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A comment on Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge says yes. Parent comment

Re:Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge ... by euyyn on Thursday March 16, 2017 @03:52PM (#13888553)
> Investigators feel clever for thinking "No one but the perp, within reason, could've ever searched for these terms in this time."

Luckily, people are convicted when a judge or jury is convinced that the evidence points at them being guilty beyond any reasonable doubt. Not when an investigator feels clever.

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Re:Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge ... by rhizome on Thursday March 16, 2017 @05:18PM (#13889271)
~95% of all convictions derive from plea bargains, and a not-insignificant portion (2-8%) of those are estimated to be innocent.[1]

So, we have a system where an investigator can indeed "feel clever," produce a defendant based on sketchy evidence, who then pleads out for any number of reasons. Neither judge nor jury ever hears what the evidence is in these cases. Ta da: the immaculate conviction.

1. https://www.themarshallproject.org/2014/12/26/plea-bargainin...

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Re:Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge ... by paulddraper on Thursday March 16, 2017 @06:56PM (#13889912)
And this is a problem that go away with less evidence collection?
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Re:Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge ... by rhizome on Friday March 17, 2017 @02:38AM (#13892020)
No, I'm saying that the plea system is the constant. The amount of evidence collected is often irrelevant.
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Re:Police ask for whole city's Google searches, and a judge ... by noobiemcfoob on Thursday March 16, 2017 @04:32PM (#13888897)
If only.
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