Author Topic: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?  (Read 37564 times)

yossarian22c

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #50 on: October 20, 2021, 02:37:41 PM »
"Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?"
...
You're going to get stuck paying the $500 deductible and nobody is going to care and nobody is going to do anything. If your community did care and had some kind of neighborhood watch and confronted thieves during crimes in progress or right afterwards then you're going to get people hurt and killed as a result just like we saw with Arbery. Let's say the police did catch Arbery. Would they have done anything? Almost certainly no, nothing at all. We're already passed the point anyone really relies on the law to protect them particularly when it comes to property crimes. The vast majority of people just give up and live with it.

Can anyone blame people who get fed up? Yeah, Democrats can. Just stop whining and suffer your fate.

What did Arbery do? Walk through an open construction site? The men who stopped him weren't the owners. WTF do you expect the police to do? Should I call the police on everyone who walks through my yard while our walking their dog. Have them get a ticket for trespass? The police would tell me to go away as they should. Seriously, how would you react if someone confronted you this way over speeding, jaywalking, or walking through a neighbors yard?

rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #51 on: October 20, 2021, 02:50:15 PM »
Cherrypoptart You seem to be trying to convince yourself.

The key is in the statement "communities to take action to protect themselves as much as the law allows". With in the law something the GOP used to believe in.

Can anyone blame people who get fed up and take matters into their own hands and apply 'justice' as they see fit?  I don't blame people who get fed up for being fed up, even so they still remain accountable for their actions. If they go outside the law to do so then society must hold them accountable. A society without boundaries will soon be a failed society. Vigilantism won't work as a foundation for a the creating a healthy society.  And you know it.

As Yossarian noted you wouldn't abide being treated as Arbery was.

How does your argument work for cooperate crime?  Which tribe is more likely to look away in that scenario?
« Last Edit: October 20, 2021, 02:56:08 PM by rightleft22 »

Fenring

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #52 on: October 20, 2021, 03:06:13 PM »
That's no excuse for vigilantes to take the law into their own hands but it is a reason for communities to take action to protect themselves as much as the law allows and often that will be beyond what liberals contend is appropriate, but then those liberals don't really care if your catalytic converter is stolen and a couple of thousand dollars worth of damage is done to your car for the thieves to make a couple of hundred dollars if that.

It sounds like you're saying that vigilantism is not moral, and that communities should do neighborhood action within the law? But that you maybe sympathize with the desire to be a vigilante?

I will note that the subject of vigilantism vs staying within the legal framework doesn't require the premise that only police officers can keep the peace. In fact a system where only police officers uphold the law is a pretty bad one. There can be other checks and balances on bad behavior other than guys with guns and a badge, especially because they are particularly bad at certain types of community relations. So having multiple levels of vigilance, including the police, neighborhood watches, hotlines, and other groups, can certainly all fall within the law (and probably is closer to the type of setup originally conceived when the laws were made). Vigilantism is specifically about disregarding the law and having a local law that's understood to supercede it, on a community or individual level.

Since you, yourself, mentioned the corruption in Mexico, do you think the citizens there are morally obligated to follow the dictates of the police/cartel operation, or are they entitled to say screw that and use their own common sense? Note the topic is morality, not practicality. That it might get you killed could be a disincentive, but is not on its face a moral dilemma.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #53 on: October 20, 2021, 03:29:51 PM »
In Mexico, people were seeing their family members murdered by the cartels with impunity, sometimes for the offense of refusing to join. It was moral for those communities to protect themselves even though sometimes it was illegal and often it was discouraged by the police, but most of the time in the end the law came around to the side of the people trying to protect themselves.

That wasn't just a question of morality either but also practicality as well because the cartels were already killing them.

People shouldn't be vigilantes but there's often a big grey area especially in America.

"Should I call the police on everyone who walks through my yard while our walking their dog. Have them get a ticket for trespass?"

A better analogy is you leave your garage door open and they walk around in there. But with your yard if you post keep off the grass and no trespassing signs on your yard and people just ignore them then you call the police and they tell you to stop bothering them, maybe even write you ticket for wasting their time, then what? People can just walk over your lawn as they please, step on your pop-up sprinklers and accidentally break them? Do it every day as they walk their dog until your trampled grass shows their clear walking path? Maybe toss their cigarette butts in your tree beds while they're at it?

Some of us are trying to live in a society here.

So you try to talk to them and they ignore you. You call the police and they ignore you too. Maybe even get you doxxed and cost you your job or even prosecute you and send you to counseling.

That's a justice system so broken that though vigilantism still isn't moral it would be crazy to think some people aren't going to just snap.

It's interesting that there is more sympathy for criminals than there is for the people who are tired of them.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #54 on: October 20, 2021, 03:38:59 PM »
Snap over someone cutting across your yard? You've got mental problems if that triggers you so badly. Say something to somebody? Fine. Somebody in my neighborhood noticed somebody sitting in a parked car that they didn't recognize. They went up and asked if everything was okay. The person said they were waiting for someone. My neighbor didn't like that answer and alerted the entire neighborhood over Facebook.

Fine. I think she's a crazy busybody, but she is benign. She didn't charge over there with weapon on hand, or gather up a freaking posse. Sometimes it seems that my neighbors have a mentality like we're under seige. Some packages have probably been stolen. Yes that's a thing. No, cops don't care and won't do anything about it even if you have surveillance footage and a license plate number.

What's a greater risk to society, a couple of stolen packages or innocent people winding up dead because you were mad that your jeans got stolen from your porch this one time, and now you're creeping around the neighborhood on the lookout for nefarious vehicles with out of state plates, or driving too slowly, or stopped in front of your house? Because you have this emotional problem with feeling powerless.

Do us a favor, and get your packages delivered to the post office instead. But that would be too practical.

oldbrian

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #55 on: October 20, 2021, 04:13:26 PM »
Cherrypoptart:
Quote
It's interesting that there is more sympathy for criminals than there is for the people who are tired of them.

