If your interpretation of angdis' comment is correct, I'm even more at a loss. What is wrong with people being found not guilty of one offence even though they've previously been convicted of others? In what way is it an example of justice not being served?

angdis doesn't say that the correct acquittal of repeat offenders is not justice being served, just that the total number of acquittals of criminals is greater than the total number of times that justice is served.

Justice is the sum of all correct results. (i.e. where the accused is guilty and found guilty, and where the accused is innocent and found not guilty)

The number of Criminals found not guilty is the sum of all incorrect acquittals of all offenders (guilty but found not guilty), and correct acquittals of repeat offenders.

Consider an example: Given 10 trials of repeat offenders, made up of 5 guilty and 5 innocent.

If every trial ends with the correct result, then justice has been served 10 times, and 5 criminals have been found not guilty.

However, If they are all found not guilty, then justice has been served 5 times, but 10 criminals have been found not guilty.

In that case, and assuming (1) the correctness of angdis' contention that criminals are found not guilty more often than justice is served and (2) a conviction rate of at least two-thirds in the court system he/she is talking about (which is not a high bar), there are more wrongful convictions than correct ones.

Yes, given 9 cases, and 3 wrongful acquittals, the remaining 6 guilty verdicts can have at most 2 instances of justice being done (i.e. true positives), meaning that the remaining 4 are false convictions. If any of those acquittals were the correct result, then even more people need to do porridge in order to make angdis' assertion correct.

I'm not saying that angdis isn't wrong, just that you seemed to be rebutting the wrong point. In fact, as I stated in my first response, proving the assertion requires information that one simply couldn't have, i.e. a chart of actual guilt vs verdict. Plenty of guilty convicts will protest their innocence, and no one, having been acquitted, will then go on to say, "Well, actually, I did it, so long suckers!" I'd add that, as you point out, this is a pretty outrageous claim, so the burden of proof truly lies with the one making it.

In fact, I've oversimplified, because there was actually another clause in angdis' original assertion, "or guilty and given probation (nothing)", this adds another set of results to the group that makes up the "more than justice" list: any probation sentence, which could be an appropriate sentence for the convict (which is justice, so it cancels out), repeat offenders being found guilty of a crime of which they are innocent, but sentenced appropriately for the charge (not justice, but also still a guilty verdict) or inappropriately lenient ( not justice). By making the latter claim, one is declaring oneself a greater authority on sentencing and its goals and outcomes than the judges whose business it is to know all about sentencing.

This means that false guilty verdicts for minor crimes could still go on the left, if the accused is a criminal.

[Replying to myself r/than frozbozz as I seem to have hit some kind of nesting limit.]

> just that you seemed to be rebutting the wrong point

It's more that I'm questioning the interpretation you've put on angdis' initial comment. Your logic is impeccable, but it leads to conclusions that are so at odds with the tone of his/her post that I feel you are crediting him/her with too much coherence and consistency.