Should David Bain get compensation?

You think Pistorius is innocent as well - it's what you do.
I consider that I show my working, but that you do not in these cases.
You made no attempt to demonstrate that the contact to the temple, is consistent with murder.
Assisted suicide may be as close as you can get, but at least say it.
 
I agree. David was a sick little SOB who decided to kill his entire family and blame his father. The paper round, the phone call, the blood on his hands, and his gun... The only sad thing about the case was he was so obviously guilty the cops didn't make sure the evidence was complete.
No. Murder/suicide was obvious - staged murder/suicide wasn't. But Columbo knows it's never that obvious. Something didn't add up and David Bain was that something. Unfortunately Columbo wasn't on the team. If he had been he would have tricked David into confessing and there wouldn't even be a trial. But real life doesn't work that way. Turns out David Bain wasn't 'so obviously guilty' that the cops didn't need to do their job properly. How do we know this? Because he is now free. If it really was 'so obvious' then he wouldn't be.

The justice system should be designed so that people don't get convicted unless their guilt is beyond reasonable doubt. Doesn't matter whether they are actually guilty or not, without that standard we can't say one way or the other. If someone commits a 'perfect' crime, it's not OK for them to get convicted on bad evidence. David Bain should get compensation for the same reason - if a conviction is unsafe we can't say they were 'really' guilty and so shouldn't be compensated for false imprisonment. They could could just as easily be 'really' innocent.

You say David is a "sick little SOB who decided to kill his entire family and blame his father". But as you say the cops didn't "make sure the evidence was complete" so you can't actually know that. If I was on the jury I would have voted not guilty because while there may be things that 'didn't add up' about the obvious scenario of murder/suicide, there are things don't add up about a staged murder/suicide too. That's reasonable doubt, and if the prosecution can't dispel that doubt with proper evidence the verdict shouldn't be 'guilty'.

The cops shouldn't be allowed to have it both ways. Compensation should paid as much to punish them for doing a bad job as to recompense the 'innocent'. Otherwise next time the accused may be truly innocent and then the result is doubly unjust. Imagine finally having a wrong conviction against you overturned only to have them say "We won't give out compensation because we know you really did it" when you didn't. That might be enough for me to mete out some 'justice' of my own.
 

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