Sympathy for the victims.

There were two crimes in the Arbery case: trespassing, and murder.  Which victim gets your sympathy?  The house owner who was trespassed upon, or the murder victim?

And could you please at least think about Drake's question:  what if you were driving to the grocery store and when you got to the parking lot three black guys waving guns approached you and said they needed to talk to you about something.  What would your reaction be?  And if it turns out they witnessed you driving over the limit on your way to the store, and wanted to perform a 'citizens arrest' on you, would you believe they were on the up-and-up?

rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #56 on: October 20, 2021, 05:13:55 PM »
Quote
It's interesting that there is more sympathy for criminals than there is for the people who are tired of them.

Laws do not deal in sympathy.

I have a great deal of sympathy and empathy for someone who has had enough. Still Society must hold them (and myself) accountable if anyone acts outside the law. Especially if they get things really wrong and act out on bias's .

I don't want to be treated that way so can not treat others that way regardless of sympathy. Slippery slope to the rule by warlords.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #57 on: October 20, 2021, 05:29:58 PM »
Do I have more sympathy for the poacher who had the temerity to hunt on the kings land, or for the feudal lord who stabbed the poacher?

I have lots of sympathy for the victim of the trespass. Who was that again?

The attorney for the homeowner, English, has explicitly said nothing was ever taken from the build site.

In statement released this week, his lawyer said, "Even if theft or damage had occurred, however, the Englishes would never have wanted a vigilante response. The Englishes did not know the McMichaels. The Englishes never enlisted the McMichaels to do what they did and do not want to be part of any effort to justify the McMichaels' actions." 

The lawyers for Arbery's family said they "appreciate the homeowner acknowledging that Mr. Arbery didn’t steal from or damage anything on the property."

"It is the homeowner’s opinion, after watching Mr. Arbery’s movements on the video, that he briefly stopped into the home under construction to get a drink of water from the working sinks," they said.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #58 on: October 20, 2021, 05:35:07 PM »
"There were two crimes in the Arbery case: trespassing, and murder.  Which victim gets your sympathy?"

There was also assault. Arbery wasn't killed for trespassing. He was killed after he assaulted those guys. Kind of like Trayvon. Now it may be those men assaulted him first. Maybe they didn't make physical contact but assault can mean under some legal definitions the perception of a threat to hurt you. I can appreciate the argument that Arbery felt like he was the one under assault and needed to defend himself. If Arbery had a gun pointed at him that's definitely assault. Now if the guy was just carrying the gun then maybe not so much.

We can even wonder if Arbery had won that fight and taken that shotgun away and then killed those two guys, would that have been self-defense? There's a very good argument for it.

The Arbery case isn't the best one for trying to make any of the points I'm making. The George Zimmerman case was better. Most of the same people who think Arbery was murdered think Trayvon Martin was murdered too so I'd be better off using Zimmerman to make my case especially since he was already found not guilty in a court of law.

As for him some gun waving gentlemen wanted to conduct a citizen's arrest against me for speeding, yeah that is problematic. You get back to the reasonable person standard. Would a reasonable person be justified in using force at that point? Was Arbery? Maybe. There's a case to be made for it.

But again, it's like I said, usually the left is all about sympathy for the criminals. Let's assume these guys are the criminals? Where's their sympathy? Nowhere. Where is the consideration for their intent? Nowhere.

Often the left is all about intent. Was it the intent of these guys to be criminals? To commit murder? To drive around until they found a black man to kill? I don't think so, but that's how they're being treated. Their intent was to be law abiding citizens and to protect their community and it seems like that only makes people hate them even more.

rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #59 on: October 20, 2021, 05:46:35 PM »
How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?

The question feels like a false dilemma.

At the stage where a system is so broken that it can't be repaired from within and that view is held by the greater majority what you have is a Failed state.  At such a point what is called for isn't vigilantism.
If a small self-appointed group of people deems the system so broken it can't be repaired from within the system and acts against the majority your not a vigilante your the Talban.

If the system is broken that a individual vigilantism points to the problem which is then addressed I guess that might be moral... even so the system must hold the individual accountable. 

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #60 on: October 20, 2021, 05:52:30 PM »
"The attorney for the homeowner, English, has explicitly said nothing was ever taken from the build site."

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/18/us/ahmaud-arbery-surveillance-timeline/index.html

"English previously told CNN that someone stole $2,500 worth of "off-shore tackle" from a boat in his garage, but said he could not identify the perpetrator, the theft was not captured on his video, he did not remember the date of the incident and no police report was filed."

I don't know if this boat was in the garage at the address in question or what but why mention it if it wasn't?

Also, many stories bring up the discrepancy between statements about there being a lot of thefts in the area and there not being police reports about such thefts. Then we get this statement about a theft that wasn't reported. That gets back to the reality that people don't bother reporting thefts because they know it's a waste of time, the only exception sometimes being if insurance will cover it.

As for what the Englishes are saying now, they sound exactly like the store owner whose employee called the police on George Floyd. They are scared to death of the mob and are doing everything they can to appease it.


rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #61 on: October 20, 2021, 05:55:46 PM »
Quote
But again, it's like I said, usually the left is all about sympathy for the criminals

Your augment makes no sense. The vigilante's created a situation that made the victim a criminal thus excusing their actions. Judge Jury and executers.  People sympathize with that because they can imaging something like that happening to them and not liking the outcome.

If you operate outside the Law your held accountable. Sympathy may impact the sentence but not the accountability.
« Last Edit: October 20, 2021, 05:59:34 PM by rightleft22 »

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #62 on: October 20, 2021, 07:14:55 PM »
Okay, I was wrong about nothing ever being taken from English. I'll own up to that error. And I understand why someone might not choose to file a report. Especially for stolen goods that might not be easy to identify even if it does get recovered. But by your admission, English has no idea who did it, or even when it happened?

