h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

One of his deputies was captured and scheduled to be put on trial in
New York City but the Mayor of New York said absolutely not. We can not afford the extra security it would take for such a trial.
If you could not put a subordinate on trial in the city where 3000 lives were snuffed out, think how much harder it would be to put the top man on trial there. Obama campained on a pledge of closing
Guantanimo Bay Prison, but has found there is nowhere else that Al-Quida terrorists can be put. Therefor it remains open and it would have been home for Bin Laden until he died of old age. You may not like execution without trial but it was a good pragmatic solution to an insoluable problem.

Should have sent him to the Hague.

I don't like executions at all actually; but that is what his destiny was, even if he went to the Hague.

Most definitely not, because, as in most civilized countries, the court in The Hague does not implement the death penalty.

Shagbark, there have been numerous trials of alleged terrorists in New York City. If the expenses involved in security are too much for New York, there may be other ways (a change of venue, or federal financial help, to name two) of handling it. The point is moot, but I'm a bit sensitive about watching the justice system get watered down to save a few bucks or for reasons of expediency. What was it about our democracy that we wanted to urge the rest of the world to adopt? Oh, yeah, a fair trial.

Seems that most people round here say they support a fair trial except for dirty terrorists. (round here is where I live)

So the accused get to be given the chance to say something before we hang em.

Ahh but; I say. What if it was a doppleganger (lookalike, but I can't remember the word or spelling). I've had this experience where some strangers accused me of being evil for treating their friend so badly.

I didn't even know their friend, never ever met her. In fact it has happened a lot where girls come up to me and swear blind we was an item. Indeed one of my close relations got a shock when he went up to a couple he thought was me with a girl only to find he had to quickly extricate himself away from an irate bloke who didn't know him, wasn't particularly pleasant but looked like me.

Thankfully I don't look like a terrorist.

Trials are problematic in cases where much of the evidence was obtained through sensitive intelligence sources. Needless to say, harm would likely come to these sources if they identified themselves in a trial. I don't know how to solve this problem, but I do know that alleged terrorists have been tried in New York and other places.

Pakistani officials seem to be unhappy that Bin Laden was killed (as opposed to captured alive) by U.S. forces.

It may be advantageous for the world that Bin Laden is dead rather than sitting in a cell awaiting trial. The people who find his death outrageous may eventually cool down. Pakistan and Fidel Castro will move on from this. Chances are, al-Qaida has a successor in place (not that the world was holding its breath waiting for them to choose one ). Whatever bounce Obama gets in the polls will have gone back down as his detractors come up with new things to hold against him. New Yorkers don't have to worry about turmoil on their streets when the trial takes place (not that there aren't other reasons for turmoil there...)

Since when is "it's convenient" a good excuse for killing someone?

"It's convenient" was merely the reason, not the excuse.

The excuse was "An unarmed man made a sudden, unexpected move, so we had to shoot him because 25 elite Navy Seals felt threatened and quite unable to physically overwhelm him."

"Since when is "it's convenient" a good excuse for killing someone?" [Malabarista]

I don't think it has ever been good, Malabarista. We didn't kill Saddam Hussein. He had a trial. Timothy McVay had a trial. When you put someone accused of terrorist acts on trial, you run up against the fact that some potential jurors are reluctant to serve if the death penalty will be a possible outcome. I'm pretty much in that category myself. Some trials are planned for, but never happen because the accused has killed himself in his jail cell. That happened to the so-called "Craig's List" killer in Boston.

Now, as for whether the trials I've mentioned were fair, that's a matter for discussion. Still, I'd rather have 6 or 12 jurors (who don't really want to be there, but such is life) mulling over the defendant's guilt or innocence than have a single bullet from a soldier's gun preclude his chance of telling his side of things.

For what it's worth, I have served on a number of juries. They were really nice people who were quite serious about what they were doing.

Unsurprisingly, the Taliban has just mounted a major effort versus Kandahar.

The US wouldn't have sent Bil Laden to The Hague, don't forget, because they don't recognise the ICC

But what a lot of people seem to forget is that other countries have brought terrorists successfully to trial without resorting to the death penalty.

Anyway, I'm pretty sure we'll all reap what "we" have sown now.

I'm just wondering if politicians should be made to undergo a truth test before standing for election.

They seem to change quite a bit when elected. Obama seemed like such a nice guy.

Then we have our poor old students conned, but education is free in Scotland to anybody in the EU that is not english, and prescriptions are free.

They are always blaming the other lot, but never set out the proof, and the other lot are scoffing at this lot because they wanted to cut aswell.

Who is running the show anyway; is it the banks since they seem to avoid paying lots of tax and what happened to the 500 billion they was given?

The biggest group even made a loss on paper, so how much tax do they pay, considering they aint lost anything yet.

Just rambling away again,

"what a lot of people seem to forget is that other countries have brought terrorists successfully to trial without resorting to the death penalty." [Sho]

I'm happy that they are able to do this. In some parts of the U.S., the death penalty is not used. However, for federal crimes it sometimes is.

Not to forget that in many European countries, there is no such thing as a trial by jury of a handful of randomly chosen people who have no idea how to interpret data and are easily swayed by a good speaker...

Meanwhile in Lansing Michigan some 18 year old with a couple of his buddies lured the Police to a vacant home and shot a cop dead.
He was convicted by a jury of his peers and was sentenced to "Life in Prison without chance of Parole"
Michigan does not have a death penalty- hence this guy living in a state penitentury for the next seventy years at tax payer expense.

I've recently been watching american cops; and most I've seen are very impressive in fact fantastic.

But really you should not ask them to do more, just help them in what they are doing.

The death penalty isn't helpful, and how much it costs even less helpful.

I lived next door to a policeman for about 20 years. He was polite and considerate, and he minded his own business. He thought of our neighborhood as a haven from the craziness of the inner city. He told me that I had no idea what goes on out there. I expect that he was right about that.

I recommend a book called "Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian" by Avi Steinberg [2010]. The book gives an interesting view of a prison.

Yes Bingo, shoow me the money

Money? What money? There is no money.

In the world of the future, your picture will appear on your money. If there's no money with your picture on it, then you will be out of luck. (I just made that up, but it might be a fun story idea )