10 guilty people

[Insane_Zang]

This question has been asked many times and many people have had different answers. I want to see what everyone here thinks. Is it better to let 10 guilty people go free rather than convict one innocent person? Discuss.

[krzych32]

Yes, because what's the point of having a law if its not to protect the innocent. The only exception that I can think of is it we are talking about Canadians, because canadians don't have souls, I know that from my bible.

[jmejia1187]

May 26, 2010 0:05:41 GMT -5 Insane_Zang said:

This question has been asked many times and many people have had different answers. I want to see what everyone here thinks. Is it better to let 10 guilty people go free rather than convict one innocent person? Discuss.

Depends on what they are guilty of doing. If it is smoking marijuana. Yeah, let them go free. They weren't hurting anyone. Is it 10 mass murderers? Then I think the innocent person who will go along with them.

In this case, a lot more innocent people will die and have lives ruined if the innocent person were not in jail. Sacrifice the few to save the many.

[Cortney]

I agree with Jon...*waits for the world to end*

Yeah, if letting those 10 guilty people go would result in more deaths, then convict the innocent one. If letting those 10 guilty people go would result in some stolen cars and a bit of pot-smoking, don't convict the innocent one.

[telmac]

I have to agree. This sort of falls into "what would we sacrifice human life for?", where if losing a life saves more than one life, then its worth it.

[Nakor]

May 26, 2010 0:43:33 GMT -5 krzych32 said:

Yes, because what's the point of having a law if its not to protect the innocent. The only exception that I can think of is it we are talking about Canadians, because canadians don't have souls, I know that from my bible.

It's true. In our ancestors they froze and eventually came chipped off. Since then we've been soulless, which is why we're so friendly and peaceful now.

Also, yes. But it's also important for law enforcement to handle the case in such a way that this doesn't become necessary in the first place. (IE: Don't blow it by bringing the case without sufficient evidence and get screwed by double jeopardy.)

[telmac]

You know what would really help the whole situation is to just not have the ten murderers. If we could raise children to be mostly normal, we wouldnt have this issue.

[jmejia1187]

May 26, 2010 10:10:22 GMT -5 telmac said:

You know what would really help the whole situation is to just not have the ten murderers. If we could raise children to be mostly normal, we wouldnt have this issue.

There is no definition of normal that fits what you are saying. Most people raise their children not to kill others. However most people also cannot separate their emotions from logic, which is one reason why they kill. But if we do create a race of logic minded super beings, we should just shoot our social conventions in the foot now.

[jmejia1187]

For example:

[telmac]

The world is to confusing! But I agree. Did any of the greek philosophers ever cover this kind of subject?

[kshults]

I think that the ten guilty people will likely go off, commit more crimes, and end up in jail anyway... unless it's something terrible (murder, rape, that kind of stuff) then let the 10 guilty go free

[Joey]

It all depends on the outcome. Whichever would cause the better outcome should be done.

[jmejia1187]

Instead of figuring out who to jail and who to be free, I think it would be better to find out why people killed? Was it to get money? Was it because their significant others cheated on them?

Poverty and mental illness can be dealt with in society. If we deal with the problems the right way, perhaps we can lower the proportion of violent crimes.

I know it is off the topic, but everyone is so quick to put the murderers away without looking at what brought them to murder.

[telmac]

Be that as it may, how would you like to die?

But also, why do people kill? i mean, its always a bit extreme, I totally understand beating someone up, but why would most people who kill, do it? I dont think its all for reasons like you mentioned,

This also brings up another question: under what circumstances that someone has killed, do you classify it as a real mental choice, or something that their brain wasnt working right?

[jmejia1187]

May 26, 2010 10:52:06 GMT -5 telmac said:

Be that as it may, how would you like to die?

But also, why do people kill? i mean, its always a bit extreme, I totally understand beating someone up, but why would most people who kill, do it? I dont think its all for reasons like you mentioned,

This also brings up another question: under what circumstances that someone has killed, do you classify it as a real mental choice, or something that their brain wasnt working right?

I listed examples. Some people kill for revenge, or rage, or for some other reason of extreme emotional distress.

Many people kill for religious reasons as well. For example Lars Vilks. Many religious people, namely muslims, have tried to assassinate him for drawing a few pictures of Mohammed.

People kill for a variety of reasons, jealousy and money being some of them. When I say money, I mean they will go up to a bank, and shoot the teller to take the money, and this happens very often.

I live close to a neighborhood where people are murdered all the time. It is Soundview, Bronx, NY. Look it up on wikipedia.

Soundview is one of the poorest places in NYC. It seems there is a link between poverty and crime.

[telmac]

I mean when people kill for other reasons, not poverty. This is whe it is a problem, and the one person should go to jail, but 10 people who killed to get food on the table is very different.

[Cortney]

There's no way to eliminate murder without losing our humanity.

Reducing poverty and mental illness isn't as easy as it looks: we've been trying to do that for a while now, thanks.

Humans are extremely flawed. We do crazy shirt sometimes, and murdering is an example of that. I'm all for reducing the murder rate, don't get me wrong, but murder is such a case-by-case thing, it'd be pretty impossible.

[krzych32]

I have to stand by my previous positions. A believe that a sacrefice of an individual is allowed for the good of the society is what Fascism was bades on. If you secrefice 1 innocent person to catch 10 criminals, then you can as well secrefice 100 innocent people to catch 1000 criminals, but then aren't we missing the point of having a society in the first place?

[Ryan]

Just saying, most of the murderers in prison, are not mass murderers. Most of the rapists in prison, are not serial rapists. Most of the people are in prison for a one time offence. Even if it's a big deal (like murder or rape), I think that it would be better to let 10 guilty men go free than to send 1 innocent person to jail.


Also, I think the WYR was originally intended as a would you rather not send 10 guilty men to prison, versus send 1 innocent man to prison. Not so much as letting people go, just not catching them in the first place.

[nuttyrat]

It depends on the crime and the mental state of the guilty.