Thoughts on the Moussaoui trial

[chickenfeet]

First a disclaimer. I am an opponent of capital punishment. I am also a realist who accepts that most states for most of human history have reserved the right to impose the death penalty. I therefore accept that the United States has the right to keep the death penalty in its legal arsenal if that's what its citizens want.

Having got that out of the way I find the way the US legal system deals with the death penalty peculiarly disturbing. First, there's the absurdity of a system that can keep someone on death row for twenty years and then execute him or her. Now, constitutional doctrine appears to evolved to the point where a jury must decide whether the death penalty is appropriate. One might hope that a decision on the life or death of a human being would be made in a sober and analytical way but, as we can see from what's going on in the Moussaoui trial, in practice we are getting something between a farce and "Survivor". Take this from the BBC today:

Prosecutors are said to be planning to read out the names of the 2,972 victims of the attacks, and show their pictures in court.

Now that's just shameless emotional manipulation. What next? The defence brings Moussaoui's kids into court crying about their daddy?

I realise suggesting that American lawyers should show some sense of decency and decorum is a bit like asking a piranha to turn vegan but really.

Comments

[itchyfidget.livejournal.com]

Couldn't agree more :-/

[theomaniac.livejournal.com]

While it may be emotional manipulation, it is fairly normal in murder trials to present the names, and photographs of, the victims. If there were in fact nearly 3,000 victims of the attacks, it's a reasonable expectation that each one of them should be given recognition.
Murder trials are never decided on a fully sober rational analysis, nor do I think they should be. That is not to discount the importance of rationality in decision making, but a recognition of the fundamental importance of the emotional impact of these crimes.

That being said, I'm sure this whole thing will turn into a media spectacle, which I disapprove of.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

If there were in fact nearly 3,000 victims of the attacks, it's a reasonable expectation that each one of them should be given recognition.

If they had done that at Nuremberg the trial would still be going on.

[theomaniac.livejournal.com]

Surely you exaggerate! I estimate it would only have taken two years to read the names of all of the Holocaust victims and show pictures where they were available. In the 9/11 case it would only take about four hours or so.
But I see your point.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

They read the names of the September 11 victims at a ceremony on the first anniversary; I can't remember the precise timing, but I think it was a few hours.

But if one accepts the principle of the death penalty (which I don't), and that it can be enforced for the murder of one person, I don't see the need to dramatise the point that this case involves nearly 3,000. No one on the jury can be unaware of this, as the deaths were very well documented; indeed, I would have thought there was a danger that the coverage would cause the jurors to enter the court prejudiced against the defendant, thus reducing his chances of a fair trial.

[sollersuk.livejournal.com]

Looking at it historically, from the Brit pov, reading out lists of victims really only makes sense if the crime is primarily against the individual as opposed to the Queen's Peace. The former, in the past, led to vendetta, which the latter tried to defuse.

It bothers me when in accounts of American trials relatives of victims equate "justice" with the conviction of the accused, feeling that they have been denied them if the accused is acquitted. Since in a significant number of cases people who have been convicted have later been shown not in fact to have committed the crime, I find this attitude disturbing.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

David Hackett Fisher argues that the culture of the Southern Highland states (where the vast majority of executions are carried out) is principally derived from that of the Anglo-Scottish border. Makes sense in the light of your observation.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

relatives of victims equate "justice" with the conviction of the accused

But that happens in the UK too, and they're outraged if the conviction is overturned on appeal. To me, it makes the crime even more disturbing if I think that an innocent person could be serving a sentence while the real killer is running free, but I presume the relatives require an emotional sense of closure which is satisfied by someone being found guilty, and therefore they rest a little more easily believing the conviction is sound.

[rhythmaning.livejournal.com]

Except that Moussaoui isn't directly accused of their murder: he has pleaded guilty of a separate conspiracy to fly a plane into the White House, I believe.

The trial and possible death sentence stems from the fact that he is thought to have known of the Sept 11 plans and not disclosed them.

[theomaniac.livejournal.com]

This whole business is greatly complicated and is making my head hurt. Is it justifiable to execute someone merely for non-disclosure of a conspiracy? I'm not inclined to say yes.
But a related question is: which is better, to execute somebody or let them rot in jail for the rest of their life?

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

which is better, to execute somebody or let them rot in jail for the rest of their life?

Which takes us into the whole debate about the morality, value, etc of the death penalty which I had hoped to avoid in this case. I think most of the people on my f-list have given it much thought and come to their own conclusions. I don't want to and won't censor debate on this question (I have never yet deleted a comment or banned a person from this journal and I don't intend to start) but I would prefer that if you want to open up that particular question you do it on your own journal. That's not intended as any kind of put down. It's just that it's not a debate I want to get drawn into for the umpteenth time right now.

[theomaniac.livejournal.com]

That's a fair enough request. I hadn't intended to begin a debate, really, I'd just written a couple of thoughts that had popped into my head at the time of the response.

[albionwood.livejournal.com]

Everything about the US legal system is dysfunctional. The adversarial framework guarantees abuse. Prosecutors are rewarded for convictions; defense lawyers are rewarded for acquittals; judges are political creatures, either appointed or elected; nobody is rewarded for seeking Truth. The entire system is rotten to the core.

The wonder is that it works at all. Despite the political nature of their positions, most judges do a remarkable job. It's the damned adversarial system that screws things up. Attorneys on both sides are strongly motivated to be jerks. This is true at every level - from traffic court to the Supreme Court; it's just that we notice it more in capital cases.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

Do you think an inquisitorial system would work better? I'm no expert but I don't see any evidence that it is.

[a-d-medievalist.livejournal.com]

Well, as yet another opponent to the death penalty, not only do I think the system is warped, but I also wonder at the logic of this. Honestly, I can't see where executing Moussaoui would give anyone 'closure' or fulfill a desire for vengeace. Now, I can understand people feeling that way if it were Osama bin Laden, although I'd still oppose the death penalty in his case on general principles of opposing the death penalty, but I can understand how people might feel that way. But in some ways this is (to me, at least) a disturbing parallel of the build up to the invasion of Iraq. Both Moussaoui and Saddam Hussein clearly sunt mali. But using people who are clearly bad as magnets to attract any other general need for vengeance and a concrete attribution of guilt for "closure' is far too disturbing.

[shezan.livejournal.com]

Well, one must have a Moussaoui trial, after all. And the judge has been trying to keep things stricly within the letter of the law, throwing out quite a bit of the State's evidence, because it was tainted. Reading the names of the victims is useful to bring this back to reality, when the WTC falling towers are used across the Islamofascist spectrum as a video-game-like cry of victory.

[chickenfeet2003.livejournal.com]

I don't think spending many hours reading the names and showing the photos of the victims brings anything "back to reality". Everyone in that court knows that 3000+ people died. The judge's behavious has been admirable. She has been both fair and dignified. The lawyers on both sides are another story. One perhaps might expect the defence in a trial like this to be somewhat histrionic but for the prosecutors in what is, after all, a state trial, to behave like a cross between gangsters and clowns is most regrettable and, at best, detracts from the dignity of the state.