There’s the old saying ‘better ten guilty men go free than one innocent man suffer’ – or some variant thereof. When the phrase first came into use it was more dramatic referring to those facing execution. But nowadays, with crime rampant and daily media reports of the horrendous things humans are capable of doing to one another, is this statement still true – or is it just the lofty philosophy of those in the ivory tower, far removed from crime and its consequences?

I reject the notion that its strictly philosophic – this is a very pragmatic principle, most especially for the modern United States of America.

Here’s the thing – our judicial system is seriously broken. It is in bad need of a serious and painful reality check. Bad laws, bad actors – the whole system is messed up. But it’s not irredeemable – it can and must be fixed. However, there is one thing that can push our judicial system beyond the brink – a total loss of public confidence.

The public has begun to lose confidence in a lot of things of late: media, government, corporations, science (the industry), celebrities – there are a whole lot of things people are beginning to seriously question. The judicial system is on that block as well – and it should be – but what happens if the public comes to believe that many, even most, convictions are wrongful – and worse, that the system is convicting the innocent?

That’s not ‘oopsie’ – that reeks of corruption. A public convinced that its judicial system punishes the innocent is a public convinced that the judicial system is invalid and corrupt. Defund the police becomes destroy the whole system. A full collapse of an entire branch of government endangers everyone.

But assuming that the government can sustain itself, create a new judiciary and calm public fears – who gets hurt the most in the meantime? The public – because during that kind of chaos, there is no effective judiciary – and not only do ten guilty go free – thousands of guilty aren’t even charged. All the negative effects – and let’s be honest, there are some – of criminals walking on technicalities and going on to commit other crimes would be dwarfed by the number of guilty free to do as they pleased during a total judiciary collapse.

Yeah, it IS better that the guilty go free than a system be so corrupt or inept that it punishes the innocent because eventually, there are so many innocent behind bars that it becomes impossible to ignore the truth – and the people will not put up with a corrupt judiciary.