The whole conceit of pre-trial detention is that we do not know if the detainees are guilty.

Which does not disprove the implication I made, since you assumed the hypothesis to be false. Given that they are guilty, would you still support them? There sure seems to be a lot of “we should be nicer to thieves” in this thread, so I think we already know the answer.

I don't support thieves. This hypothetical where we know guilt before trial is not especially interesting or enlightening.

Personal attacks are not allowed here, so please don't do that.

Also, please don't use HN for ideological battle, regardless of what you're battling for or against. It looks like you've been doing that a lot, unfortunately. It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.