Comment by mandevil
9 days ago
Law does not work like engineering does. Lawyers, judges and juries understand the intent of the law, and are not bound like we software engineers are to the exact commands in front of them.
You could try to convince a jury of this argument, sure. Do you think it will work? And if you do go with that argument then are you actually convincing the jury of your guilty conscience- often an important part of a white collar crime where state of mind of the defendant is very important?
> Lawyers, judges and juries understand the intent of the law, and are not bound like we software engineers are to the exact commands in front of them.
a good example is O'Connor v. Oakhurst Dairy, No. 16-1901, also known as the Maine Dairy oxford comma case. the District Court followed the intent but the Appeals court followed the law as written.
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/missing-oxford-com...
from the Appeals Court ruling
> The District Court concluded that, despite the absent comma, the Maine legislature unambiguously intended for the last term in the exemption's list of activities to identify an exempt activity in its own right. The District Court thus granted summary judgment to the dairy company, as there is no dispute that the drivers do perform that activity. But, we conclude that the exemption's scope is actually not so clear in this regard.
https://cases.justia.com/federal/appellate-courts/ca1/16-190...