Here's another example of the U.S. having the best justice that money can buy. Another slap in the face to middle and lower income people in our country. Another example that if you are rich and famous you will be given special considerations as long as you have the money to grease the wheels of our piece of shit justice system in this country.




http://www.cnn.com/2004/LAW/04/30/williams.trial.ap/index.html

I don't see any route to buy Jurors.

You say the Justice system is a piece of shit - I disagree. What would you suggest as an alternative?

I don't see it that way. Of course no one can really no for sure, but the result doesn't seem that unreasonable to me. The problem is that poorer people can't afford the really good attorneys and thus suffer the consequences, not that the rich people are getting special consideration.

I agree Havok, money buys everything in this country "fair treatment" belongs to the rich,{and famous} not everyone.

Oh come on - I see stories of "normal" people being acquitted in the paper every day. Some people are getting screwed, but by and large the system works. Except for the part where you end up much poorer than when you started.

"normal" people get treated alot better when they have fame and money. It may not be a nice fact but it is a fact.

No system is perfect of course, but the legal system in the US is a wonderful institution. Being able to pay for a talented lawyer is not special consideration. Amost all talented lawyers were at one time public defenders - providing their services at the state's expense.

There is an ongoing trend for lawsuits, particularly ones involving multinational companies to be filed in the US. Why? - because the US has the best, most efficient and most transparent legal system in the world.

The judicial system is the backbone of our democracy and way of life. Don't call it worthless based on a few isolated cases that you don't happen to like the verdict on.

Michael Jackson is rich & famous and I don't see him getting much special treatment. If rich & famous meant you got a real break - then the rich & famous would never be in court.

Originally posted by DrewM
No system is perfect of course, but the legal system in the US is a wonderful institution. Being able to pay for a talented lawyer is not special consideration. Amost all talented lawyers were at one time public defenders - providing their services at the state's expense.


Michael Jackson is rich & famous and I don't see him getting much special treatment. If rich & famous meant you got a real break - then the rich & famous would never be in court. When you have a system where the difference between a guilty verdict and not guilty verdict is decided upon how much money you can afford for a quality lawyer, that system is seriously flawed.

Using Molester Jackson as an example is pretty poor. He has already bought himself out of one molestation charge.

If you think that the rich and famous do not get special considerations when judges or juries are deciding cases, then i need to get me some of whatever it is you are smoking.

There are lawyers of all skills in the system - no doubt there are many high quality lawyers acting as public defenders also. Lawyers are people - not robots all cast from the same mold. I think you are the one smoking something if you think that the only way to make the system good is to have all lawyers exactly the same.

Evidence and motive are far more crucial to the outcome of a trial than any lawyer. No matter how great a lawyer you have - he isn't going to get you off if the evidence clearly points to guilt. You seem to seriously overlook that & appear to be in some dreamworld where you are nieve enough to imagine that an expensive lawyer can make a jury beileve that the moon is made of green cheese.

Good lawyers get no special treatment, they can just argue the case more effectively and because there are a million shades of abilities of lawyers - both public defenders and paid attorneys - your argument seems fanciful at best and in reality a mere fantasy.

Famous people may possibly have an impact on a jury because of their fame - but look at Martha Stewart (one of the richest women in the world) - the jury was not swayed by her fame, they were swayed by evidence & testimony. Jury's are 12 good people - your cynical view can only be interpreted as a statement that people are dumb (all except you of course)

Regardless - the number of famous people trials is a tiny tiny fraction of the trials taken to court each year - yet you generalize the whole legal system (without any kind of solution I may add) based on what? A miss-placed view of reality gleaned from reading too much national enquirer no doubt. Must be, because you have no data to backup your claim that guilt is determined by how deep your pockets are. Show me the hard data.

Originally posted by DrewM

Evidence and motive are far more crucial to the outcome of a trial than any lawyer. No matter how great a lawyer you have - he isn't going to get you off if the evidence clearly points to guilt. You seem to seriously overlook that & appear to be in some dreamworld where you are nieve enough to imagine that an expensive lawyer can make a jury beileve that the moon is made of green cheese.

Famous people may possibly have an impact on a jury because of their fame - but look at Martha Stewart - the jury was not swayed by her fame, thet were swayed by evidence & testimony. Jury's are 12 good people - your cynical view can only be interpreted as a statement that people are dumb (all except you of course)

Regardless - the number of famous people trials is a tiny tiny fraction of the trials taken to court each year - yet you generalize the whole legal system (without any kind of solution I may add) based on what? A miss-placed view of reality gleaned from reading too much national enquirer no doubt. Must be, because you have no data to backup your claim that guilt is determined by how deep your pockets are. Show me the hard data. Maybe you and i do live on different worlds then. I guess you havent seen the case involving the 60 year old multi-millionaire who murdered and dismembered his victim then dumped his body in a lake, yet was never charged with a single crime? Or maybe you think i read that in the national enquirer?



http://www.thebatt.com/news/2003/11/19/Opinion/Acquittal.Of.Millionaire.Bad.For.Texas.Jurispruden ce-561822.shtml

http://cnnstudentnews.cnn.com/2003/LAW/11/11/ctv.durst/


This is only one case that shows exactly what im talking about. However im sure you will respond to tell me i wasnt privy to all the "hard data" that the jury was, or some other such nonsense i already know. Murder has surrounded this guy his entire life, yet he has never been held accountable for it. I guess he is just an unlucky fellow that a lot of people he is close with just happen to get murdered.

