(That link is broken, but regardless, I retract my claim that this never happens, I was incorrect)
But like I said, it’s largely due to the jury not really doing their jobs.
When all you have is one witness, and literally zero other evidence… then there is reasonable doubt, unless you have preconceptions that person did it before even going to the trial.
Which is why you then get guys exonerated after the fact, like this guy.
False accusations are regrettable, but I don’t think they occur that often.
And while third party witnesses and physical evidence are good things, our legal system would be hopelessly dysfunctional if they were always required. Too many crimes lack both.
(btw I fixed the broken link).
That’s ridiculous.
If there’s no evidence, then there’s reasonable doubt. That’s how our system of justice is designed to work.
Your suggestion that a conviction should be made based on literally nothing but one person saying that you committed a crime, is insane. I could accuse you of committing a crime then. What would stop me?
I would assume the defendant’s prior record is also considered relevant in some cases.
If it is admissible. I don’t know that past history is always allowed in court.
As much as I realize that it would allow some guilty to walk, the idea that you could be convicted without any evidence but the say so of one person is kinda scary.
A jury who decides that you are lying.
Humans are surprisingly good at detecting liars. We’ve evolved for the task.
On the other hand, why would you falsely accuse me of a crime? You risk going to jail for perjury, and you wouldn’t stand to gain anything from a false accusation. Unless of course you would indeed stand to gain… but then you’ll face a very uncomfortable cross-examination.
Because I don’t like you? Because I want to punish you for some slight at some point in the past?
Fake news.
Ok, then you stand to gain from my suffering. That will almost certainly be used against you to make you look like a liar on the witness stand. Now the lack of physical evidence is not unfortunate, it’s suspicious. Now you need to start wondering if the DA is considered perjury charges.
Unless you are a practiced liar, a competent defense attorney has a good chance of breaking you right on the stand. And if you are a practiced liar, then a competent defense attorney will have found previous examples of your untrustworthiness.
Any or all of the above are enough to cause reasonable doubt.
Not perfect.
But face-to-face, with a witness who lacks a prepared script in front of a hostile questioner? When you aren’t too ideologically biased towards one side? Pretty good.
Are you guys debating what criminal procedure is, or what it ought to be?
I’m debating what ought to be, since apparently people do get convicted on literally nothing other than the word of one person… but that’s not reasonable at all to me.
Timex, suppose again you don’t like me and want to punish you for some slight at some point in the past.
Rather than bother with a false accusation, you decide to just follow me to the parking lot one night, pick up a brick, and use it to break my jaw. You’re a smart guy and you know for a fact that everyone else will have gone home and nobody will see you do this. You also know that there aren’t any cameras around. And you know I don’t carry a gun and could not defend myself against your brick.
What’s stopping you?
The fact that you can fight back? Or the fact that it’s really hard to attack someone and leave no physical evidence?
Some are. Some vote for Trump.
I think it’s really key that Trump comes across as a ‘bullshitter’ rather than a ‘liar.’ There’s a visceral response to his bluster and braggadocio which doesn’t come across to some folks as dishonesty. He spews so much untruth with so little guile that he paradoxically appears, to these folks, more trustworthy than someone like Hillary whose falsities are an order of magnitude fewer but whose hyper-cautious word-parsing sets off some kind of atavistic Spidey Sense.
Humans are terrible at it. I mean, if the innumerable undetected deceptions of everyday life didn’t convince you of that, surely 2016 would.
I don’t think there is a lot of research to back that up. The ability to lie and the ability to detect lying is an ongoing arms race of sorts, according to evolutionary psychologists (why is it evolutionary item, because of sexual selection). That being said, Evolutionary Psychology is not exactly a strong field and is based more on storytelling than actual research, and should not be confused with the theory of evolution.
Anyway, the bottom line is that I highly doubt your statement, and I believe you might be lying to us all. Which you claim I am good at detecting.
I would think that liars are better at detecting lies than the average person. Where that takes us I don’t know.