Crime and Punishment

[Tom]

Mooooving on (hopefully)


I can't for the life of me remember the name of the movie, but it had a really interesting concept.

They had technology to see forward in time (or travel back in time, can't remember which!) But it meant law enforcement can see murders and rape before it happened.

The police would burst in and apprehend the murderer, before he did the crime, thus saving the victims life.

I think its an interesting concept to be honest. Can you sentenance someone who hasn't committed a crime, but know for sure they were going to?

It's obviously hyperthetical because I doubt this technology will ever exist. But its interesting.

Would love to hear what everyone had to say.





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I think if and when society develops so far that we have the means to make that determination, you are more likely to see us help/change people before they commit a crime as opposed to punish them for it in advance.

As a long-term prediction, which will not materialise fully until long after we are all dead, I believe that we will continue to move away from punishment for crimes and move towards helping/rehabilitating criminals.

History tells us that numerous acts which were once considered crimes, eventually become accepted or tolerated by society; or treated as disabilities etc.

 

[adsyrah]

You're thinking of Minority Report.

It's an interesting film because it looks at the morality of punishing someone for a crime that is yet to be commited.

In terms of the real world, I guess it's relevant to look at whether you think punishing someone for a thought-crime is right - i.e. thinking / planning something but not actually carrying it out. Terrorism plots are an obvious example. People are arrested and charged for plotting to carry out an act of terrorism before it happens. The Terrorism Act covers this in the UK.

While I totally agree we should be stopping terrorists in their tracks before they have a chance to carry out whatever they're planning, it does bring up the question of where this stops. I'm no legal brain at all, so I'm not sure if there are any other crimes that this covers, but I'm uncomfortable with criminalising people for thinking of commiting a crime - seems to be jumping the gun a bit.

 

[BigT]

Several posts have been edited and removed this morning.

May I remind everyone of our Member Expectations while using TowersStreet. With a particular focus on respecting members.

A few posts in here have been blatant personal attacks towards others. As well as very rude accusations and name calling. This is not welcome on TST at all. Several PMs have been issued this morning - and if ANY members continue to post in such a aggressive or rude manner than further action will be taken and you could lose membership privileges on TST.

When getting involved with debates remember to stay constructive, adult and ensure you add to the debate. A few posts in here have been posted solely to insult others. Make sure you're adding to the topic!

As always if you see a post that you feel steps out of line then flag the post so a member of the team can deal with it - and if you have personal issues with members or their posting style contact a member of the team that will be able to take any action needed.

Let's keep TowersStreet a friendly and happy community! Thanks.

I'm not sure what posts your on about James as most of them are still here!

The bottom line is this, I will speak to people how they speak to me, I don't get offended by anything.
If people get personnel with me then I get personnel back so if you can't take it don't dish it out.

If the Mods have a problem with this then ban me!

 

[Tom]

Several posts have been edited and removed this morning.

May I remind everyone of our Member Expectations while using TowersStreet. With a particular focus on respecting members.

A few posts in here have been blatant personal attacks towards others. As well as very rude accusations and name calling. This is not welcome on TST at all. Several PMs have been issued this morning - and if ANY members continue to post in such a aggressive or rude manner than further action will be taken and you could lose membership privileges on TST.

When getting involved with debates remember to stay constructive, adult and ensure you add to the debate. A few posts in here have been posted solely to insult others. Make sure you're adding to the topic!

As always if you see a post that you feel steps out of line then flag the post so a member of the team can deal with it - and if you have personal issues with members or their posting style contact a member of the team that will be able to take any action needed.

Let's keep TowersStreet a friendly and happy community! Thanks.

I'm not sure what posts your on about James as most of them are still here!

The bottom line is this, I will speak to people how they speak to me, I don't get offended by anything.
If people get personnel with me then I get personnel back so if you can't take it don't dish it out.

If the Mods have a problem with this then ban me!

The arguing of tiny little points/mistakes not relevant to the topic was enough without martyrdom to boot.

 

[pluk]

I can't for the life of me remember the name of the movie, but it had a really interesting concept.

They had technology to see forward in time (or travel back in time, can't remember which!) But it meant law enforcement can see murders and rape before it happened.

The police would burst in and apprehend the murderer, before he did the crime, thus saving the victims life.

I think its an interesting concept to be honest. Can you sentenance someone who hasn't committed a crime, but know for sure they were going to?

It's obviously hyperthetical because I doubt this technology will ever exist. But its interesting.

Would love to hear what everyone had to say.

Broadly speaking you are referring to offences of conspiracy, attempting and going equipped. Of course future predicting technology does not (and probably never will) exist, so we have to rely on intelligence leading us to catch people before the act, but once enough has happened to provide evidence for a successful prosecution. This obviously can be a very fine line between intervening to early (creating lack of evidence so the suspect has to be released to actually commit their crime) or too late (when the crime has occurred and the damage done). In the case of 'attempted' offences the act of the suspect must be 'more than merely preparatory', so they really have to have started committing the offence.

One thing is for sure, police would not be able to catch practically any offenders pre-emptively like this if it were not for information received from the public. If you suspect something, report it. Some people think reporting minor suspicions would be a waste of our time but we would always rather check things out to see if they are all in order then get called later once the crime has happened and the suspect has gotten away!

 

[MrMutterson]

Can you sentenance someone who hasn't committed a crime, but know for sure they were going to?

Yes, for certain crimes if it is possible to prove a person had intent to carry a crime out then that person can be dealt with accordingly.

Obviously the hardest part is proving the intent as currently it's not possible to read a persons mind, but if someone was to write it in a diary or discuss it with another person, or blurt it out in police interview etc then the offence is complete and can be charged accordingly.