What did those guys think was going to happen? They take him into custody on citizens arrest and then what? There's no evidence of anything, even if a prosecutor did decide to bother with it. It appears to me that if they didn't plan to do him harm, which isn't clear, their plan was likely to threaten and intimidate him.

What baffles me is not the idea that reasonable people might consider them innocent, but that they didn't even do anything inadvisable. That they are somehow to be admired for their actions.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #63 on: October 20, 2021, 08:50:48 PM »
I think they just wanted to talk to him and have the police talk to him. If they had just been out to murder a black man why would they have called the police?

My idea of what they thought would happen is they'd talk to him and ask him if he'd been in the house under construction and then he'd say yes or no and if yes they'd ask what he was doing and then he'd give some sort of explanation and hopefully by then the police would show up and they'd go from there.

Instead they were surprised when he suddenly attacked them and they were in a fight for their lives.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #64 on: October 20, 2021, 09:14:38 PM »
We see what happens when a broken justice system like the one in Chicago in order to stop people from committing felonies just changes the definition of what a felony is, and there are no consequences for criminal activity. This is the broken window syndrome on steroids. Not only do you not fix the broken windows but you stop doing anything meaningful about serious everyday crime. It just leads to constant escalation. The criminals will take it as far as society lets them, and then some. Give them an inch and they will take it a mile, a Magnificent Mile even.

And you know while the politicians and the police do nothing to stop the criminals, if citizens tried to do anything to protect themselves they'd get the full force of the law dropped on them like a box of hammers.

https://chicago.cbslocal.com/2021/10/20/michigan-avenue-magnificent-mile-crime/





rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #65 on: October 21, 2021, 09:47:05 AM »
Quote
I think they just wanted to talk to him and have the police talk to him

So understanding. I'm chasing you and have weapons why don't you want to talk to us?

You want us to feel sympathy for vigilantes because they had enough. And the man murdered, he probably did something so deserved what he got, no sympathy their.  Just a innocent encounter gone bad... But hay if he ran he was guilty and if he fought he was guilty.

Your sympathy and understanding for those two men that created the situation is....  I wonder though if you protest to much and that at some level of awareness you know your undermining your own values and are ashamed.

I wonder what you would do if walking down the street and  two men started to chase you in a pickup with weapons  asked you to stop and have a conversation.  If you might wonder if they would believe whatever you had to say or had already formed their opinion. Just a innocent encounter how could anyone imagine it to go so wrong.

I wonder how the main line right media would still report such sympathy if the two men who just wanting to talk were black and the man murdered was white. Some how I can't picture it.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #66 on: October 21, 2021, 11:03:24 AM »
Straw man. I never asserted that they were out to murder the guy. Just that they wanted to intimidate him, and maybe rough him up.

I can see you feel your argument slipping away when you have to start throwing up irrelevance in Chicago.

Tried to do anything to protect themselves? From your neighbors tackle box being stolen?

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #67 on: October 21, 2021, 11:15:12 AM »
I have a proposal to stop crime, though. 24/7 surveillance with motion detection, pattern recognition, face recognition. And yet it's the conservatives who fight against even automated traffic tickets.

yossarian22c

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #68 on: October 21, 2021, 11:19:05 AM »
...
We can even wonder if Arbery had won that fight and taken that shotgun away and then killed those two guys, would that have been self-defense? There's a very good argument for it.
...

You have your answer. The two rednecks in the pick up were in the wrong. They instigated a situation in which you see them getting killed and Arbery having not committed a crime then its pretty inconcevable they're actions were legal or wise.

Maybe these two idiots weren't out looking to kill someone but they clearly aggressively confronted a black man for being black in the wrong neighborhood. They brought the guns, they were the aggressors, Arbery clearly tried to keep jogging around the truck in the video. Something made him stop to try to get the gun away. The most likely explanation for his change in tactics is either the man tried to physically stop him or pointed the gun at him.

If these two "vigilantes" are innocent via self defense then anyone can get away with murder. Pull a gun on someone in the street make sure they know they can't run because you're in a vehicle and when they fight you shoot them and claim self defense because you were assaulted. Might as well legalize murder at that point.

I think vigilantes is too kind a word for these guys.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #69 on: October 21, 2021, 05:55:34 PM »
This wasn't just some random guy on the street though. He had just trespassed. A lot is made of the fact that he didn't steal or damage anything but they didn't know that yet.

Many states are doing away with citizen's arrest laws completely. Maybe that's the way to go if people don't want to see situations like this happening. The fact that they had guns is a legitimate issue and I can see a reasonable person feeling like their life is in danger but there isn't a law yet in that state that you can only make a citizen's arrest if you are unarmed either.

"They instigated a situation..."

Did they though? Or did Arbery instigate a situation after trespassing? If he had just jogged through the neighborhood and never illegally gone into that house would any of this have happened? I don't want to blame the victim but after what he had just done, and knowing he was seen and running right after he saw someone watching him in the house, he had to have some inkling that this wasn't just a couple of random racist hicks looking for trouble.

And speaking of a broken justice system, it's interesting how many facts the jury must be kept from knowing in order to have a "fair" trial. The only way to get a fair jury is to make sure they are as ignorant as possible. A justice system that isn't broken would let the jury have ALL of the facts and then let them decide what's relevant and what's not.

https://www.newsweek.com/suppressed-ahmaud-arbery-documents-accidentally-shared-court-juror-pool-1640641

"The documents include details of Arbery's mental health and past criminal history, both of which a judge had ruled as inadmissible in court, Vice News reported."


rightleft22

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #70 on: October 21, 2021, 06:17:07 PM »
Quote
This wasn't just some random guy on the street though. He had just trespassed. A lot is made of the fact that he didn't steal or damage anything but they didn't know that yet.

They didn't know and couldn't know. Do you think they were prepared to believe whatever this not random guy said? Can you imagine how this black man experienced the encounter?

If you took a shortcut in a neighborhood and technically trespassed and two Black men in a muscle car with weapons came after you. How would you feel about the encounter?
Same rules apply if you run your guilty, if you defend yourself verbally or physically your guilty...

