea agreement where the municipality collects a fine--prosecutors can offer reduced (or even no) license points, but when someone dared to try and insist on a trial, it usually wasn't very pretty--especially for the others sitting int he courtroom and seeing the consequences. Cops would routinely lie and the judge would many times even ignore the law; it could be appealed to superior court, but for a few hundred dollar fine, few would try to take that on and the courts knew it. I would counsel my clients on how to practically survive in the system (and usually got them the best plea I could, even if they were not guilty), but could not see myself becoming part of it on the prosecutorial side and declined. DUI is a gigantic boondoggle which no one wants to take on; there are some practitioners who claim success in defending against them, but if the evidence is shaky, so is what's offered (even though you are not supposed to plea bargain this charge--I had a few shaky cases reduced to wet careless driving--a fine but no suspension--even though in a fair forum I think we could have won.

[Jarlaxle]

Prosecutors typically have the morals of Vasily Blohkin and the ethics of Stalin.

[Burning Petard]

Jaraxle, they are the prosecutors we want. They are lawyers, The generally appear in court defending the people, or the state. It is trial by combat and we want the very beast (meanest, willing to do anything to win) to be in there fighting for us. Unhappily, IMNSHO, the Supremes are producing a general trend to abandon the idea that in the USofA, sovereignty is held by the people. They are returning us to a condition that we the people are ruled by another human being who is the sovereign.

And oh boy, the prospects are clear that the sovereign is certainly full of human frailties.

snailgate.

[Jarlaxle]

Jaraxle, they are the prosecutors we want. They are lawyers, The generally appear in court defending the people, or the state. It is trial by combat and we want the very beast (meanest, willing to do anything to win) to be in there fighting for us. Unhappily, IMNSHO, the Supremes are producing a general trend to abandon the idea that in the USofA, sovereignty is held by the people. They are returning us to a condition that we the people are ruled by another human being who is the sovereign.

And oh boy, the prospects are clear that the sovereign is certainly full of human frailties.

snailgate.

Thats idiotic. That's the type that sends innocent people to death row.

[Big RR]

And that's one of the reasons we should not have a a death penalty.

[Jarlaxle]

WHOOSH

[liberty]

Is this yet another case where the prosecution errors would not have been uncovered except by high priced and very competent defense attorneys? It seems to me that Brady - if I understand correctly = turning over all evidence to the defense - must be prosecutorial 101 and if they fuck up that badly on a very high profile and closely examined case, who knows what they get away with routinely on the day-to-day stuff?

Yes, that is the state of American prosecution. It's a hard line of work if you have a strong moral core - unless you wear filters on your lenses that assist you in living in delusion.

Some here will recall that years ago when I decided to move from the public defender's office to the prosecutor's, our dearly departed Andrew D made some disparaging remarks toward me and we got into a big row over it. (We did reconcile later by PM, wherein I conceded many of his points about the state of American prosecution - which I didn't know and didn't want to believe until I saw them firsthand.)

I have always been a naive person and as a consequence my entire life has been a painful awakening as to the true nature of people and institutions. I am no saint and certainly have many flaws, but craven ambition and a capacity for dishonesty that harms others has never been among them. I made the mistake for many years of meeting people with the expectation that they all operated in their heads like I did in mine - and even now at midlife I struggle to keep the chainmail on and typically just avoid meeting new people, because I have been kicked in the teeth by the reality over and over again that the world is full of despicable types and they aren't all wearing stripes, many of them are the ones in power and control.

So the vicarious trauma I experienced over the years as a prosecutor of viewing bodies obliterated by bullets fired by loved ones and very little girls being raped by adult men and all other manner of human depravity was one of the horrors that drove me from the work, but it was actually more painful to grapple with the deep imperfections in the system and the people who make the system.

If the system was always striving to be the best it could be and the actors in it were honest and fair and only occasionally made honest mistakes, a person could deal with the pain of all the ugly things broken people do to break other people in this world. But to realize that the system itself is sick and broken and full of many bad actors - that was too much for my brain to bear.

In my heart I still hold the ideal that most cops are good and most prosecutors are good and just trying to do their jobs and be the line between depravity and the good people they love, their neighbors and communities. I still want to believe it. It's easier to believe it from the outside looking in.

Was it Plato who said - quoting Socrates? - that the only people who should hold power are those who don't want it? It would be a good thing to live in such a world, I think.

I've always thought the most dangerous place for an innocent person to be is in a court of law; there's just too many people lawyers, prosecutors, judges, and jurors that don't take their duty seriously enough.