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[Fredward]

I'm trying to think of this as purely hypothetical.

As I think its an interesting debate, ignoring the fact that current day tech means we can't know for sure.

I'm saying if we knew for sure does it make it right to punish them for a crime they didn't commit.

I'm unsure where to stand in honesty, it depends how you phrase the question, What the crime is ext.

I'm not speaking of conspiracies ext. I'm thinking of a hypothetical circumstance.



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[Sam]

The movie is called Minority Report.

 

[Fredward]

Yes it is.

Though I'm afraid you have been beaten to it Sam!

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[James]

I'm not sure what posts your on about James as most of them are still here!

The bottom line is this, I will speak to people how they speak to me, I don't get offended by anything.
If people get personnel with me then I get personnel back so if you can't take it don't dish it out.

If the Mods have a problem with this then ban me!

If you would care to PM me with the posts not dealt with or flag the posts then myself or another member of the team will deal with it.

I only had time this morning to respond to over 5 reports I woke up to. I will further investigate this topic later.

If you respond to others the way they speak to you this will only risk you being reported and having action taken against you. I'd recommend you report the members stepping out of line instead of joining in and risking your membership on here. That's up to you how you behave though.

If you would like to discuss this matter further send me a PM. If you reply in this topic your post will be deleted as the arguments are now over and it's off topic.

Thanks.

 

[Jonathan]

I mentioned yesterday that in a survey of S*n readers, 99% of them called for the return of the death penalty. Now that their website is up again, I can give you the article which contains that information.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/ne ... hment.html
Just from the way it's written, you can tell that the paper is in favour of capital punishment without even needing the information about the poll! This only makes me even less likely to buy the S*n, and makes me even more against capital punishment. It simply does not work.

 

[BigT]

It simply does not work.

Without wanting to go over old ground here you either need to add "in my opinion" to the end of that or show some hard evidence.
You can't just state it as a matter of fact.

 

[Tom]

It simply does not work.

Without wanting to go over old ground here you either need to add "in my opinion" to the end of that or show some hard evidence.
You can't just state it as a matter of fact.

Murder rates are categorically higher where it exists than where it doesn't. Evidence of that has been provided earlier in the thread.

Your only possible counter to that is that murder rates would be even higher if CP weren't in place. In that case it'd be up to you provide evidence of that.

 

[adsyrah]

Without wanting to go over old ground here you either need to add "in my opinion" to the end of that or show some hard evidence.
You can't just state it as a matter of fact.

Murder rates are categorically higher where it exists than where it doesn't. Evidence of that has been provided earlier in the thread.

Your only possible counter to that is that murder rates would be even higher if CP weren't in place. In that case it'd be up to you provide evidence of that.

Not only that, but the link you provided earlier detailing how US states which have the death penalty have higher murder rates than those that don't have the death penalty.

Considering the US is culturally similar state-by-state this is pretty difficult to refute.

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/deterre ... rder-rates

 

[BigT]

It simply does not work.

Without wanting to go over old ground here you either need to add "in my opinion" to the end of that or show some hard evidence.
You can't just state it as a matter of fact.

Murder rates are categorically higher where it exists than where it doesn't. Evidence of that has been provided earlier in the thread.

Your only possible counter to that is that murder rates would be even higher if CP weren't in place. In that case it'd be up to you provide evidence of that.

Well this article from the most anti death penalty paper you can get says murder rates have more than doubled since it was abolished in the UK. In the 60's.

http://m.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jan/20/ ... pe=article

Anyway I'm not saying it does work, but you can't just say it doesn't without any evidence.

 

[BigT]

Without wanting to go over old ground here you either need to add "in my opinion" to the end of that or show some hard evidence.
You can't just state it as a matter of fact.

Murder rates are categorically higher where it exists than where it doesn't. Evidence of that has been provided earlier in the thread.

Your only possible counter to that is that murder rates would be even higher if CP weren't in place. In that case it'd be up to you provide evidence of that.

Not only that, but the link you provided earlier detailing how US states which have the death penalty have higher murder rates than those that don't have the death penalty.

Considering the US is culturally similar state-by-state this is pretty difficult to refute.

http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/deterre ... rder-rates

I didn't provide that link or say any such thing!

 

[adsyrah]

I didn't provide that link or say any such thing!

I didn't claim you did, I was talking to and backing up Tom.

As for your 60s Britain vs. Britain now, it's a very hollow argument. We're different culturally now to the 60s so you can't attribute the rise in murder rate to lack of capital punishment.

Have another look at the US link Tom pointed us to. It's comparing murder rates each decade - a much better comparison.

 

[Martin]

Anyway I'm not saying it does work, but you can't just say it doesn't without any evidence.

Good thing that we have lots of evidence then.

A few pages back I saw someone mention about it being cheaper, but again, this is not true. In America at least, it costs more to execute someone.

Also, no matter how much more 'humane' methods become, there is never anything humane about murder. There's also controversy about how 'humane' the current method is. A few states have changed from 3 injections to a huge dose of the first injection, as there is concerns the current method leaves victims conscious and can feel their muscles, lungs and heart failing, which as you can imagine, is not exactly humane.

 

[Fredward]

Well done noonoo... I thought we finally moved on!

Anyone up for hyperthetical discussions regarding future reading technologies?

Just me. Damn!




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[Martin]

I am but I'm not sure there's anywhere to take it really.

I'm not convinced it's ethical to arrest someone for a crime they themselves may not even be aware they're going to make, plus there's the possibility of the self-fulfilling prophesy, whereas action taken ends up creating the situation in the first place, and if no intervention happened, the person may not have committed/intended to commit the crime.