Re:Prosecutors halt vast, likely illegal DEA wiretap operation
by ipsin on Friday February 26, 2016 @06:46PM
(#11185185)
(1) By definition, if the law provides no remedy, there is no legal recourse;
I meant the law mandating the requirement, not "all law".
It's possible that there's another law dealing with the execution of duties, similar to "honest services fraud".
I'm not saying that it exists, but I disagree that it's impossible by definition.
I do take your second point, though.
Re:Prosecutors halt vast, likely illegal DEA wiretap operation
by dragonwriter on Friday February 26, 2016 @06:55PM
(#11185228)
> It's possible that there's another law dealing with the execution of duties, similar to "honest services fraud".
I was taking that as a case of the law providing a remedy for the offense in question, as part of some more general provision, so I think that our disagreement here is mostly just semantics rather than substance.
(1) By definition, if the law provides no remedy, there is no legal recourse;
(2) The law often provides remedies, either specific to the violation or more general, but there may be difficulties in securing them (e.g., many violations of people's rights are, in fact, crimes by government agents. However, prosecutors are unlikely to pursue such crimes, especially if they were in support of executive policy rather than a rogue -- with respect to the leadership -- agent. Many also would generally open up civil liability under generally-applicable principals of law, but public officers and the public entities they work for may be able to assert various forms of governmental immunity to such liability.)
Ultimately, the remedies for bad behavior by government often must be political, rather than legal.