Hacker News Reader

Comment by ls612 | Hacker News Reader

In a nation with strong rule of law and in particular a presumption of innocence and robust due process a few percent of people will get off simply because the prosecutors make mistakes (either intentional or accidental), on top of people who are actually innocent. A 99% conviction rate suggests that such protections don’t exist in the Japanese system and it is thus suspect in terms of respecting human rights.

View on HN

Could it also not mean that many guilty but hard to prove are let free earlier in the process? Before it goes to trial?

The fine balance between false positives and false negatives.

A balance ideally struck within actual court rooms, not outside it. Otherwise the prosecutors turn into judge, jury and executioner and you lose the point of the court system to begin with.

Is the average Juror more educated / with a better understanding of the law than your average prosecutor?

If you trust prosecutors to not be corrupt, be well trained, and do the right thing - they should be a better place to throw out flimsy cases.

Why is it a requirement in nations with strong rule of law that prosecutors make mistakes? This logic is baffling. Could it not simply be that prosecutors in Japan are very, very careful?

Of course, as others have said, the reality is that prosecutors only go to trial if they have what they view as a guaranteed conviction, and the evidence is typically a confession.

Prosecutors make mistakes everywhere because they are human and have all of the negative traits which go along with that. With due process requirements this normally leads to dismissal of the charges or acquittals. In Japan it apparently leads to soft core torture to coerce a confession which can guarantee a conviction.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com