Why do you find it so necessary to defend these two guys?
What type of world does your position on white vigilantism create? 

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #71 on: October 21, 2021, 06:41:52 PM »
The concern in the end is that it will be illegal for citizens to protect themselves and their property and their communities and as we've seen the police won't do it either and in fact in Portland the police are arguing that it's now illegal for them to protect your property. We saw it in Baltimore too where the mayor gave rioters "space to destroy".

As usual the Democrats will go too far and end up making things even worse, getting much more of what they are trying to stop, in this case by outlawing citizen's arrests as vigilantism and then preventing the police from protecting the public, they will only be encouraging eventual worse forms of vigilantism as our society breaks down in anarchy and chaos.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #72 on: October 21, 2021, 07:05:06 PM »
Where did you get the idea he had been spotted by anyone at the construction property that day?

As for his past history, their actions wouldn't be any better or worse if he turned out to be a major drug lord or if he had killed his grandparents for entertainment.

And no, it doesn't make sense to create a potentially lethal confrontation to stop people from breaking windows.

I wonder if you'd be just fine with the star trek society in the TNG episode "Justice", where Wesley crusher is sentenced to death for trespassing.

Here's the thing. Society isn't going to crumble if we let people get away with minor non violent transgressions sometimes.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #73 on: October 21, 2021, 08:29:11 PM »
"Where did you get the idea he had been spotted by anyone at the construction property that day?"

The media has done a really bad job of laying out the timeline of what actually happened that day. Could it be because if they did then it wouldn't fit the narrative they are trying to promulgate?

I'd be interested in knowing the idea that you and others have gotten so far about what happened? I mean y'all are all ready to string things guys up based on the information the media has so far provided so what do you think happened?

These guys were just riding around armed in their pickup truck and they saw a black guy out jogging so they decided to perform a citizen's arrest on him for the crime of jogging while black and he naturally assumed they were going to lynch him so tried to defend himself and was murdered?

Is that what the media has told you because that's what I'm getting.

And it's interesting because when you try to search for timeline of events in the case you don't get the timeline of what actually happened. You get the timeline after what happened up to the jury selection. This is what I'm talking about with the media constantly practicing deception.

Here's one example among many:

https://www.firstcoastnews.com/article/news/crime/ahmaud-arbery/ahmaud-arbery-death-timeline-accused-killers-travis-mcmichael-gregory-mcmichael-william-roddy-bryan/77-1ef4a227-fcd2-426c-b4da-b238a3c24fca

So you want a timeline and their timeline starts when he was shot. Real helpful.

And here's the BBC:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52623151

So no mention of why these guys wanted to talk to Arbery. Just a black guy jogging through the neighborhood.

Even Fox news starts their timeline with when he was shot and killed:

https://www.fox23.com/news/trending/timeline-investigation-into-killing-ahmaud-arbery/WTSVQV7ZIFFT5FNHK4MW45R5ZM/

Same thing with CNN:

https://edition.cnn.com/2021/10/18/us/ahmaud-arbery-case-timeline/index.html

----------------------------------------------------------

So why did these guys try to perform a citizen's arrest and detain Arbery?

All the stories mention that there were rumors of thefts in the area without police reports to back them up. So these guys just see a black jogger and try to citizen's arrest him? That's what happened?

I just spent too long looking for the actual timeline and can't find it. Also no more references to the other videos of someone who may or may not have been Arbery going through that house on previous occasions. I did see a reference to the family saying they won't comment on those other videos and whether that is or isn't Arbery. Honestly what I was looking for was a reference to why those guys were after Arbery. Did they get a phone call about someone just going into that house and the person matching Arbery's description? Did English mention to them or somebody else that he'd been having problems with people going into the property and he'd appreciate if they could keep an eye on it? If he didn't then why put up the camera and if he didn't mind then why put up the NO TRESPASSING sign? I thought I'd read something about all of that when the story was just coming out but if so all of that information has been purged from the internet, or at least hidden so well that I can no longer find it.

And that's the danger that nobody seems very concerned with, that our news media doesn't tell us the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. They are like the judges and we are the juries and they'll decide what information is pertinent and what isn't in order for us to come to a "correct" decision.

The thread is about the justice system and we also have to consider how often nowadays cases are tried in the court of public opinion. When information and facts are withheld by the media that's also a corruption of the justice system.

"Here's the thing. Society isn't going to crumble if we let people get away with minor non violent transgressions sometimes."

Beg to differ. That's exactly how it starts.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #74 on: October 21, 2021, 09:23:14 PM »
"Here's the thing. Society isn't going to crumble if we let people get away with minor non violent transgressions sometimes."

Speak of the devil...

https://californiaglobe.com/local/san-francisco/exclusive-iconic-target-store-in-mission-district-to-close-amid-a-shoplifting-tidal-wave/

"Mayor London Breed challenged that narrative. She attributed the closings to demographic shifts and the Chronicle dutifully reported that “the five stores slated to close had fewer than two recorded shoplifting incidents a month on average since 2018” (while acknowledging that few stores bother to report a crime that now routinely goes unpunished). Everyone who has stood in line at a drugstore and watched thieves shove hundreds of dollars of items down their pants knew that Breed was mistaken at best or lying at worst.


Now, in a Globe exclusive, San Francisco Police Department has revealed that the iconic Target on Mission Street between Third and Fourth Streets will be shutting its doors before the end of the year.

“This store loses $25,000 a day to shoplifting,” an SFPD officer told the Globe in lengthy, taped interviews conducted this week. “That’s $25,000 that walks out the door on average between 9 and 6 every day.”

(The Globe is redacting the officers’ names because of critical remarks made about Mayor London Breed and District Attorney Chesa Boudin that could potentially endanger their jobs.)

“This store does between $80,000 to $120,000 in sales every day. And they lose 25 of it [meaning $25,000]. Even if they’re making 25% profit, the stealing takes that down to zero.”

