PRE-CRIME AND CIVIL RIGHTS

We are entering into a new era of crime and punishment. In a way, I suppose we should celebrate leaving an era of “innocent until proven guilty” and entering an era of proving “potential guilt” what could be called an era of “pre-crime”. Apparently, many feel so comfortable we have mastered handling people who actually commit crimes they would move us into an era where we can prosecute crimes before they happen. If we can punish would be criminals, we can make our world a better place to live. Crime has bad consequences; thus, without crime we would live better—a no brainer. The goal has merit but fraught is with obvious difficult and dangers.

“Stop and search” laws fall into this category. In a neighborhood with a high crime rate and gun violence, stopping “by profile” and searching prevents crimes from happening.  This is a proven fact. The question is, “At what price?” What happens is that frisking by police may or may not reveals guns. If the police find a gun, it is either register or not. If it is not registered—owner and serial number do not match—it is confiscated and the police arrest the “suspect”, charge him/her with having an unregistered firearm, which means that person now has a criminal record, and can never legally own a gun. If the gun is registered, it remains on the street. If the police find a gun or not, the incident tells the neighborhood people, the police are there “to protect them”. The point in this context is that “stop and search” laws are pre-crime laws. The authorities assumed the person with the gun “would commit a crime” so to prevent that from happening the police charge them with another crime. What happened to illegal search and seizure? What does self-incriminating mean in this context? The concept of innocent until proven guilty simply does no longer apply. The reward to society is that “stop and search” reduces the crime rate not by just a little bit but by a whole lot. The thumb on the scale of justice seems to be a good thing.

We have a “no fly list”; a list of people our government generated to prevent terrorist from doing harm by blowing up the plane or crashing it into a populations center. The possibility of the traveler going to a distance city to attend a terrorist meeting is too remote to consider. The “disconnect” from reality is obvious. Over and above people wanted for crimes, the government most often puts an individual on the no “fly list” because of their associates. In fact, short of committing a crime, that and suspicious activities are the only reason. Attending meetings or having associates are not crimes; it is a pre-crime referred to as “guilt by association”.

However, like the “stop and search” law, there can be circumstantial evidence short of a Transportation Safety Authority official finding explosives or weapons on that person as they board a plane, which can never happen because; theoretically at least,  that person is prevented from boarding an aircraft. Obviously, this is different from finding explosives, a gun, or a knife on an individual on the “no fly list” trying to board a plane—like a gun in the waistband of a teenage gangster. Nonetheless, the government punishes that person by prohibited him or her from flying—punishes them for a pre crime.  Unlike with “stop and search” laws, the government (TSA) actually punishes individuals for inferred guilt. If the “no fly list” makes me safer, just as I am for “stop and search”.  I am for these things but feel we have a long way to go before we can balance civil rights with our fervor to pursue pre-crime. 

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