Ramsey Tragedy

I have to admit I didn't follow the JonBenet Ramsey tragedy at all, but unless you were the unibomber you couldn't help but get the basics, which I won't go into here. It looks like they finally found the murderer, and it wasn't Mr. Ramsey. My point with this blog is that the American public was absolutely convinced that the father and possibly mother were responsible, and there were persisitant rumors of even more disturbed things going on. While I can never have proof, my gut says if there were some kind of election for Mr. Ramsey guilt or innocence he would have been voted guilty.

This is why we have courts, protections and process. Those who argue for lesser court protections in the name of quick "justice" need to remember that the public does get things wrong. Furthermore, what information we get is often wrong. And that hysteria, and/or the need to find someone "guilty" severly biases the court of public opinion. This notion that if you can get 51% of the people to agree then it must be right is misguided. The bottom line is while we live in a democracy, the democracy only works with a strong, somewhat undemocratic court system.

While the Ramsey's lives were destroyed when their daughter was murdered, and then further devestated when the public relentlessly hounded them as the murderers, at least they never went to jail.