Asked if the presence of armed, uniformed police officers had any deterrent effect on thieves, one officer was blunt in his assessment.

“They don’t care. There’s no consequences. Literally zero consequences. I’ve kicked out… I’ve been here since 9 AM today. I probably have already kicked out eight or nine people and I’ve recovered a thousand dollars worth of stuff alone off of that. Whether we kick them out, tell them they can’t come back, whether I put them in handcuffs and take them down to the county jail—there is no difference. Because they will not be prosecuted by the district attorney. Therefore, there is nothing documented that they can’t come back here. You know, they get no time in jail to think about what they did, right? There is zero consequence. And that’s why in this store the same exact people come in every other day and in the city the same couple percent of people are the same people committing all the car break-ins, all the robberies and all the shootings, any aggravated assaults right in town where there’s more street people, people fighting. It’s all the same exact people, and there are zero consequences. Therefore you take them to jail they get out of jail. They do it again. It’s a big circle.”

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #75 on: October 21, 2021, 11:34:42 PM »
I'm getting my information as direct quotes provided by the men and their defense attorney. As reported by Breitbart and newsmax who are fawning all over these guys as martyrs.

Neither of the men stated they saw arbery until seeing him run in the street. They had seen previous surveillance video provided by the property owner and assumed it was the same guy and /or made a positive Id. The owner stipulated that he never got anybody on video the day he was actually robbed. So we have no idea if it was the black guy who might be arbery, or one of the neighborhood kids also caught on video. Whom nobody seemed to want to track down.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #76 on: October 22, 2021, 12:02:48 AM »
So what made these guys get involved at all?

Why were they out on that road in their truck, armed, exactly where and when Arbery was jogging?

Nobody called them?

Were they out on patrol? Making their rounds? Going to or coming from work?

Then they just happen to see Arbery jogging and they think he might be responsible for the recent rash of burglaries that nobody reported to the police so they decide to call the police on him and perform a citizen's arrest?

Something just isn't adding up here. It's almost like there are pieces of the puzzle missing.


TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #77 on: October 22, 2021, 01:16:14 AM »
You tell me. According to their own accounts, they were aware of and pissed off (presumably) that there were some robberies in the neighborhood. As far as I've heard from them, they weren't patrolling, but happened to be keeping an eye out. I haven't found a detailed blow by blow from them. In the absence of information, you are making your own assumptions. Don't you think if they had witnessed this guy on that property, they would be saying so? Where is your source of information?

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #78 on: October 22, 2021, 08:55:16 AM »
https://www.news4jax.com/news/local/2020/06/06/gbi-testimony-reveals-new-details-about-what-happened-the-day-ahmaud-arbery-was-killed/

"The 25-year-old is first seen on surveillance video wandering into an open construction site in the Glynn County neighborhood Satilla Shores on the day of the deadly shooting.

Not long after Arbery enters the construction site, a neighbor is seen on camera standing on the front lawn of the house right across the street. Records show the neighbor called 911 complaining that a guy was in the unfinished home.

Video shows Arbery run out of the house and past the neighbor as he’s on the phone with the dispatcher.

“There he goes right now,” the neighbor told the dispatcher.

The lead investigator for the Ahmaud Arbery GBI investigation testified during the preliminary hearing Thursday. GBI Special Agent Richard Dial said according to Gregory McMichael – he saw Arbery run past his home.


Dial said according to testimony from Greg McMichael he didn’t know if Arbery had stolen anything, but his “instinct” or “gut feeling” told him Arbery was responsible for the thefts in the neighborhood.

Police reports state McMichael went back into his home to tell his son Travis who he saw running past their house. Greg McMichael then grabbed his Glynn County department-issued pistol, Travis grabbed a pump-action shotgun and they left their driveway in Travis’s truck in the direction Arbery was running.

“They caught up with Ahmaud Arbery as he was running,” Dial said."

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Okay, that is not a good look for the McMichaels. I still don't trust the media to tell the whole truth and we saw that with the Zimmerman case, the case in Ferguson, and many others, but if they just saw a black man running past their house and decided to chase him down and perform a citizen's arrest on him then I'm starting to lose interest in defending the McMichaels in the court of public opinion.  I'm not seeing where the McMichaels called the police either, just the neighbor.

I could say some not so nice things like I wonder if the thefts around the neighborhood, if there were any, stopped, but I won't speculate on that. Even if they did it wouldn't mean Arbery was responsible and even if he was the way some of the citizens handled it does expose them to the possibility of legal trouble. Well we'll see how it goes.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #79 on: October 22, 2021, 09:56:52 AM »
I appreciate your willingness to reconsider.

You have asked why I have sympathy for a law breaker. Simply put, unequal treatment. How many times did this neighbor see other people on that site and not call the police? We know from first hand statements, arbery was far from the only person caught on video. Why are you even now speculating that he was the neighborhood burglar, and not one of the trespassing kids who are guilty of the trespass?

kidv

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #80 on: October 22, 2021, 10:07:17 AM »
Cherry- Some of the key followup is then the McMichaels and a third man, who was videoing while driving his own car, followed Arbery around in their cars for 15 minutes trying to corral Arbery between the two cars, driving ahead, trying to cut Arbery off and eventually succeeding in running Arbery to ground.  So you could chillingly sort of envision three armed men [You can hear the third man rack his pistol on the video just before the shooting] running an unarmed black man to ground for 15 minutes before the ultimate denouement.

kidv

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #81 on: October 22, 2021, 10:27:22 AM »
edit - chased for 4 minutes.

TheDeamon

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #82 on: October 22, 2021, 12:06:19 PM »
Snap over someone cutting across your yard? You've got mental problems if that triggers you so badly.

And then you eventually get sued when someone has a trip and fall incident on your property resulting in a lasting injury because of something left out in your yard. If you're not doing anything about the tresspassers cutting across your yard, that must be defacto permission to use it as a short cut after all. In that case, calling the cops periodically to at least formally complain about it is potentially going to give a legal defense should a worst case event occur on your property. It demonstrates you were aware of it, and had taken actions to address it (contacted the police), but the police were useless, so if anyone should be getting sued for that injury, it's the police for failing to respond to the trespass complaints and creating the preconditions for what happened.

