In violation of a court order. This shouldn't come as a surprise. Regardless of whether she's right or wrong, this is a decision where the price was clear. It was her choice to pay it.
Why is there always a comment from the legal fatalism gallery in every HN thread like this? Can we not strive for victim's rights or for more human policy-making?
Beyond that, it's annoying, obvious, and contributes nothing.
Legal fatalism is one of the few responsible comments one can make about a case like this. We don'k know much about the case--the facts are sealed, and we have no context--and I'm not willing to second guess a judge based on one sided, incomplete, inflammatory comments leaked by an angry first-party. But by all means, pass judgement and cast the first stone yourselves. It wouldn't be the first time vigilante justice has been performed.
I presume that such cases are a minority, that those who plead guilty generally are. But I don't know what the actual odds are. What makes you certain? Or are you comfortable passing judgement regardless?
I'm comfortable forming an opinion based on the facts available. As I said in my comment, I'd like more info since it's ostensibly a public function to run a government court.
Otherwise we can all just run around with our hands in the air crying about how we just can't make a decision on anything in which we weren't directly a party.
Naming people on the internet in regards to sexual crimes is dangerous. I understand the frustration of her and her family and I cannot say she was wrong to make the injustice public.
With that said, this is not a clear cut issue. I hope grace prevails and we do not attempt to ruin the boys lives in pursuit of vengeance. This is not something a mad internet does very well and would be a justifiable reason for the court to ban publication.
>"Naming people on the internet in regards to sexual crimes is dangerous."
Sexually assaulting people in real life is dangerous.
Why should the victim care one iota about what happens to these guys? Because of some arbitrary "moral-code", "justice" or "rule-of-law"? If this were me, I'd have done the same or worse. Which is why I can say, unabashedly, good for her. She witnessed first hand how the justice system works. They got their slap on the wrist, no she'll get hers.
So sexual assault is OK as long as they are kids? I have four kids and often think courts are ridiculously stupid for trying them as adults.
However, two of my kids are daughters. As the victim, their rights should trounce the rights of the attackers. That doesn't necessarily mean naming them, but if they aren't going to be named (which is usually the right thing to do for juveniles), they must be appropriately punished.
Unfortunately, we are missing whether they were appropriately punished. From her perspective, I'm sure the answer is No, but objectively, we don't know the answer.
I can't imagine how much it would suck to be a judge.
>So sexual assault is OK as long as they are kids?
OK? of course not. But it shouldn't destroy their whole lives, the way being publicly named would. As long as you're a kid you deserve another chance, even after murdering someone. That's the whole point of trying juveniles differently.
We sometimes have a tendency to err on the side of whatever has the strongest emotional pull. It's important to protect your daughters from becoming victims, but don't forget that your sons can also be victimized by false accusations or even false convictions. Don't forget that what you think is "appropriate punishment" from hearing one side of the case may actually be far too much for the actual crime, or perhaps even a non-crime where someone plead guilty because the plea deal let them get on with their lives sooner and with less risk.
Criminals should be appropriately punished. But those decisions need to be made in light of all the facts, preferably within the legal system. Dumping the names out there on Twitter is, as an above post said, dangerous. Maybe these guys deserve it, but maybe "twitter justice" will give these guys -- or some innocent kid in a similar case -- punishment far beyond what they deserve.
Victim's rights? More human policy-making? I wish.
Apparently not, guess the GP must be right and the victim got what was coming to her.
It's insane how detached we've become from the real world. Arguing about patents and iOS vs Android and open source. Two people pled guilty to a rape, within a court that we all pay for, and somehow there's a random smart-ass that wants to sound smart with the legal fatalism angle on this.
It's annoying, obvious, and contributes nothing because:
1. Any state actions that promotes the current legal hegemony is inevitable, making a comment noting the fatalism inherent in taking an action (principled or not) that could trigger blowback from this legal hegemony is by definition obvious.
2. It's annoying because it doesn't say anything that isn't already evident from a passing understanding of the power dynamics of western society, especially as it relates to the courts. You don't need to say something emphasizing the power of the judicial system to ruin your life...we know that already.
3. And it contributes nothing because such comments rarely go beyond capitalizing on the opportunity to be snarky, doing nothing to describe the ethics of the situation or how the system could be improved.
