How Should Judge Candlass Rule?

[Questor]

-You can be stripped of several basic rights (freedom of assembly, freedom of press, academic freedom, freedom of association, secrecy of correspondence, righ of asylum and right of possesion) - but only if you are actively using them to destroy the "freiheitly demokratische Grundordnung" - freedom, democracy and order. This can only be done by the Bundesverfassungsgericht -our constitutional court.
You still have all your other human rights, and all rules at a court still apply to you.

Is this a separate process from imprisonment/probation? If not, I can't think of any analog, really, maybe court orders (like a restraining order).

[Simon_Jester]

I've heard that the "two witnesses" requirement has since been waived; the standards of evidence are now the same as for murder. Thus, material evidence is likely to be as important as, if not more important than, the number of witnesses.

I'd be very skeptical of that, especially as there hasn't been a treason trial (rather than charge) that I can find in recent memory. The courts would have to declare the article arcane (which it probably is) and interpret it, but no trial court would do that, and I doubt even an appeals court would. They'd leave it to the USSC.

Excuse me. I misread my source. It was the British law that inspired that clause that was waived. Nothing to see here, move along.

Renouncing by default would be interesting, are you referring to the "vote in foreign election" type things?

As I understand it, yes. Likewise accepting a title of nobility from a foreign country, or serving in a foreign military. I think.

Again, though, this is very rarely enforced as I recall.

[Serafina]

Is this a separate process from imprisonment/probation? If not, I can't think of any analog, really, maybe court orders (like a restraining order).

Well, if you have done something to get this rights stripped from you, you are definately going to get imprisoned.
These things can not be taken away by court/restraing orders - there are only a few expections (you are not allowed to found unconstutional associatons, on some cases your mail can be searched), but these are expections, and you still have the rights.

You only loose these rights when you have done something really drastic against the state and democracy itself - like planning a putsch and installing a dictatorship, something on that scale. And even then, only the constiutional court can do it.
While i do not recall specific cases, it is a really, really rare thing to happen.

It's kinda the ultimate punishment (we have no death sentence), as it takes away a couple of fundamental human rights.

[Buritot]

I don't insist on the letter of the law being upheld but rather its spirit. In this case there are no direct precedences to the crime (I view it as such), but indirect events mirrored the applied interrogation technique. These had been outlawed (if I'm not mistaken) and rightly so.

It is in no way my intention to take the side of the victim. Rather the opposite, actually. What she did was despicable in the way of betraying your species, not merely the occupying force of war. I can see the reasoning of peoples, partisans, traitors and guerilla alike to fight an enemy openly or from within. I don't even dare to comprehend the influence of faith in that.
However, when it comes to species, there applies a different ruleset. We don't know which one yet and neither are we aware of the specifics of the rules therein, but that is not to decide for the judiciary branch of law. Therefore the judge ought to apply lesser suited laws to this case.

I do not doubt there will be a movement for sophont rights, alike to human rights. What these will entail? I have no idea.

[Simon_Jester]

In Ms. Branch's defense, it must be said that she was almost certainly the victim of brainwashing in childhood; recall that her father was a fundamentalist preacher associated with the Branch Davidian cult. I speculate that Michael might have manipulated her further to secure her loyalty when he recruited her. Given the woefully screwed up state of her mind, I'm not sure she really had a choice.

So I don't say that what she did was defensible, but I don't think she belongs in quite the same ethical category as someone from a sane background who consciously decided to do the same thing in exchange for, say, a big pile of money (or a ticket into Heaven).

[CaptainChewbacca]

In Ms. Branch's defense, it must be said that she was almost certainly the victim of brainwashing in childhood; recall that her father was a fundamentalist preacher associated with the Branch Davidian cult. I speculate that Michael might have manipulated her further to secure her loyalty when he recruited her. Given the woefully screwed up state of her mind, I'm not sure she really had a choice.

Unfortunately, childhood indoctrination hasn't been an excuse. Most (if not all) the detainees at guantanamo bay were indoctrinated into madrasas at a young age and became jihadis, but they aren't given a pass for their present actions. She's clearly mentally ill, but knew what she was doing was illegal.

[Temmybear]

Given the wildly lopsided results of the polling, it's pretty clear what most people here think. But something about this bothers me. Wouldn't this create some amount of precedent (IANAL) that a defendant could give a confession and then later claim they felt they were being threatened? Or would we be looking at a ruling that only prevents demons from working in law enforcement?

[Serafina]

Given the wildly lopsided results of the polling, it's pretty clear what most people here think. But something about this bothers me. Wouldn't this create some amount of precedent (IANAL) that a defendant could give a confession and then later claim they felt they were being threatened? Or would we be looking at a ruling that only prevents demons from working in law enforcement?

You can already do that - it is already illegeal to get admissions by threat.

Of course, the police takes steps against such claims - such as recording the interrogation.
A Baldricks mind-entaglement will not show on video (Lugas did not) - but keeping Baldricks out of interrogation rooms is not that hard.

[Gil Hamilton]

Given the wildly lopsided results of the polling, it's pretty clear what most people here think. But something about this bothers me. Wouldn't this create some amount of precedent (IANAL) that a defendant could give a confession and then later claim they felt they were being threatened? Or would we be looking at a ruling that only prevents demons from working in law enforcement?

