In a recent episode of the excellent series, "Forensic Files" on TruTV, a sixteen year old girl was casually murdered by a handyman. It turned out that some years before, when he was 13 years old he had shot in the back and killed the mother of a friend as she was hanging out her clothes. Fortunately the criminal justice system in his area was aware of the latest research on juvenal offenders and allowed him to serve six months before release. To a person of ordinary common sense, a serious crime committed by a juvenal signals that he represents an even greater danger to society than if he were of age. The question of possible innocence is quite another matter. In any criminal trial any lingering doubt as to the guilt of the defendant must be weighed against the risk to society of acquitting him if indeed he is guilty. To people of Ms. Lithwick's stripe, all defendants are to be presumed innocent after conviction in a court of law.

Hmm and Forensic Files is a scientifically validated representational sample of the population?

Yeah I knew it was well researched...

The reality is that Ben Franklin was the one who reformulated Blackstone's famous 10:1 ratio for the American jurisprudence system to say that

It is better that 100 guilty go free rather than one innocent rot

All those who keep insisting on the "risk to society" seem to be the same ones that object to Nationalized healthcare. Hmm odd that.

Okay degsme, enlighten me:

How is someone who shot and killed a woman innocent?

(Incidentally, when reading the OP I couldn't help imagining someone outraged at the crime spree perpetrated by a famous Roman satirist.)

quidfecisti:

Okay degsme, enlighten me:

How is someone who shot and killed a woman innocent?

(Incidentally, when reading the OP I couldn't help imagining someone outraged at the crime spree perpetrated by a famous Roman satirist.)

If the evidence seems incontrovertible, he may well be one of the 100.