Reggie Bautista wrote: > including the behind-the-scenes legal wrangling between the two > lawyers and the judge concerning what evidence is admissable and how > testimony can be presented. In the most recent episode, the judge > clearly didn't like the prosecutor and did everything he could to keep > the prosecutor from being able to make a good case. The judge even > banned police witnesses for the prosecution from saying that the > defendant pointed a gun at them. The police could testify that the > defendant *had* a gun in his hand, but couldn't say where it was > pointed. The judge clearly wanted to get a "not guilty" verdict from > the jury, at least in my opinion. If the judge was responsible for > the verdict, this one would have been "not guilty," and a man who > murdered his girlfriend because she dumped him would have gone free. > Question for Brin-Law... Last night on West Wing here (probably 3 seasons ago there...) the Joint Chiefs wanted to arrest a major terrorism sponsor, and they had hard evidence linking him to a barracks bombing, including forensic chemical analysis, money trails etc. All this because a prisoner under torture gave them a tip which started them looking in the right direction. Once they had a starting point they pieced together a convincing argument which was based entirely on evidence and not on the prisoner's tip. The judge ruled that all the hard evidence, forensics, documentation, everything were not admissable in court, and the whole thing collapsed. (if this is an ongoing story line, as I suspect it is, please don't tell me the outcome).
While it is obvious that the evidence gained from the prisoner should not be admitted, it seems kinda nuts to rule clear hard evidence - proof of guilt - as inadmissable. Why can't it stand on its own independent of the tainted evidence, and how permanent is the "tainting" of the hard evidence? If the point is to punish the investigators, it punishes society and the legal system far more the the investigators. (esp in this case where the investigators acting on the tip were unaware of the source of the information - the prisoner was interrogated by a foreign power who then supplied the information to the US.) Cheers Russell C.
