Yes, there was a Law & Order episode where it was used. I remember laughing at how all the defendants identified themselves in court with their name, “rank” and “serial number” - the latter two, of course, being the ones used within their organization.
I did find this site which reads like the same sort of thing the people referred to in the OP would buy into. A quick search of Snopes doesn’t show anything about it, but a Google search using the terms flag, fringe, and “military court” provides a plethora of sites similar to the one I linked to.
Crazy stuff - I suppose there’s some reassurance that no-one told them “Hey, you’re right, we don’t have any authority over you. Go and kill whoever you want now.”
Must be time for me to go to bed. I read that as Senior Citizen Movement. Visions of gray-haired geezers arguing that they were too old to be tried, or something like that.
A bunch of criminals facing the chair, willing to do anything to get out of it, not very smart, not having the money for a wizard lawyer who could pull them out of the fire, and finally just putting up a hail mary…something, ANYTHING, that has even the tiniest prayer. Nothing about this strikes me as anything other than textbook normal. News flash: A one in a million shot (what they did) beats a zero in a million shot (doing nothing) any day.
What the hell am I supposed to be feeling here? Disgust? Disbelief? Smug superiority? Laughs? Jeers? Exasperation? “Mild interest” would be pushing it. And of course, the fact that they succeeded makes it even harder to mock them.
Judges are human and execution is a really lousy way to go. Deal with it.
Contrary to popular belief, it is more than a little difficult to get the death penalty.
The jury, in a separate phase from the guilt/innocence phase, enters the punishment phase.
There, a distinct list of aggravators (anything not on this list cannot be considered by the jury) is weighed against any possible mitigator the jury cares to consider.
Acting like this not only shows lack of remorse, but it also takes a lot of the warm fuzzies that the jury might think of as mitigators off the table.
They had no way of knowing, going in, that their tactic would STALL the DP off the table. They thought the were going to SKATE.
Bad stategy.
IIRC, several of them had to be dragged out of the courtroom when they stood up and started reciting the Declaration of Independence, or something like that.
(The funniest part, at least to me, was that the leader of the organization also had played a priest who refused to reveal a murderer’s confession in another episode)
I thought it was a really interesting article, not least in its implication that this crazy idea actually had some success in this case. I wonder, is there a way to change the legal system to address such craziness? On the one hand, you don’t want assholes to be able to game the system (at least not without high-priced legal aid–and note this isn’t a crack at all attorneys whatsoever). On the other hand, you don’t want to deny them the right to make the legal argument of their choice. How can you accommodate their right to make legal arguments without letting them bog the system down interminably?
The Law & Order episode with the pseudo-constitutionalist defendants was “Nullification”. Their spokesman was Denis O’Hare (check out the artsy head shot). O’Hare also played a reluctant priest witness in “Under God”, as well as a schizophrenic lawyer defending himself in “Pro Se” and a homeowner on trial for beating a homeless guy half to death in “Volunteers”.
Conflicted priests and pro se defendants appear quite a bit, though. I’m trying to track down another repeat actor who played a pro se defendant who charmed a female juror in one episode and may also have been a priest pressured to break confidentiality (and dramatically and sadly taking off his collar in the final scene) but I may be mistaken.
How about if someone absolutely refuses to participate in the process that the presumption of innocence is switched to a presumption of guilt, with the maximum penalty (based on the alleged crime they committed) attached. The scenario changes to, “You mean if I don’t go through the trial that I’m going to be put to death anyway? Fuck that, bring on the trial.” I don’t see this being done willy-nilly, but decided by a judge in cases like this.
I recall a few years ago, someone posted a weird question to the board saying something to the effect that his national service or selective service card was illegitimate, because his name had been spelled in capital letters, and he kept saying “nom de guerre” as if it meant something significant. I wonder if he had been exposed to this kind of nonsense.
Y’know, every time I think some of those on my side are completely out of line, and completely not understandable, you come along and remind me of how even more not understandble those on the other side are for me. You’re a dick.
More than anything, stories like this show us all that we should never underestimate the stupidity of the average Human.
These are the kind of people who put lemon juice on their faces, convinced that it will prevent video cameras from picking up their face. Then when they’re busted, are completely shocked, saying “But I used the juice!”.
“To Henry Smith, arrested moments after returning home with a stolen stereo. His error was having tattooed on his forehead in large capital letters the words “Henry Smith”. His lawyer told the court: “My client is not a very bright young man.””
“A would-be burglar was arrested after using a manhole cover to break the plate-glass window of a store. To avoid the shattering glass, he stepped back, away from the window, and fell into the open manhole.”
More here. In fact, there’s an entire entertainment industry built around the stupidity of people in general and criminals in particular.
I find it puzzling that there’s no corresponding “World’s Stupidest Cops” TV franchise. Certainly not the venerable “COPS,” set in a fantasy world where the police are always unfailingly polite, eschew profanity, always get their man after a vehicle or foot chase, and never use excessive force during arrests. Portrayals of bumbling/incompetent police are ironically left to fiction, like “Reno 911” or—some commercial a year or two ago for some product I can’t remember, which showed various scenes of a hapless cop locking his keys in his patrol car, being elbowed in the groin by a fleeing suspect, etc. I suppose it would be harder to convince police to participate in a show about police foibles than in an idealized morality play like “COPS.”
COPS is that way because the producers have learned over the years based on criticism of the past. At this point I am certain that they are very careful to select only the most courteous and polite officers and/or to go out of their way to instruct those officers (whom I’m sure are being likewise instructed by their own department heads) to show their best side and not embarass themselves or their department.
I remember an older episode with a cop who was driving along with fighting gloves on, bragging about busting heads and hoping they’d find some trouble while the cameras were with him so he could show his stuff. I’m sure that didn’t go over well with his department or his community.
I have vague recollections of other early episodes with knuckleheads who similarly wanted to show off for the cameras.
“He’s the jackass who likes to go around beating people up” tends to have an impact not only on the community view of the department, but on any future claims of police brutality against that officer. I’m sure that sort of thing doesn’t go over well with the Department Chief, local prosecutors or the community leaders, because it costs them money, time and cases.