[wagglebee]

I agree with everything you are saying about the rule of law and the presumption of innocence. However, by your logic, any criminal who is savvy enough to wear gloves goes free. If you talk to prosecutors, they will tell you there is almost never the type of absolute evidence that TV and the movies suggest, thus the term is "reasonable doubt" rather than any shred of doubt.

No one is a criminal until convicted as such by a jury of their peers.

You might want to rethink this. Crimes are committed by criminals, yet many criminals are never caught, the absense of a conviction does not mean the crime did not occur. Additionally, some criminals are neither charged nor convicted, we had one in the Oval Office a few years back.

[rwfromkansas]

As one of the people trying to mitigate the Salem Witch Trials said roughly, "It is better for 100 witches to get away than for one innocent to be convicted."

It should be the same with today's murders etc. If people are not caught but one innocent is protected, so be it.