Of course, those same complaints become a legal double-edged sword, as it also means you've demonstrated awareness that tresspass is common on your property, and thus you should have taken "reasonable precautions" to prevent trespassers from being harmed while on your property.

TheDeamon

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #83 on: October 22, 2021, 12:12:40 PM »
"The attorney for the homeowner, English, has explicitly said nothing was ever taken from the build site."

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/18/us/ahmaud-arbery-surveillance-timeline/index.html

"English previously told CNN that someone stole $2,500 worth of "off-shore tackle" from a boat in his garage, but said he could not identify the perpetrator, the theft was not captured on his video, he did not remember the date of the incident and no police report was filed."

I don't know if this boat was in the garage at the address in question or what but why mention it if it wasn't?

Also, many stories bring up the discrepancy between statements about there being a lot of thefts in the area and there not being police reports about such thefts. Then we get this statement about a theft that wasn't reported. That gets back to the reality that people don't bother reporting thefts because they know it's a waste of time, the only exception sometimes being if insurance will cover it.

As for what the Englishes are saying now, they sound exactly like the store owner whose employee called the police on George Floyd. They are scared to death of the mob and are doing everything they can to appease it.

Words mean things. Off-shore tackle isn't construction equipment, and the boat was likely not on what they'd define as "the construction site" when it experienced its theft incident. The fun thing about lawyers is you have to remember about being very careful about defining terms and precise about how you interpret their word usage.

yossarian22c

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #84 on: October 22, 2021, 12:19:50 PM »
Snap over someone cutting across your yard? You've got mental problems if that triggers you so badly.

And then you eventually get sued when someone has a trip and fall incident on your property resulting in a lasting injury because of something left out in your yard.
...

Listening to you and Cherry fret about trespassing I'm amazed I survived childhood without someone shooting me for trespassing by cutting across a lawn or wooded area on my way to my friends houses or just out playing. Somehow survived without being shot or ever arrested for trespass. Good thing I'm not black.

yossarian22c

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #85 on: October 22, 2021, 12:38:25 PM »
Okay, that is not a good look for the McMichaels. I still don't trust the media to tell the whole truth and we saw that with the Zimmerman case, the case in Ferguson, and many others, but if they just saw a black man running past their house and decided to chase him down and perform a citizen's arrest on him then I'm starting to lose interest in defending the McMichaels in the court of public opinion.  I'm not seeing where the McMichaels called the police either, just the neighbor.

I could say some not so nice things like I wonder if the thefts around the neighborhood, if there were any, stopped, but I won't speculate on that. Even if they did it wouldn't mean Arbery was responsible and even if he was the way some of the citizens handled it does expose them to the possibility of legal trouble. Well we'll see how it goes.

And there is the problem with the neighborhood not even bothering to report the break ins. We don't know how wide spread the thefts were. Yes I know the police aren't going to spend 10k+ on time, forensics, and investigating to recover 1k of stolen goods and the perpetrator is unlikely to be caught. However, not reporting it at all lets the crime go unnoticed completely by police. Collect ring camera footage, eventually the police may stumble across the guy and get him to plea bargain out on the robberies. Using guns and two cars to chase down every black man that wanders through your neighborhood isn't the answer. I can't see caring about crime that much and not caring enough to spend 30 minutes talking to the cops. Hell, if you really care, walk around the neighborhood and collect and review door bell footage yourself. Probably nothing will come of it, but filing a police report and reviewing security footage isn't going to end up with anyone dead and if someone ends up in prison it will be the thief and not you for going off half cocked after every "suspicious person" you see.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #86 on: October 22, 2021, 03:01:03 PM »
"In that case, calling the cops periodically to at least formally complain about it is potentially going to give a legal defense should a worst case event occur on your property."

Though not applicable in the Arbery case, there is also the possibility of an easement by prescription developing.

TheDrake

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #87 on: October 23, 2021, 02:32:59 PM »
Meanwhile, remember this case of another trespassing investigation?

Atkinson, a student at Naropa University in Boulder, was picking up trash on March 1 in a patio area of his apartment when he was confronted by Smyley, whom police officials said was trying to determine if Atkinson was allowed to be on the property.

It isn't up to this off duty cop to find out if he lives there. He wasn't trespassing, there was no reason to believe he was. Drew a gun, and started ordering the guy around. Then you had cop apologists saying that he was just trying to keep the neighborhood safe. And that the guy in question was lucky he didn't get shot for refusing to submit meekly on his own porch.

This is happening all the time. You don't look like you belong here, boy! You know what, I would rather have rampant trespassing than have people threatened and killed while minding their own business.

Grant

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #88 on: October 24, 2021, 06:47:57 AM »
Is there ever a threshold for which justice is so unlikely to be achieved through the judicial system that vigilantism becomes morally acceptable?

This depends on the system of morality, which are varied and personal. The simple but bad answer is that vigilantism becomes morally acceptable when it does to a particular person. But vigilantism must never be legal in order to have a functioning society.  So the juice must be worth the squeeze. 

Personally, I believe that vigilantism is morally acceptable when all alternatives are exhausted and the vigilante has no other recourse within the political system. When an individual has no political power at all, not necessarily that they get their way.  And the action must be somewhat proportional to the immoral situation that is the catalyst.  And the consequences must be accepted.  As an example, it’s morally acceptable to me that Ali refused to be drafted because he stood up and then went to prison.  I generally draw the line at murder, but at some point vigilantism becomes rebellion.  I don’t see how I could be an American without believing that at some point vigilantism and rebellion are morally correct actions.

“ That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government”

It’s vague, but it lays out the argument for vigilantism and rebellion right there. The question remains what are a human being’s inalienable rights.

