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Niche ammo in court(Buffalo Bore,etc)
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Spats McGee
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I'll have to disagree on this one.Nanuk said:No, a trial is held because there is probable cause to believe that a crime was committed and the person standing trial committed said crime and he plead not guilty at an earlier hearing and either a plea bargain was not offered or it was rejected. A criminal trial is not held as a fact finding mission, that is called an investigation.
"Probable cause" is a specific legal term, and only one part of the criminal trial process. Once probable cause has been found, the State must still prove each element of the crime charged beyond a reasonable doubt. The purpose of the criminal trial is to determine whether the State can do that.
While an investigation is a fact-finding mission, it is the trial that establishes facts for legal purposes. In many appellate decisions, the appellate court makes reference to "the finder of fact," which may be the judge or the jury. If that finder of fact determines that "Spats McGee drove at 70 mph on Roosevelt Road," that fact becomes true for legal purposes. It does not matter how it was proved, whether anybody clocked me with a radar gun, or anything else. It becomes, legally, a fact.
Spats McGee
Administrator
It makes no difference, until it does. One problem is credibility. If I claim the attacker was 4 feet away and was 10 feet away, the jury may look at that and begin to wonder what else about my story isn't quite true.Nanuk said:Too many people get all wrapped around the axle about this. If you are the victim in a robbery and say the BG was 4 feet away when in reality he was 10 feet away it makes no difference.
No, its called distorted perceptions. Under life threatening stress your perceptions are altered.Maybe not. Maybe it will.
The issue irises when, if you say an attacker was moving at you from extremely close range, and good honest eyewitnesses whose attention was drawn to the situation only after you had moved some distance, you will likely have a credibility problem. That could be a killer.
Spats McGee
Administrator
^^^Perhaps, but do you expect the jury to know that?
Is the suggestion that a defendant's statement being different then the demonstrable facts in the matter making no difference in a case actually being put forward?
No, I am saying that under life threatening stress your perceptions are altered significantly. If you take statements from 10 witnesses to a crime you will get 10 totally different stories.
I can't tell you how many times we would be looking from a brown 4 dr and it turned out to be a blue 2dr.
OldMarksman
Staff
No what? Do you contend that the discrepancy might not severely harm your credibility?No, its called distorted perceptions.
Is that directly relevant to the scission at hand?Under life threatening stress your perceptions are altered.
I'll have to disagree on this one.
"Probable cause" is a specific legal term, and only one part of the criminal trial process. Once probable cause has been found, the State must still prove each element of the crime charged beyond a reasonable doubt. The purpose of the criminal trial is to determine whether the State can do that.
While an investigation is a fact-finding mission, it is the trial that establishes facts for legal purposes. In many appellate decisions, the appellate court makes reference to "the finder of fact," which may be the judge or the jury. If that finder of fact determines that "Spats McGee drove at 70 mph on Roosevelt Road," that fact becomes true for legal purposes. It does not matter how it was proved, whether anybody clocked me with a radar gun, or anything else. It becomes, legally, a fact.
What are disagreeing with? Probable cause is what is needed to be CHARGED with a crime, which potentially results in a trial. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt of all elements comprising said crime is the burden of the state DURING a trial.
Spats McGee
Administrator
Here was your original statement:
All I'm saying is that a trial is more than that.Nanuk said:No, a trial is held because there is probable cause to believe that a crime was committed and the person standing trial committed said crime and he plead not guilty at an earlier hearing and either a plea bargain was not offered or it was rejected. A criminal trial is not held as a fact finding mission, that is called an investigation.
No what? Do you contend that the discrepancy might not severely harm your credibility?
That depends on the investigation. If my estimate is 4 feet and it turns out 10 feet, is the discrepancy a material misrepresentation, an oversight, an error in judgement or a outright falsehood. And then does it really have any bearing on the case. It is why when conducting crime scene and accident investigations everything is measured and documented. My point is a simple mistake of fact, when it really does not change anything is irrelevant in the big picture.
Under life threatening stress your perceptions are altered.
Is that directly relevant to the scission at hand?
If you are suffering from the stress associated with a life or death situation it is absolutly relevant and well documented.
It makes no difference, until it does. One problem is credibility. If I claim the attacker was 4 feet away and was 10 feet away, the jury may look at that and begin to wonder what else about my story isn't quite true.
They might also say, yes but it was a dark rainy night and the guy was wearing a dark hoody and jumped out behind the victim so it is possible he was so scared he percieved it differently.
OldMarksman
Staff
If that finder of fact determines that "Spats McGee drove at 70 mph on Roosevelt Road," that fact becomes true for legal purposes. It does not matter how it was proved, whether anybody clocked me with a radar gun, or anything else. It becomes, legally, a fact.
No.
We're going a bit afield here, but maybe something can be salvaged from that statement.
If a jury decides that someone was driving 70, it can matter a great deal how they arrived at that conclusion.
Even if a radar gun wa used, and the state attempted to introduce the reading as evidence, there would be more to it.
The state could be required to processed the calibration records for the gun in question.
