And Your Perspective on Criminal Trials Comes From TeeVee

People are upset that PVC or SPF or DMC or whatever his name is hasn’t been charged and arrested yet. I’ve been asked to explain, in a diplomatic and respectful way, why this might be.

It’s because you’re an unserious person with the attention span of a sugared toddler.

/1 https://t.co/q4V8wy5EV1

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

And, as I say, everything you know about a trial comes from TeeVee or the movies. Which are about as realistic as "Harry Potter."

/3 White collar crimes generally have more complex and difficult intent requirements. Often you have to prove fraudulent intent or even specific intent to break the law. That’s much more complicated than proving the dude robbed a bank.

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

Yes, this does mean the system is skewed. No, that is not an accident. Common law arose from the courts trying to create a legal system that was a bit more than rulers rule and commoners suffer. But rulers still rule and to this day the concept of "sovereign immunity" (even though we don't have a Crown) prevails. Trickle-down, bay-bee.

/5 So: proving white collar crimes can be hard. When I say that, let me remind you, in a way that is as respectful as God has made me capable, that things are not easy just because you don’t understand them. Many things you don’t understand are very hard.

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

A/k/a "Poor people are crazy, rich people are eccentric." The fix is in. It ain't justice, but that's what we call it. And, speaking of things you don't understand: as I was saying.

/7 So if proving white collar crimes is so hard, why do the feds have such a good plea and trial win record? It’s because of their competitive advantage — vast resources they can use to conduct slow, methodical, multi-stage grand jury investigations.

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

I especially like the point about "jury instructions." If you don't understand the power and importance of jury instructions, you understand NOTHING about jury trials. Let me repeat myself: NOTHING. If the power of jury instructions was widely understood it would be regarded as a "technicality," as in the report I heard this morning where a journalist casually reported that a death row case out of Harris County was plead into life without parole, because the defendant got a new trial granted years ago on a "technicality." When you get the benefit of that "technicality," you call it "justice." Just so we're clear.

/9…in part because you’re not supposed to use the grand jury to gather evidence for something you’ve only charged, only for new charges. And because once you charge you’ve shown your hand and can’t play any of the feds’ favorite games, like….

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

/11 The feds win cases because they slowly, steadily build a web. They gather evidence, examine it, follow leads, call witnesses and lock in their testimony in the grand jury early, use all that to flip cooperators, apply slow pressure.

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

The first principle of criminal prosecution: "They don't catch the smart ones."

/14 pic.twitter.com/K5RHrRwMdj

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

Yes, I left one out. You're not missing anything.

/16 If what you want is instant gratification, go buy a bag of fucking Doritos, would you?

/end

— Popehat (@Popehat) December 8, 2022

I'd still rather address the inherent flaw in the system, and it's not just that rich people can hire competent counsel (as Trump has proven time and again, they can hire incompetent counsel, too.) The system flatly favors the "white collar" criminal over the "blue collar" criminal. 

Never forget the infamous AP caption to the photos of people taking food from a flooded store in the flooded city of New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina, when no help was coming from ANYONE! White people were feeding themselves; black people were "looting" the store. 

The problems run deep, and all the way back to "Mother England."