Back in the Day

[game_byrd]

Title: Back in the Day
Characters: Nathan Petrelli, Peter Petrelli
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Word count: 1,200
Setting: Preseason, New York, 2002 (set a few couple years after Light Up and Reminiscences)
Summary: Peter gets busted at a club and has to call his big brother to bail him out.

Comments

[wanderinspirits]

Thank you very much. I'm not planning on being a cop but instead to go and get a masters in either that or Psychology (my minor) or law school. But, I'm open minded to what's out there.

There's a lot of imperfection in it, I will admit. It even makes me question. Heck, they say that DNA evidence that was collected and tested from years ago is questionable and I've read about a few people being released from prison/death row because of retesting confirming that it was not them who committed the act. Then there's the issue of dry labbing with it.

I have met a fair share of people who work in the C.J. system who should never work with the general public and I've met people who truly want to help but have to do within the confines of the system. So, I definitely agree that it is not the people as much as the nature of things. Honestly, I think you're view is dead on in some areas. It really is that way in real life. (It's nothing like TV where they show people wanting justice and doing whatever they can do ensure that the right person is caught and in prison by the end of the episode.) They simply want the case solved or something to be confessed to...so they can move on to the next thing. (Probably other reasons too, definitely not everyone there either.)

[game_byrd]

Yes, you're exactly right with them simply wanting the case solved. That's what I meant by backwards incentives. They're measured and rewarded by how many people they get convictions on, not whether they got the guilty party. 'They' in this case constitute the district attorney, prosecutorial teams, and the police.

I read an article Friday about investigations into crime labs - how the high case load and big backlog led to rewards for those who processed samples faster, and the fastest processing was simply to say 'yes' or 'no' to a match without bothering to test them. Since the criminal justice system is often immune to being double-checked by outside parties, the practice of falsifying results appears to be endemic and widespread.

[wanderinspirits]

Oh. *blush* Sorry, I was reading and posting before my coffee kicked in. I feel really stupid now.

Oh, I'll have to look for that article. I know the last thing I read was a while ago and it was about one particular lab. I don't remember a ton about it and I lost the link to it. I'll have to look for that one too.

It's a shame that the incentive is for simply solving it and not...well, actually doing right by the people involved or connected to what happened. I definitely think that there needs to be someone going in and checking things, I just have no idea who would be able to do that. I suppose people from outside of the places (labs, departments, perhaps the state of the place mentioned) or how they could work something like that out.

For example, probably a strange one but I think it also is another reason why their should be people going in and doing things or double checking what is done, that whole case in Steubenville, OH...those were all people who had connections (in some way) to those kids. (At least, from what I've read) They should be taken off of the investigation and people from another part of the state should step in.

[game_byrd]

Yeah, but for the Stuebenville thing, the state DA's office sent a guy down, who hob-knobbed with the local DA (?) and then his son mysteriously got a job at the local police office. The guy didn't find any evidence of misconduct, to no one's surprise.

Cronyism like that is hard to counter as long as the law is above the law. There's so much frickin' immunity for the state that it's tough to do anything about it. Here's a HuffPost article about that: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/16/the-power-of-the-prosecut_n_2488653.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

Here's a related one: http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/washington/judicial/2010-09-27-hyde-federal-prosecutors_N.htm

Here's the crime lab article I mentioned. It was from Monday, not Friday: http://www.slate.com/blogs/crime/2013/01/14/serrita_mitchell_dna_the_unsettling_underregulated_world_of_crime_labs.html?fb_action_ids=10151224624528861&fb_action_types=og.likes&fb_ref=sm_fb_like_chunky&fb_source=aggregation&fb_aggregation_id=288381481237582

(I had these on my Facebook, so they were easy to find.)

[wanderinspirits]

Ah, thank you. I'll have to read those when I get the chance. :)

Ugh, seriously? (Yeah, not surprised. Just what else can I say?) And you do have a good point and it's something that I'm seeing more and more as time goes on here. Law is above the law.