I'm not saying that for the purpose of argument. The rdar engineer who dat net to me at work was the test case. He appealed his conviction as a mater of principle, and he won.
The conviction was thrown out, and precedence regarding the admissibility of speed measurement evidence was established.
Spats McGee
Administrator
Perhaps, but do you really want to count on discrepancies in your story to work in your favor in front of a jury?Nanuk said:They might also say, yes but it was a dark rainy night and the guy was wearing a dark hoody and jumped out behind the victim so it is possible he was so scared he percieved it differently.
Spats McGee
Administrator
As I was posting, I actually had a few extra words in mind that I should have included in my post. Let me clarify:OldMarksman said:No.Spats McGee said:If that finder of fact determines that "Spats McGee drove at 70 mph on Roosevelt Road," that fact becomes true for legal purposes. It does not matter how it was proved, whether anybody clocked me with a radar gun, or anything else. It becomes, legally, a fact.
We're going a bit afield here, but maybe something can be salvaged from that statement.
If a jury decides that someone was driving 70, it can matter a great deal how they arrived at that conclusion.
Even if a radar gun wa used, and the state attempted to introduce the reading as evidence, there would be more to it.
The state could be required to processed the calibration records for the gun in question.
I'm not saying that for the purpose of argument. The rdar engineer who dat net to me at work was the test case. He appealed his conviction as a mater of principle, and he won.
The conviction was thrown out, and precedence regarding the admissibility of speed measurement evidence was established.
Spats McGee said:If that finder of fact determines that "Spats McGee drove at 70 mph on Roosevelt Road," that fact becomes true for legal purposes. It does not matter how it was proved, whether anybody clocked me with a radar gun, or anything else. It becomes, legally, a fact. Once the appeal has run its course, the matters that have been found as fact cannot be challenged further.
The part people seem to be missing is that a violent attacker will have a lengthy record of criminal association and crime leading up to this. Armed robbery for example is not a crime one starts with. The BG in this case may be well known to the local police, may even be currently wanted.
The hard part to any of this is that it is largely dependent on where you are when this happens. I am retired from LE after having been a big city cop and then federal agent for 30 years and by choice I live in a relatively crime free conservative region of the county. If you live in New England or Cali, OR, Wa is it an ENTIRELY different world.
I believe that 19 states have some sort of qualified immunity to civil action after using force in Self Defense. My state has a great law in that respect. The reasoning here is that the state does not want its good citizens victimized by a criminal and then victimized all over again after the use of justified force during SD.
The hard part to any of this is that it is largely dependent on where you are when this happens. I am retired from LE after having been a big city cop and then federal agent for 30 years and by choice I live in a relatively crime free conservative region of the county. If you live in New England or Cali, OR, Wa is it an ENTIRELY different world.
I believe that 19 states have some sort of qualified immunity to civil action after using force in Self Defense. My state has a great law in that respect. The reasoning here is that the state does not want its good citizens victimized by a criminal and then victimized all over again after the use of justified force during SD.
All I'm saying is that a trial is more than that.
Oh absolutely. I am usually not overly verbose and try to keep my answers short and to the point. My point was that a trial is based upon PC, not to determine if there was PC.
OldMarksman
Staff
Doesn't matter. We are taking about the credibility of the defendant, whether he has misremembered or lied or unintentionally described something erroneously and subsequently changed his testimony.That depends on the investigation. If my estimate is 4 feet and it turns out 10 feet, is the discrepancy a material misrepresentation, an oversight, an error in judgement or a outright falsehood.
That's almost the crux, but once the defendant's credibility has been impeached and found faulty, nothing he says can be relied upon.And then does it really have any bearing on the case.
It is why when conducting crime scene and accident investigations everything is measured and documented. Everything that can be measured
Alrighty then.My point is a simple mistake of fact, when it really does not change anything is irrelevant in the big picture.
And that may be the reason for a material discrepancy in the testimony.If you are suffering from the stress associated with a life or death situation it is absolutly relevant and well documented.
Or it may not.
OldMarksman
Staff
You are surely aware that, unless those facts were known to the defendant before the incident, they will not support a defense of justification.The part people seem to be missing is that a violent attacker will have a lengthy record of criminal association and crime leading up to this. Armed robbery for example is not a crime one starts with. The BG in this case may be well known to the local police, may even be currently wanted.
There are a couple of exceptions in a couple of jurisdictions, but that's the general principle.
Perhaps, but do you really want to count on discrepancies in your story to work in your favor in front of a jury?
No. Point being, you as the victim may not have had the information available to you that CSI's had. In police shootings very, very few officers can even accurately tell you how many shots they fired, does that bring their integrity into question or can that be explained by the normal physiology of stress?
The part people seem to be missing is that a violent attacker will have a lengthy record of criminal association and crime leading up to this
So it is impossible to use an affirmative defense if the "victim" does not have a criminal record? More to the point, in a criminal trial, is a record that the defendant was not aware of ALWAYS admissible? I was led to believe years ago that it was generally not because the defendant's frame of mind could not be influenced by facts he or she did not know.
And really? Did you just assert, as a matter of fact, that no violent criminal attack has been carried out by someone without a criminal record?
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