From muh iphone




cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #89 on: October 28, 2021, 06:50:29 PM »
I don't know about vigilantism being moral in this case but how about accepted as mutual combat?

https://chicago.suntimes.com/crime/2021/10/4/22709632/mutual-combatant-lori-lightfoot-kim-foxx-austin-jack-boys-shootout-four-corner-hustlers

"Around 10:30 a.m. Friday, members of the Body Snatchers faction of the Four Corner Hustlers drove to the 1200 block of North Mason Avenue in two Dodge Chargers and began shooting into a home using handguns that were modified into automatic weapons, according to an internal police report and a law enforcement source with knowledge of the investigation. Members of the rival Jack Boys faction then fired back from inside the home."

So you have Cook County State’s Attorney Kim Foxx Monday refusing to "reconsider prosecuting five suspects in a deadly gang-related shootout last week in Austin after they were released when prosecutors rejected charges against them."

Even if it is mutual combat, some of these people can't be charged as felons who are illegally in possession of a firearm? Or anyone in possession of illegally modified and illegally carried automatic weapons? And even in The Purge, "the use of weaponry above Class 4 is forbidden." So even with mutual combat there should be some limits on the types of weapons authorized by the State's Attorney. Sure, automatic weapons are only Class 3, but Purge rules are not in effect during a random early morning in Chicago. Or are they?

wmLambert

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #90 on: October 28, 2021, 08:12:50 PM »
Vigilantism is not the issue of today. it is the opposite. when legal citizens do legally sponsored actions to address malfeasance by the DOJ - that is not being a vigilante. However; when a school board official uses his/her offices to go after a parent only wanting justice, that is just not right. Worse is that the official uses charged rhetoric to attack innocent opponents. That is what is happening.

Another aspect that demonstrates the same thing is the one-sidedness of DOJ operations. When Hillary Clinton clearly violated a felony statute, but was exonerated by the FBI claiming there was no intent - when the statute specifically stated intent could not be used to invalidate the charge. The response against this chicanery is justice. Calling it vigilantism is perverse.

More correct is to determine how to watch the watchers.

TheDeamon

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #91 on: November 01, 2021, 11:32:59 AM »
Meanwhile, remember this case of another trespassing investigation?

Atkinson, a student at Naropa University in Boulder, was picking up trash on March 1 in a patio area of his apartment when he was confronted by Smyley, whom police officials said was trying to determine if Atkinson was allowed to be on the property.

It isn't up to this off duty cop to find out if he lives there. He wasn't trespassing, there was no reason to believe he was. Drew a gun, and started ordering the guy around. Then you had cop apologists saying that he was just trying to keep the neighborhood safe. And that the guy in question was lucky he didn't get shot for refusing to submit meekly on his own porch.

This is happening all the time. You don't look like you belong here, boy! You know what, I would rather have rampant trespassing than have people threatened and killed while minding their own business.

Making me remember a statement from a (black) writer who got in trouble with the management for Star Trek: Discovery for relating a story about a conversation he'd had with an LAPD officer some decades prior to the writer's room. (the language was a bit more colorful, and someone complained it created "a hostile work environment")

The Gist of what the officer told him was(from memory): "I stop white people I find in black neighborhoods. I stop black people I find in white neighborhoods. Anyone in an area where it's not normal for people 'of their kind' to be in means they might be up to no good."

Not defending the practice at all, it is fraught with all kinds of problems. Although there is going to be a (self-)selection bias as to both where the officers are patrolling more, as well as where both the opportunity for such a stop to be made presents itself, and where complaints are going to draw public attention.

Very few "up and coming white people" are going to move into racial ghettos. While plenty of minorities with the means of escaping "the hood" are going to do so, and end up in "a white neighborhood" as a result. Meanwhile, the white people who do end up living in the racial ghettos, well. The sterotypes for them aren't typically good, exceptions exist where it was a choice, but for the rest, there is a reason why their choices were so limited and nobody is going to complain about those white guys being "racially profiled" and thus you don't hear about it.
« Last Edit: November 01, 2021, 11:37:21 AM by TheDeamon »

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #92 on: November 04, 2021, 05:59:38 PM »
"How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?"

Moral to whom? Moral to the individual vigilante, moral to the society with a broken justice system, or moral to outside observers?

Should the form the vigilantism takes also be considered? In one society the vigilante act may be totally illegal whereas in another society it may be totally fine and as a matter of course carried out by the government itself and even protected by the Constitution.

Here's a case where a mom went into vigilante mode and now faces prosecution for the crime of publicly identifying the child who murdered her daughter.

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/mother-who-posted-photo-online-of-one-of-the-boys-who-murdered-ana-kriegel-thought-it-was-wrong-they-are-protected-when-ana-was-not-41017846.html

"Fitzpatrick told gardaí she could not understood how two juveniles could do something like that.

She said she had heard about the judge's order and that people could be brought to court and fined.

She admitted to sharing the material on Facebook, saying she had screenshotted the photo from someone else's page and then shared it.

She said she took it down two or three minutes later because people were texting her.

When asked by gardaí why she had shared the photo, Fitzpatrick said she questioned why the boys were being “hidden” when their actions were not the actions of juveniles and that the girl did not get a say in anything.

Fitzpatrick said she thought it is “wrong they are protected when she [Ana Kriégel] was not protected”.

She said she was sorry for the boys' families, but was not sorry for them."

----------------------------------------------------------------------

So hers was an act of vigilantism over there across the pond but in America it's not a crime and is done as a matter of course by our own government, by news organizations, and is protected speech under the First Amendment if a citizen does it.

https://firstamendmentcoalition.org/2009/06/can-i-publish-the-name-of-a-minor-involved-in-a-crime/

"Can I publish the name of a minor involved in a crime?

Q: We printed the name of a 17-year-old arrested for car jacking. Now the mother is complaining and said we should not have legally named her kid. Does she have a case?

