I guess you could call it semi-rhetorical. I can’t think of a way that it significantly impacts the defence of an innocent person, so I suspect at this point that it might not. But I am open to suggestions that it does in ways that I haven’t thought of. So I may have a position to debate and I may not, depending on the answer to my question.
Not obvious to me. Obviously, until the guilt or innocence of a given person is known, the procedural safegurds that apply to all must be given. But if there is a specific type of safeguard that only protects the guilty (IOW is unneeded by the innocent), I don’t see why it should be in place.
So how are you planning on distinguishing between the innocent and guilty suspects, Izzy? As far as I can tell, what you’re really claiming is that the guilty have no entitlement to pre-trial procedural safeguards. That ain’t the way we do things in America.
As for impacting the attorney-client relationship, I can personally attest that an attorney is best able to effectively represent a client when the lawyer has access to all the relevant (and many irrelevant) facts. For a myriad of reasons–including, but by no means limited to guilt–clients frequently withhold information from their attorneys that they don’t want them to know. This is true even though attorneys are legally bound not to reveal such information to any other person on the face of the earth, from now until the end of time.
Now throw a couple FBI agents into the equation. How much harder will it be to get the client to reveal the information necessary for their defense? Even assuming that any information revealed during the course of the legal representation may not be used by the government in prosecuting the suspect, there is no guarantee at all that the information will be kept confidential. In fact, the entire purpose of having those government agents in there is to reveal whatever is said to law enforcement personnel, not to mention god knows who else. Confidentiality is utterly destroyed by the presence of anybody other than the lawyer and the client, and that is a problem whether or not the information is subsequently used to prosecute the client.
This, I submit, is a significant detriment to the adequate assistance of counsel.
Strange, I could have sworn that I just said the opposite. Again, I don’t think the government is entitled to distinguish between “innocent” and “guilty” suspects. But I do think that safeguards whose impact is to protect the guilty, and are not needed by the innocent, are unneeded, and in fact, a bad idea, and should not be given to anyone, regardless of guilt.
This sounds strange to me, but I don’t know any actual information or have any experience with this. So if you say it is so, I can’t argue with you.
And in certain situations, this is the case. If the police, through normal, legal means happen to find illegal drugs on your possession then guess what? You’ve just given up your right to employ the 4th amendment for your benefit. The guilty don’t have those rights.
The police also don’t need a warrant when they use search techniques that can ONLY show illegal activities. Drug sniffing dogs, for instance.
But the situation here, the point here, is that no one knows if these people are guilty or innocent. That’s the reason they’re talking to their lawyers in the first place! When we start snooping around as if they’re 100% guilty save for a verdict, then we destroy a number of rights and the whole legal system in the process.
Also, while I realize you haven’t yet brought this argument up people who say “What’s the problem? If you’re innocent you have nothing to hide,” make me cringe.
No, I was suggesting that in the case of innocent people the assistance of counsel will not be rendered inneffective by the lack of confidentiality. That it was only (or almost only) in the case of guilty people who have something to hide, that they will find the lack of confidentiality to render their counsel ineffective.
Reminds me of a woman I used to work with. When the subject of no-knock drug raids came up, she cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
After listening to the story of another coworker whose house was searched (actually, ransacked and partially destroyed would be a much more accurate description) in a no-knock raid based on an anonymous phone call, she cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
After listening to said coworker explain again that she didn’t do drugs and had no drugs in her house or in her possession, that either the police had screwed up or the phone call was a fraud, CW1 cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
Reminds me of a woman I used to work with. When the subject of no-knock drug raids came up, she cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
After listening to the story of another coworker whose house was searched (actually, ransacked and partially destroyed would be a much more accurate description) in a no-knock raid based on an anonymous phone call, she cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
After listening to said coworker explain again that she didn’t do drugs and had no drugs in her house or in her possession, that either the police had screwed up or the phone call was a fraud, CW1 cheerily chirped “Oh, well, that would never happen to me because I don’t do drugs. Of course there’s no problem with those! The only people who have to worry are guilty people, like drug dealers and addicts.”
It continued like that until I gave up.
Some people simply WILL NOT understand that “only guilty people have to worry” just doesn’t work.
