one more example showing how US standard are incredibly low regarding basic human rights…
Arrest records are public. Even if you’re innocent or the charges are dropped or whatever, they still smear your reputation by putting your mugshot up. It can be a good thing too, since it cuts down on the number of people arrested quietly with no disclosed reason.
Ziggurat@jlai.lu 16 hours ago
jqubed@lemmy.world 12 hours ago
Adding on, there can be good reasons to have arrest records be public and accessible. It can be beneficial for people to know if someone in the community has engaged in dangerous activity that could threaten others around them. Even if that person is able to avoid conviction or negotiate a lesser charge, you might personally want to change your interactions with them. The most common example might be with sex offenders, but that’s also being used for a lot of disingenuous arguments right now, so I’ll offer some others. Say someone is arrested for driving while intoxicated, perhaps someone you know. You might have never noticed them intoxicated before but perhaps they’re just good at hiding it, and you would probably choose not to ride in a vehicle with them driving or let a family member ride with them. Or perhaps you see someone arrested for a violent assault and you’ve also had past experiences with them that were also violent or threatening but never felt like it was worth reporting or felt that reporting the crime might make you less safe. If you or others know that person is in jail it can be easier for you and others to come to the prosecutors to report your own experiences and make it easier for the prosecutors to get a dangerous person out of the public.
On the flip side, the US is supposed to have the principle that someone is innocent until proven guilty. Publicizing arrests before a conviction can make that harder, and there are plenty of examples of innocent people who were “convicted in the media” but later found not guilty in court. That can often place a burden on innocent people to continue defending themselves for years afterwards.
In theory an open and transparent judicial process makes the system harder to abuse. In an effort to prevent punishing innocent people for crimes they did not commit, a judicial process might be designed in way that sometimes allows guilty persons to avoid punishment. The public has a right to know about threats so they can take actions to protect themselves. Wrongly accused individuals should not have to be burdened by false accusations after successfully defending themselves. People who have served their sentence for crimes they committed should not continue to be punished after completing their sentence.
Balancing these different interests is challenging and I think it’s pretty easy to say the current system is not at a good balance. Perhaps a good balance isn’t possible. The world is far more complicated than little comments online can make it seem. I think it’s pretty easy, though, to say the government should not be arresting people and making money by selling information about those arrests. A commercial entity taking that information and publishing it for a profit can also be morally questionable and should perhaps have legal restrictions. Outlets that exist solely to find the most attractive mug shots are at least in bad taste. But the question gets harder the closer this gets to a reputable news organization that is also trying to responsibly balance these considerations.
I’d certainly be interested to see the results of a lawsuit based on the original question.
Beacon@fedia.io 12 hours ago
No, absolutely not. None of your arguments hold any water. There are reasonable arguments that convictions should be public information, but not arrests. If anything, your arguments further prove that arrests SHOULDN'T be public information
pfwood178@sh.itjust.works 11 hours ago
Yeah, that guy’s arguments are invalid - you don’t need to know that Juan from down the block got picked up on suspicion of DUI and spent the night in lockup.
The only reason arrest records SHOULD be public is so the police can’t simply “disappear” Juan from down the block.
ಠ_ಠ
WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world 17 hours ago
Thank you for making the second point. It does suck that I am forever searchable on an arrest database but I’ll take that over the cops being able to disappear me as a matter of course, as opposed to having to do extra work to disappear me. This is why the suspension of due process for ANY crime is bad. I know I’m preaching to the choir here.
M1ch431@slrpnk.net 14 hours ago
It should be able to be wiped clean, and not ever be published to the internet without safeguards to prevent AI-scraping/people search websites for picking it up. These websites should block anybody without a legitimate or reasonable need to know that information - it’s also not news-worthy to systematically report on arrests that are e.g. victimless and not tied to a notable event.
If you want it completely publicly accessible, that should be a right upon arrest.
Beacon@fedia.io 17 hours ago
In no way is that a good thing. A person should be able to acquire and publish their OWN arrest record, but absolutely no one else should be able to without their permission
foggy@lemmy.world 17 hours ago
Think outside the box.
“If anyone in that jury was served an ad from this provider, we cannot assume they have no preconceived notion of my guilt or innocence.”