A: In general, under the First Amendment the truthful publication of the identity of a juvenile who has been accused of a serious crime cannot be punished.  See Smith v. Daily Mail Publishing Co., 443 U.S. 97, 103 (1979). (Note: this case deals only with criminal sanctions, but other United States Supreme Court cases have held that accurate reports cannot give rise to civil liability, either.  See Bartnicki v. Vopper, 532 U.S. 514 (2001).)

In California, the Supreme Court has held that the publication of the names of minors involved in crimes is not an invasion of privacy.  See Kapellas v. Kofman, 1 Cal. 3d 20, 36-39 (1969).  (Note that this case dealt with minors who were the children of a political candidate; however, the reports of recent crimes are consistently held to be newsworthy, so this is probably a distinction that makes no difference in the outcome.)If a report is based on information from a public record source, the law is even more clear.  The accurate report of that information is absolutely privileged, both by statute (Civ. Code section 47) and by the First Amendment (see Gates v. Discovery Communications, Inc, 34 Cal.4th 679 (2004))."

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I just rewatched "24" and one thing along these lines that struck me was the provision for the granting of total immunity for crimes including murder and raping children in return for cooperation, knowing full well that the people would continue to commit the same crimes for instance an assassin who would be released in a foreign country where she could keep plying her trade.  That made me wonder if we would have the right as citizens to know what types of crimes our government has provided immunity against prosecution for and to whom they have been provided and then have the ability as citizens to decide for ourselves if we want the elected representatives responsible for those decisions to have our vote next time or not.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #93 on: November 05, 2021, 02:35:20 PM »
Nothing to do with vigilantism but as far as the justice system being broken or at least challenged, one thing I've noticed in many stories nowadays is the focus on the racial makeup of juries and the left's determination that they not be a jury of your peers but instead a jury of the victim's peers, but of course for the most part reserved for cases in which the victim is black and the accused is white. They are applying the standard in the Rittenhouse case though even though everyone involved is white.

https://news.yahoo.com/ahmaud-arbery-americas-white-juror-153306011.html


"What is the actual definition of “one’s peers”? Many people are familiar with that phrase: you are entitled to a jury of your peers. How are peers defined under the law?

You aren’t really entitled to a jury of your peers; you’re entitled to a jury pool of your peers."

Oh, really? That's new.

https://www.findlaw.com/criminal/criminal-procedure/what-is-a-jury-of-peers.html

"While it isn't specifically stated anywhere in the Constitution, criminal defendants generally have the right to be tried by "a jury of peers." You may be wondering what exactly that entails. Contrary to popular belief, defendants are not entitled to a jury containing members of their own race, gender, age, or sexual orientation.

So what exactly is a jury of peers and what are defendants' rights in this respect? The following is a brief overview.

A Jury of Your Peers: The Basics

The phrase "a jury of peers" dates back to the signing of the Magna Carta in England. At that point, the provision ensured that members of the nobility were tried by a jury comprised of fellow nobles, rather than being judged by the king. Now, however, this phrase more accurately means "a jury of fellow citizens."

-----------------------------------------------

It seems more like another Orwellian attempt to change what words mean, and weighting things in favor of the prosecution by insisting the accused face a jury that looks more like the victim than themselves is an interesting approach from the left which generally favors giving the accused, and even the guilty, every possible consideration and advantage.

NobleHunter

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #94 on: November 05, 2021, 03:02:31 PM »
Do you really think it would be best for people to be only tried by their social and economic equals? That justice is more likely if the jurors closely resemble the accused?

Also, this is in no way a new problem and certainly not an invention of the Nefarious Modern Left. Unless you're willing to cede the Civil Rights movement to us, which would put you in rather poor company.

TheDeamon

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #95 on: November 05, 2021, 04:07:15 PM »
It seems more like another Orwellian attempt to change what words mean, and weighting things in favor of the prosecution by insisting the accused face a jury that looks more like the victim than themselves is an interesting approach from the left which generally favors giving the accused, and even the guilty, every possible consideration and advantage.

Given that the United States of America operates on the premise of "All men(and women) are created equal." Then "a jury of your peers" is a jury comprised of your fellow citizens. Although that gets murky when the defendant isn't an American Citizen. Or a felon who doesn't have their voting franchise. (Since Jury pools are normally drawn from voter registration rolls)

But as I'm pretty sure the felon would fail utterly at getting a conviction overturned by trying to claim the conviction was invalid because the jury wasn't comprised of felons, I don't think that line of logic is going to get very far.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #96 on: November 05, 2021, 09:33:08 PM »
"Then "a jury of your peers" is a jury comprised of your fellow citizens."

Then it doesn't matter whether jurors are black or white, men or women, and it doesn't matter how the makeup of the jury relates to the victim and the accused?

The left sure acts like it matters, and matters a lot.


TheDeamon

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #97 on: November 05, 2021, 10:25:28 PM »
"Then "a jury of your peers" is a jury comprised of your fellow citizens."

Then it doesn't matter whether jurors are black or white, men or women, and it doesn't matter how the makeup of the jury relates to the victim and the accused?

The left sure acts like it matters, and matters a lot.

Legally it doesn't, and shouldn't matter.

But the reality is a different matter. They realize this, and know that if they can skew a jury in their desired direction, they can skew the decision that jury is likely to make.

cherrypoptart

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #98 on: November 06, 2021, 01:10:23 AM »
Exactly. And if your fate depends on the whims of a capricious jury, then how sound can a justice system really be?

You get this group of twelve people and you go free. You get another set of twelve people from the same jury pool of totally competent jurors who see and hear exactly the same evidence and testimony and you go to prison for the rest of your live or even get executed. Both the prosecution and the defense understand and accept this reality which is why they take jury selection so seriously. That sounds a lot like a broken justice system, or at least one with a serious flaw at its heart.

NobleHunter

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Re: How broken does a justice system have to be before vigilantism is moral?
« Reply #99 on: November 06, 2021, 10:40:32 AM »
Who do you think invented the practice of rigging jury selection to get the desired verdict?