“Blind Injustice” 一書認為，是官僚主義 #拒絕承認錯誤 的態度所致：拒絕、野心、偏見、記憶、直覺及 #隧道效應。隧道效應起源於渴望討好老闆而不是惹事生非。檢察官經常拒絕囚犯請求DNA測試，而這些測試可能幫助囚犯獲得釋放。檢察官認為自己是好人，因此覺得被告都是壞人。民選的法官知道「對犯罪強硬」總是會贏得更多選票。法醫科學，是所有錯誤判決中佔了幾乎一半因素，僅次於錯誤的目擊證人。
有網友問我：這與美國許多州檢察長是民選的有關嗎？我想到美國芝加哥檢察官的2噸比賽 two-ton contest，也就是百人斬比賽的概念。
On his first day as a prosecutor assigned to a trial courtroom at the Criminal Courts Building, Michael Goggin slid into the chair next to the judge's chambers and his shoes struck a most unusual object--a bathroom scale.
"What's this?" Goggin recalls asking another prosecutor.
"That's for the Two-Ton Contest," came the response.
"The Two-Ton Contest?" Goggin replied, quizzically.
More than two decades later, as Goggin, now a defense lawyer, recalls the moment, his original amazement is still apparent.
There was an ongoing competition among prosecutors to be the first to convict defendants whose weight totaled 4,000 pounds. Men and women, upon conviction, were marched into the room and weighed.
Because most of the defendants were African-American, Goggin recalls now, with no small degree of discomfort, the competition was described in less sensitive terms behind closed doors--"Niggers by the Pound."
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/watchdog/chi-020103trial2-story.html
改善方式，包括記錄審問過程，標準化目擊證人識別程序，擴大取得定罪後的DNA測試。也許最重要的是，在檢察官辦公室設立定罪審查委員會，調查那些定罪後被告聲稱無罪的案件。
另外私人監獄是不透明的，它的商業模式促使更多人被監禁， #從他人的監禁中獲利本質上是不道德的 。私人監獄越蓋越多，因為政府不能迅速興建監獄容納受刑人。廢除私人監獄的最好辦法就是監禁更少的人。
#冤獄 #法律 #公共政策
https://www.economist.com/news/books-and-arts/21732513-why-criminal-justice-system-so-very-fond-incarceration-problem-prisons
A recent study by Israeli scientists found that judges were much more likely to grant a convict parole if they had just eaten a meal than if they were at the end of a session. At first, the scientists thought that falling sugar levels might be making the judges grumpy. But in the end they concluded that making too many decisions was tiring the poor things out. So, as a sitting wore on, they were more likely to take the easy option—in this instance returning the prisoner to chokey.
https://www.1843magazine.com/content/ideas/bill-ridgers/how-and-when-make-a-decision
