Comment by rpcope1
18 days ago
There's no way this isn't a slam dunk case to sue the piss out of the Fargo Police, probably the US Marshals and maybe other orgs. The woman in the surveillance phone clearly looks way younger, among the many other obvious signs this woman didn't do it. I hope she wrings at least several million dollars out of the government.
It literally doesn't matter -- you're focused on the wrong thing. She could be that woman's exact twin and it wouldn't matter. Spending six months in jail and losing your house, your car, and your dog with the flimsiest of evidence is ridiculous.
'you can beat the wrap but not the ride' has been a pop culture reference in the US since the 1940s. Our society wants/supports the ability for this to be inflicted at police/court whim on people.
Which means that, if the cops (and other relevant personnel) gets it wrong, they should get served with the same injustices that they committed, no questions asked... you know, because they didn't raise any when they were the ones dishing out punishments.
Edit: wording, formatting
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I don't think society supports it as much as you are suggesting. Marijuana is still illegal despite 65% of the nation being in favor of rescheduling. Clearly our laws do not easily mirror what the population believes.
A lawsuit is exactly what matters. They learn only the hard way, and no other way. If you want them to not be ridiculous, a lawsuit with large punitive damages is the only practical way to get there.
I disagree. The city or state gets sued and they pay the result from the taxpayer funds and literally nobody learns anything, especially not the hard way. Everyone is so completely divorced, and in some cases immune, from consequences that this will change nothing.
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With all the lovely qualified immunity doctrine? That's wishful thinking.
That may protect them personally, but not the city and the department itself from being sued.
Nope.
https://abovethelaw.com/2016/02/criminally-yours-indicting-a...
You can be arrested, indicted, and held in jail on pretrial, and there is literally no recourse. There are many other ways jail can happen without due process. Where I live:
* Civil contempt. Absolutely immunity. No due process. Record is about 16 years. Having a bad day? Judge can toss you in jail.
* "Dangerous." Half a year. No due process. He-said she-said.
* "Insane." Psychiatric hold. Three days. Due process on paper, not in practice. Police in my town can and do use this if they don't like you.
Absolutely no recourse. You come out with a gap in income, employment, and, if you missed rent/mortgage, no home. Landlords will simply throw your stuff away too.
You're also basically damned if things do move forward, since from jail, you have no access to evidence, to internet (for legal research), and no reasonable way to recruit a lawyer (and, for most people, pay for one).
Can happen to anyone. Less common if you're rich and can afford a good lawyer, but far from uncommon.
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Criminal immunity? Sure. Civil immunity? Nope! She could definitely make a nice buck.
Qualified immunity doesn't apply to criminal cases. It is used to defend against civil suits. It is unfortunately very easy to find many cases where it leads to injustice. For example:
>...Abby Tiscareno, a licensed daycare provider in Utah, was wrongfully convicted of felony child abuse when a child under her care suffered brain hemorrhaging. After calling emergency services, subsequent medical tests supported these findings. However, during her trial, requested medical records from the Utah Division of Child and Family Services (DCFS) were not provided. It wasn’t until a civil suit that Ms. Tiscareno saw pathology reports suggesting the injury could have occurred outside of her care. She was granted a new trial and acquitted. Her subsequent lawsuit for due process violations, alleging that DCFS failed to provide exculpatory evidence, was dismissed due to lack of precedent indicating DCFS’s obligation to produce such evidence.
https://innocenceproject.org/news/what-you-need-to-know-abou...
Off of taxpayer money sadly. Imo we really need a fix for this. When cops are grossly negligent the money should come out of their aggregate pension fund (or at least partially).
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imho the US Marshals are the only innocent party here, as my understanding is they don't do investigations and just serve warrants without any knowledge of the underlying case.
“Unable to pay her bills from jail, she lost her home, her car and even her dog.”
Who stole her dog?!
Probably picked up by animal control as abandoned and euthanized.
That’s really horrible. I’d prefer to know rather than guess at that.
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I'd love for her to go John Wick on those responsible.
>I hope she wrings at least several million dollars out of the government.
which the citizens end up footing the bill for. yay.
Maybe the citizens will learn to elect better leaders.
Thanks, I needed a good laugh this evening.
Maybe they'll realize votes have consequences.
People famously do not learn from the experiences of others. It's a big reason why life is so hard when you'd expect it to be pretty easy based on our collective experience.