BS: Robert Blake walks

Subject: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: GUEST,Grace-watcher
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 09:28 PM

Just like his pal OJ, Robert Blake killed his wife and gets off.

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Bobert
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 09:44 PM

Normal... You got money, you walk. You don't, you fry...

It's the American justice system and it ain't cheap to walk... Ask Michael Jackson how much it will have cost him when he walks...

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 10:24 PM

Bizarre. And yet- if there is a reasonable doubt... And most/all of the damaging testimony came from a couple of known druggies. (To do a well-loved figure here: And what difference does that make, Bobert? Never mind.)

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 10:53 PM

At least he did some jail time while waiting to go to trial, since they had denied him bail.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Troll
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 10:56 PM

I go with you Ebbie. (surprise!) You never hear about the low-profile ones that walk, only the high profiles.

I have a friend who is a public defender and he tells some stories that would surprise you about people who got off.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Ebbie
Date: 16 Mar 05 - 11:00 PM

Makes you wonder just what a 'jury of your peers' actually means.

(Glad you and I have found mutual ground, troll. *G*)

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Donuel
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:32 PM

Menu of Justice

$10 million to murder your wife (double that if her blood is on your socks)

$5 million to be found innocent of cocaine sales.

ect.
..........

all they way down to traffic court where it costs $40 for a bogus parking ticket and $80 to be found innocent.

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:38 PM

Any of you brilliant commentators actually follow the trial in any detail?

Watch for the civil case-- where Blake has to testify. Checks and balances ain't quite done yet.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Ebbie
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:40 PM

No. I did not follow the trial in detail. Nor did I follow Scott Peterson's trial. Nor O.J. Simpson's. It doesn't mean I can't have an opinion.

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: Wesley S
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:43 PM

Susan - We don't need facts if we have opinions !!

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: bobad
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:50 PM

A lawyer once told me that "justice" was expensive and that the more you paid the more you got. His fee was CDN$200 per hour.

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: wysiwyg
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 12:58 PM

The acquittals in this case have to do with the nature of the evidence that was available-- it was going to be a tough case to prove no matter what people thought of him as a rich celebrity. The count the jury hung up on is, I believe, still viable. It had been said that this count was potentially the most provable-- so it would be my hope that additional corroborative evidence may be forthcoming on that charge. It's also entirely possible, as many jurors implied, that some other hit man (besides the two for which Blake was tried on "solicitation of murder" charges) actually did the deed-- and may yet be identified, bringing Blake back into criminal court.

Murders for hire are often just very, very hard to prove, no matter how large or small the payment, and the checkbook of the mindermast behind the killing.

In any event, with or without a refiling of that charge-- the civil case is going to be as hard on him, and as humiliating, as OJ's was on him.

Our system is larger than any one charge, any one case. The beauty of law is its breadth-- it doesn't work instantaneously or in small sound bites. You have to step back a bit to see its operation-- a little slice is just not representative of any one case or the system's operation on any one individual.

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Robert Blake walks
From: GUEST
Date: 17 Mar 05 - 02:49 PM

The American criminal justice system is based upon the tenet of the presumption of innocence.

We've been having more and more problems maintaining that tenet with the advent of 24/7 talk radio and TV stations that hype these criminal cases.

I actually sat on the jury of a criminal trial last year--a rape case. All I can say is, no one who has posted here seems to have a clue about what the criminal justice system is all about.

I have started following some of these trials much closer than I ever did before I sat on the jury of a criminal trial, because the experience just blows all your preconceived notions and prejudices right out the window.

I believe the jury in the Blake case did an excellent job. I thought the Scott Peterson jury was awful--based upon the evidence presented at trial (rather than what all the yellow journalists sensations discussed and are still discussing--like what monsters Scott Peterson's PARENTS are for christ sake), that guy NEVER should have been convicted. The prosecution in that case brilliantly exploited the jurors' revulsion over the nature of the crime (the disappearance and murder of a pregnant woman), rather than proved their case.

The evidence in both cases were entirely circumstantial, with no direct links between the crimes and the defendants. But especially with the Peterson case, the presumption of innocence was thrown out the window from the gitgo. He really has no chance of appeal either, from the looks of it. Though he will keep trying.

I hate the death penalty with a passion too, BTW, so I wasn't happy with the death sentence being handed down in that case either. I don't think capital punishment should be allowed unless there is incontrovertible evidence that links the defendant to the crime. In other words, in a case like Scott Peterson, if you are going to find the dude guilty with no proof, shouldn't be allowed to execute them.