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Comment by nabilhat | Hacker News Reader

Everyone deserves a vigorous legal defense, even the most reprehensible. If the accused or convicted are exempt from the rule of law, so are those who are accused or convicted by mistake, corruption, or abuse of power. Competent and committed legal defense for everyone defends the rule of law as it's applied to all of us.

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> Competent and committed legal defense for everyone defends the rule of law

I agree wholeheartedly, but in practice this often doesn't happen, for a multitude of reasons. Legal representation costs money in most countries, and most lawyers don't particularly enjoy defending guilty people (obviously they do it anyway, but it's a bit like having to fix a '90s PHP website when your passion is Python 3...). Hence my curiosity about the backstory of this particular situation going on for so long (20 years and all the way to SCOTUS is a lot of work).

Definitely on the same page. I'm just glad there are dedicated people doing the hard work to hold government's actions under the light of their own rules. There's way too much room for improvement in the system(s).

Yep, but it also doesn't change that this particular person might be let free. I think it's OK to feel a little ambivalent about this ruling.

Unlikely. I can’t think of any immediate reasons that federal courts would consider anything different to the states, where something so heinous as rape of a child is concerned.

I think it’s not about his freedom, but one of the two courts that could charge him have the death penalty. His legal case is about avoiding that.

He was already convicted and sentenced to 1,000 years. So I don't think the death penalty was on the table.

What would the tribal law sentence be for the same crime?

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