Proving Guilt and Maintaining Innocence

Proving guilt and maintaining innocence

By: Noah Walker

D.Condon

JAN 27 2016

CLN 4U

Technicalities are an essential part of law but they are a double edged sword. On one side they protect the rights of everyone in Canada from the law and its enforcers. On the other side however they can allow criminals, rapists and murderers to walk free. But how can we change this, if we get rid of technicalities what's to stop police officers from going into any house or building they want and arresting everyone. Eventually they will find people who have broken the law but we will have no sense of privacy and even more important no rights. It's a slippery slope and where do you stop? If you allow all evidence to be admissible in courts sure that will allow more people to be convicted. However what lengths will police to go to in order to get evidence? Do the means justify the ends? is it alright if we violate the rights of criminals as they have violated the rights of our citizens?

“As nice as it would be, we cannot have one set of laws for the innocent and one for the guilty” if only it were that easy however guilt is decided at the end of the trial not the point of investigation. Therefore we can't have rules about which evidence is admissible and how it is gotten. We can't have cops treat the innocent one way and the guilty the other on the simple fact we don't know which one the accused is until after the fact. “We like the technicalities that protect our privacy from the police. What we really object to is the use of technicalities by those we believe to be criminals” We as humans are hypocrites, it's easy for us to say that those we suspect to be criminals shouldn't have rights in court or be able to use technicalities as an excuse no one is above the law. Typically when you hear that you think of politicians or government officials but the term can easily be applied to those who are guilty as well they have every right to use or hide behind anything an innocent man can use as well.

“The price we pay for the luxury of our freedom, and it is acceptable coinage, is that it becomes more difficult for the police to be effective in catching criminals”. We can't have the freedom we have in today's world without these technicalities. They protect all citizens from being unfairly treated as we are all the same in the eyes of the law. “Technicalities are indispensable, even to the accomplishment of case utility. in other words we need technicalities to get the verdict right”. We always focus on the negative side of technicalities however they have kept many criminals behinds bars that would have otherwise walked. For example Peter Demeter was on trial for murdering his wife. He attempted to introduce a statement that was supposedly made by his prison cellmate saying that he was the one who murdered Peter's wife not Peter. However he could not call upon that