Stupid legal question

[kmortis]

This is mainly to the lawyers in the crowd, but it's something that I've been curious about for a while. It's a simple question, so...

What happens to people convicted of a crime that later gets repealed. For example (and this is the inspiration for this) what happened to the journalists (and others) who were arrested, tried and convicted of the Sedition act when it was repealed? What would have happened to Benjamin Bache if he'd not died of yellow fever (assuming that TJ didn't pardon him upon gaining the Presidency)

 

[Athyrio]

Perhaps it depends upon one's locale. This case is currently of interest in Georgia, USA.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilson_v._State

 

[ceo_esq]

What happens to people convicted of a crime that later gets repealed.

The general rule is that the effect of a repeal is not retroactive unless the repeal legislation so provides. The default position is that prior convictions and penalties still stand, and new prosecutions can even be brought to punish acts committed prior to the repeal.

 

[JJM 777]

More common and more regrettable is to be jailed for a crime that one has not committed.

For example, rape and child abuse cases are often based on the word of one witness only. (Who may have confessed a few years later that she or he was lying to the court.)

Just in case the disgraced and probably divorced person will not commit suicide in jail before the erroneous sentence is revoked, there seldom is much restitution that covers the social damage.

---

And then, Guantanamo prisoners and other persons suspected of terrorism (while often innocent) are just jailed and tortured indefinitely, without much or any compensation.

 

[kmortis]

The general rule is that the effect of a repeal is not retroactive unless the repeal legislation so provides. The default position is that prior convictions and penalties still stand, and new prosecutions can even be brought to punish acts committed prior to the repeal.

That's kind of what I thought the answer would be. Thanks

More common and more regrettable is to be jailed for a crime that one has not committed.

For example, rape and child abuse cases are often based on the word of one witness only. (Who may have confessed a few years later that she or he was lying to the court.)

Just in case the disgraced and probably divorced person will not commit suicide in jail before the erroneous sentence is revoked, there seldom is much restitution that covers the social damage.

---

And then, Guantanamo prisoners and other persons suspected of terrorism (while often innocent) are just jailed and tortured indefinitely, without much or any compensation.

While that may be true, it's something that I can follow. The instance of laws being repealed are far fewer than people being wrongly convicted. In fact, I can't think of a modern example of a criminal law being repealed. The most recent example that I can think of are the laws associated with the Volstead Act, which was repealed some 40 years before I was born. I'm sure that ceo_esq could probably come up with a more modern one, but I'm not a legal scholar by any stretch of the imagination. I'd just been reading about the period of time when the Alien & Sedition acts were in force here in the States and I, because I study my history, knew that they were going to be repealed in just a couple of years (in the timeline of the story) and I was curious as to the fate of those already jailed because if them.

 

[elliotfc]

There are no stupid legal questions, only stupid lawyers.