Comment by brigadier132

1 year ago

You can't claim to be defending people's rights while also jailing people without trial.

Indeed, but no one is doing that.

In Brazil there's what we call "preventive custody". If you're caught committing a crime, and if there is a risk that you could jeopardize the investigations (by eliminating evidence, threatening or influencing witnesses, etc.), then you are held in custody until the investigation is concluded.

I don't believe you would find something very different going on in any other democratic country.

  • In this scenario, are you actually charged with a crime? If not, that’s the literal definition of being jailed without trial.

    Many (most?) democratic countries impose strict limits on how long you can be held without being charged. In the US, for example, you can only be held for 72 hours — at which point the police must either charge you or release you.

    • Sure, you're actually charged with a crime. And the kind of limitations you talk about do apply.

      Even in situations where you could be held in jail, there's a tendency to let you go unless it is impossible to prevent you from jeopardizing the investigations by any other means. For instance, if the only real worry is that you flee to another country, you might have your passport confiscated rather than being held in jail. Likewise, if the worry is that you can use your influence to make others do stuff for you (stuff that jeopardizes the ongoing investigations, I mean), then you might remain at home, under surveillance, and so on.

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  • > where it's possible to hold someone in jail before trial

    Honestly, what did you expect? "Pretty please turn up for the trial and not kill anyone else while we're waiting?" Every country allows this if the crime was severe enough or the person is likely to be dangerous to others in the meantime. Usually there's a threshold to do that, but it's going to happen.

    • The threshold, at least in the countries whose laws I'm familiar with, isn't just "will they turn up for trial", but also "are they a risk to other people or are they likely to continue breaking the law". And, to be honest, that makes sense.

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What if the people being jailed are urgently trying to take away people's rights?

Also, what's supposed to happen to criminals before they are on trial? Normally they get jailed.

  • "All things are poison, and nothing is without poison; the dosage alone makes it so a thing is not a poison."