It's already illegal for police to drug a defendant and extract a confession with force/threat of force. This isn't anything new, which is why the results of the poll are heavily in one direction. I don't think anyone is HAPPY about having Miss Branch's confession be poisoned fruit and the very real possiblity that she'll get off because of it, but it was a clear Due Process violation.

What I think would be interesting is a court case that hits the Supreme Court on whether entanglement counts as a 4th Amendment violation.

Text:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Now, in the original intent, what I've bolded means that the police can't search or arrest a person without probable cause and thus gives rise to Due Process. However, demonic entanglement literally fits the text of the Bill, that it's an unreasonable seizure of the person's very self. Were I to judge this, even on the basest level, the prosecution lost the case unless they can magic into existence a warrant from a judge allowing Luga's action on the 4th Amendment by itself. I think it would be an interesting court case for the SCOTUS though.

[Simon_Jester]

Unfortunately, childhood indoctrination hasn't been an excuse. Most (if not all) the detainees at guantanamo bay were indoctrinated into madrasas at a young age and became jihadis, but they aren't given a pass for their present actions. She's clearly mentally ill, but knew what she was doing was illegal.

Remember, I'm not saying "I think her actions were legal" or "I think she should not be punished." I just don't have that utter hatred for her that some people here seem to be expressing, the kind that lets one really wish she were being tortured or that there were more ways to heap punishments on her head. For me, a fair trial is enough.

If it hadn't been for the screwup in the interrogation that happened when 'Kamikaze' decided to go for intelligence rather than evidence, she'd have been looking at a very long prison sentence or an execution, and I wouldn't mind that. But I don't feel a need to go beyond that and start thinking "oh, well we can't charge her again, we can't revoke her citizenship, dammit there's got to be some way to punish her!"

[TimothyC]

Quick question about the demonic entanglement - does the Daemon have to be in the same room? Otherwise throwing it out because of that is very very problematic.

[Stuart]

Quick question about the demonic entanglement - does the Daemon have to be in the same room? Otherwise throwing it out because of that is very very problematic.

Under pre-tinfoil hat conditions, no. The illusions could be projected for a considerable distance and effectively anybody with a line-of-sight to the source would be deluded. Some walls would act as impediments, others would not (for example a standard frame house wall with two pieces of sheetrock on a wooden framne would offer virtually no resistance. Post-tinfoil hats, humans call still have their minds entangled but the source has to be either very close and concentrate wholly on a single human or extremely powerful (Uriel for example). In attempting to entangle a huiman protected by a tinfoil hat, the minimal extra resistance offered by even a flimsy wall would be significant. So, assuming people are wearing their hats, keeping a succubus (or most other daemons) out of the room would be effective.

[TimothyC]

Quick question about the demonic entanglement - does the Daemon have to be in the same room? Otherwise throwing it out because of that is very very problematic.

Under pre-tinfoil hat conditions, no. The illusions could be projected for a considerable distance and effectively anybody with a line-of-sight to the source would be deluded. Some walls would act as impediments, others would not (for example a standard frame house wall with two pieces of sheetrock on a wooden framne would offer virtually no resistance. Post-tinfoil hats, humans call still have their minds entangled but the source has to be either very close and concentrate wholly on a single human or extremely powerful (Uriel for example). In attempting to entangle a huiman protected by a tinfoil hat, the minimal extra resistance offered by even a flimsy wall would be significant. So, assuming people are wearing their hats, keeping a succubus (or most other daemons) out of the room would be effective.

Ah, thank you for answering my question Stuart [As an aside - my local book store has both TBO and AoN in their system, and I'll be buying AoN through them soon]. Then I don't have a problem throwing it out establishing a precedent. If this wasn't the case, then I would, because people might claim that they were the victim of a daemonic projection anytime they admit to a crime while being questioned.

[Darth Wong]

Since the US is apparently not under martial law and she still has constitutional rights, I voted that her testimony should be inadmissible, since it's pretty much impossible to interpret the situation any other way. If I held a gun to your head and threatened to blow your brains out it would obviously be an "under duress" confession, regardless of whether there's a bullet in the chamber. I don't see how there can even be any question about this. The drugging is just icing on the cake as far as the accusation of improper interrogation techniques is concerned.

Having said that, they obviously had evidence on her before Luga became involved, and it may still be possible to convict her without her confession and testimony. There is no need to assume that she necessarily walks just because that particular piece of testimony is ruled inadmissible. And the authorities could still use the information she gave them in order to investigate the people on her list, regardless of whether the list itself is admissible in court. They would still be able to instantly remove all of them from any kind of security access if they currently have it (there is no due process for being removed from high security access AFAIK), and they would be able to put them all under surveillance.

[open_sketchbook]

I'd say this is controversial at all more due to the magnitude of the crime rather than the circumstances by which evidence was gathered. If she were, say, a thief, then clearly the evidence would be thrown out.

[Simon_Jester]

Evidence that isn't admissible in court for small crimes shouldn't be admissible for large ones. If I can't extort a confession to something punishable with a fine I shouldn't be able to extort a confession to something punishable with death.

[open_sketchbook]

That's what I'm saying. The only reason there is any debate is because some people think the magnitude of the crime overrides her rights.