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Unreasonable Doubt and the American Justice System
- Jul 5, 2011 at 7:31 PM
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- Comments (15) Total Views (1075) Everyone can see this journal post.
We have been duped. We have been sold a bill of goods, by 24/7 news outlets, by talking heads and legal pundits, by thinking we know about evidence because we are told on television and movies how precise and exacting it can be, and therefore, should be. We have been given long disserations on reasonable doubt and what that level of proof is meant to be. We have been taken down a path to a great misunderstanding.
Reasonable doubt does not mean "no doubt at all". Imagine what kind of bar that would be, what hurdle prosecutors would have, if you had to believe it without any doubt at all. If that was the burden of proof, it would be hard to convict someone found with the gun in their hand, smoke billowing from the weapon, dead body on the floor at their feet, because there could always be another explanation. You know, someone else did it and handed me the gun, or, I was somewhere else so that couldn't have been me.
We have been treated through several high profile trials that reasonable doubt means people are checking their common sense at the courtroom doors and using this higher, impossible, level of burden of proof. Robert Blake springs to mind as someone who got away with murder, besides and of course always OJ Simpson. Now we have Casey Anthony. Was there a smoking gun? No. Was there a definitive manner of death? No.
Why not? Because Casey Anthony wrapped her daughter in a garbage bag and threw her in a swamp. Because she didn't even let anyone know for a month after (according to her) the baby drowned in the family pool. Because even after she admitted the child was missing, she lied and said she was taken by someone who didn't even exist. Because she spent months and months leading investigators on a wild goose chase to find a child who was already wrapped in a garbage bag and languishing in a swamp. She was able to do this for a long enough time that by the time they discovered the body, the decomposition was such that much of the evidence had disintigrated and disappeared. That is only because of Casey Anthony's lies.
Why would a mother lie about this? Why would a mother who's baby is found drowned in the pool not call 911 and see if there's a chance to save her? Why would a mother who has taken her newly dead child and thrown her like garbage in a swamp (why would a mother not want a proper burial for her child???) be out dancing and drinking and sleeping with her boyfriend and getting tattoos about how beautiful life is?
Why would a mother who was afraid she would be in trouble, when in the greatest trouble of all and being accused of murdering her child, not blurt out to the detectives "OK, I'm sorry, she drowned" instead of insisting that she didn't know who had put her baby in the swamp? Why would a mother wait until almost three years after the child was dead to announce that the real thing that happened was the accidental drowning?
Caylee Anthony is dead. George and Cindy Anthony are left with a dead granddaughter and a daughter who was willing to tell the world that both George Anthony, her father, and Lee Anthony, her brother, molested her repeatedly and for years. The family is left torn to shreds so that Casey could put enough unreasonable doubt into the minds of jurors who have been sold a bill of goods for years about DNA and forensic evidence and the level of proof needed to prove a case so that she could get off.
We can't have a justice system where the burden of proof is so high that sociopaths walk. The one thing this jury agreed on was that she was a liar. Over and over and over again, Casey Anthony was a liar.
An innocent liar.
Comments:
Thank you. I just feel so helpless when verdicts like this come down. They couldn't even find the child abuse claim. As a mother, this just kills me.
"Not Guilty" is far from being the same thing as "Innocent."
It is a sad, sad day when people can do these horrible acts to a child (or anyone) and get away with it. The only silver lining in this cloud is that everyone knows what a horrible human being this women is. I'm so sorry that a poor child had to die, but maybe it's better then being raised by that women. I don't know how anyone can call this women a mother, because a REAL mother does everything in her power to protect her child(ren) from harm, and if (and when) it does happen she gets them help. Not hides their bodies and goes out a parties.
I don't think she's gonna live very long, even when she does get out. I think unless they put her in like witness protection (Which I doubt highly), someone's just gonna walk up to her and put two in her head.
Well said!! I'm heartbroken over this and really don't know how to put my thoughts into words..............
The verdict makes me sick!!! I truly do not understand how 12 men and women, some of whom I'm sure are parents, can let a heartless, soulless monster like this walk free. "Vengeance is mine, I will repay, thus saith the Lord." Casey Anthony won't be able to lie to the Almighty Judge. She WILL answer one day and REAL JUSTICE will be served!!!
Very well said
I agree this verdict was wrong but it is a pretty broad blanket to say that we have be sold a bill of goods. There is no perfect justice system.
I am sure that many of you are really angry but the Judicial Sytem is built to protect us all and to avoid sending the wrong person to jail. Someday some of you might be in a situation where you will appreciate that.
All of this Casey Anthony drama has to be put in the past. There is nothing you can do. I would advise you to go to the Library and read up on "reasonable doubt" among other topics in Law.
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