The legal and media spectacle that followed the senseless terrorist bombing at the Boston marathon has me worried for the future. Not because of the the terrorists themselves, but because of the reaction of the American media and the American leadership to the terrorist acts against our society. A great article worth a quick read:
http://www.jpost.com/Features/Front-Lines/What-message-is-US-sending-with-a-Boston-lockdown-310424
Now that a suspect has been caught, the mob mentality is taking over our justice system. First off, the suspect is denied his Miranda rights. A great point made by this author as to why we should care about this.
The next thing to watch will be to see if the suspect is denied habeas corpus and detained indefinitely. Apparently, according to this article, the National Defense Authorization Act of 2013, there is a provision that claims to ensure that “any person inside the United States” is allowed their constitutional rights, including habeas corpus. Thus it seems if they continue to treat this suspect outside of the normal rule of law, they would need to send him offshore to Guantanamo Bay. Senator Lindsey Graham has already stated a desire to treat the suspect as an enemy combatant for intelligence gathering purposes, though the Obama administration has said that is unlikely. Should this suspect be sent to Guantanamo Bay to be questioned, that would set a strong and disturbing precedent for the treatment of any american citizen accused of a crime.
I don’t want the lingering result of this terrorist act to be the canonization of lynch law. If we don’t provide the suspect his civil rights, the terrorists will have won the battle.
First I want to say that I agree with the overall message and concerns in this post.
One of the things being said on the broadcast I was watching was that if he was not given his Miranda rights anything he said before being given his rights could not be used against him. Only things he said after being given his rights could be used. This makes sense and it seems like it would be prudent to find out if there were any other imminent threats. I would think that enough evidence can be found against this person without any immediate potential admissions.
One of my biggest concerns was the immediate declaration by two US Senators (Graham R-SC and McCain R-AZ) that this person be declared an enemy combatant. This declaration by two US Senators was made without evidence that this was any plot by a foreign organized group. I doubt that there has been sufficient time to find out what this person knows or what his state of mind will be for cooperation or the best way to gain his cooperation.
Whether this was an attempt by these two individuals for political posturing or just a kneejerk reaction I find this to be the ultimate in irresponsibility by some of the most powerful individuals in our government.
I applaud all the law enforcement people who helped to do what was necessary to capture this individual and I certainly hope that this will eventually lead to some of the answers to our questions regarding this despicable crime. If there is a connection with other groups and if he can provide information to help our law enforcement agencies and Homeland Security department then we will all be better off.
There will be plenty of time to make a determination of how to deal with this individual.
Let trained professionals do their job first.
With the Patriot Act, the drone program and now Eric Holders Department of Justice decision to expand Miranda exceptions we now have had two consecutive administrations, one Republican and one Democratic, who have made it official administrative policy to expand the ability of the government to spy on and deny basic rights of American citizens without judicial oversight.
Since it does not seem to matter which party is in power regarding the desire of government agencies to expand its own power has the United States now crossed the line where individual Constitutional liberties are no longer truly protected?
The NRA uses all its power to successfully block any law where they feel the government infringes on the rights of individuals regarding guns. How come there isn’t an equally powerful group to help protect all citizens against the power of a government infringing on all the other the Constitutional rights of its citizens?
I wondered what happened to the concept of presumed innocence.
The problem is that America has become a nation of pussies. Lock down of the whole city? Come on! It is also terrifing that everything is on video tape somewhere. It could be a case of mis-identification. There were a few people who early on were identified as the bomber. If we don’t treat this citizen with all his rights, then we are giving up ours.
Who was on the grassy knoll?