Dont make me bring up O.J.'s case. I mean, he was innocent, right?


As far as you trying to trivialize the differences of the convictions between rich/famous people and average americans: You say the number is "a tiny tiny fraction of the trials taken to court each year". Well that is what my comment was on. How there is an unequal justice system in this country betweeen wealthy defendants and not wealthy defendants.

If I had been the defendant in the Durst case, there is no doubt that I would now be serving a life sentence or facing the death penalty as i write this. I would not have had the millions of dollars to go to my defense against these charges. Plain and simple. If that is not a flaw in this "wonderful institution" of yours, i dont know what is.

By the way, in my dreamworld the word is "naive".

Show me data - not isolated cases where you feel the Jury made a bad decision.

Correlation between wealth and guilt - you'll never find it - because it doesn't exist. So, therefore your point is er...lacking.

You know, it's very often the case that court-appointed attorneys and public defenders are actually better than an attorney with his own shingle. Because, you know, they aren't in it for the money or the fame.... they're in it because they believe that criminals/poor folks deserve good representation, too.

Frankly, I wouldn't want Mark Gerragos (currently defending Scott Peterson, who is accused of murdering his wife and their unborn child; former Michael Jackson attorney) defending me for all the tea in China. His biggest interest is getting his name in the papers.

As for fixing our messed up judicial system, I've often wondered if professional jurists is the way to go.... I believe our appeals arrangement is all out of whack, too.

Clearly - the judicial system is not perfect - I agree with that.

The point I can't follow though is the one about wealth = no justice.

I know of a case about a property disbute. The lady was told by the lawyer that the property did belong to her and it could be proven and won. The only problem is that because it would be draged out by system it would be very costly. The lady did not have the MONEY to get a fair trial through the system so she just let the property go. Now tell me again how money doesn't help the rich get what they want?

F. de Marzipan;

Don't forget, if Mark G. doesn't win these "public circus trials" then his fame and fortune is lost. He will pull every trick he can to keep himself looking like a good lawyer. The lawyer that looses doesn't get more cases. The public defender isn't in the paper and media so SOMETIMES he could care less how the case goes.

Originally posted by DrewM
]Show me data - not isolated cases where you feel the Jury made a bad decision.

Correlation between wealth and guilt - you'll never find it - because it doesn't exist. So, therefore your point is er...lacking. ]

Just the other night I was watching the case of "Harry The Hit Man". He was the number 1 hit man for the Mob back in the 70's. He killed a guy in front of 2 witnesses the lawyers figured they had an iron clad case against him, open and shut. Well to make a long story short the judge was payed off and the guy got set free. His{Harry's} lawyer new how much the "system" was worth. 17 years later the case was brought back to trial and Harry was found quilty. The reason I bring this up is because as long as certain people run the system it will allways be corrupt. Until money doesn't run our lives the system will be corrupt.

There will always be corrupt people in any system. There is corruption in eveything to a degree - but as you mention, the guy got found guilty in the end. Sounds like a great example of how it does in fact work.

This is my point, if people can be corrupt then the system must be corrupt. How do we make a system without the corruption, once money is involved, the more a person has, the better chance they have of things being in their favor.

I am glad that Harry was finally convicted, but it sure does SUCK how long it took for the system to straighten out THEIR mistake{17+ years after the crime}.

My question is, is there really such a thing as a fair trial? Or should we just feel trials will allways favor those with money?

By that logic - there is not a single thing in the US that is not worthless and completely corrupt.

Ask Martha Stewart if money helped her..

Yeah, honestly money and celebrity can hurt you as much as they help you. It all depends.

Although it doesn't have anything to do with the criminal justice system, Mad Dog does have a point about being able to shut people up people up by filing frivilous lawsuits that the defendant can't afford to defend. It's happening more and more. Yet another good reason to go to a "loser pays" system.

The UK has the loser pays system. It has it's benefits in taming silly lawsuits, but judges have the power to toss out silly lawsuits. The issue tends to be filing lawsuits that never end up in court but cost a lot of money to defend.

With the exception of ambulance chasing - the system where lawyers take on cases where they stand to make money does regulate to a large degree the filing of lawsuits that have merit and can be won.

Originally posted by DrewM
]By that logic - there is not a single thing in the US that is not worthless and completely corrupt.

Makes one think doesn't it? Now back to the topic when we are talking about crimes should the system be corrupt? Shouldn't we as a "free" nation have a system {that to our best try} is not corrupt. Why should two people commit close to the same crime but, one gets treated better because of who they are, how much their worth, or who they know? Our system is in trouble and needs an overhaul.

Ask Martha Stewart if money helped her.. ]

Ask O.J., M.J. etc... One famous person finally gets slapped and that's suppose to make every single case legit? Why not make every case equal to began with?