Heresay Evidence

ACSBlog has an entry by Geoffrey R. Stone and Harry Kalven on the Bush proposals for admissable evidence in military tribunals. The administration proposes allowing evidence that is

• coerced,
• secret or
• heresay.

Stone and Kalven discuss the latter.

In their discussion, they find Justice Scalia to be a strong voice against heresay evidence:

1) Scalia on the notorious Sir Walter Raleigh trial:

Lord Cobham, Raleigh's alleged accomplice, had implicated him in an examination before the Privy Council. … At Raleigh's trial, [Cobham's statement was] read to the jury. Raleigh argued that Cobham had lied to save himself. … Suspecting that Cobham would recant, Raleigh demanded that the judges call him to appear, arguing … 'Call my accuser before my face.' The judges refused and, despite Raleigh's protestations that he was being tried 'by the Spanish Inquisition,' the jury convicted, and Raleigh was sentenced to death. One of Raleigh's trial judges later lamented that 'the justice of England has never been so degraded and injured as by the condemnation of Sir Walter Raleigh.'

2) Scalia on whether heresay evidence might be acceptable if it were judged reliable:

Dispensing with confrontation because testimony is obviously reliable is akin to dispensing with jury trial because a defendant is obviously guilty.

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Ordinary Rocks

It was just an ordinary rock. Or rather they were three, sitting in the water near the river's edge in the shade thrown down by the cliffs soaring upwards a few feet from the shore. Sometime, a long time ago, those rocks must have fallen from somewhere up on those cliffs. What a noise they must have made.

And there were three Sycamore trees growing out of the cracks and seams between the rocks. And there were two turtles sitting on a log in the water just beyond those rocks, the light of the morning sun warming them. And hidden in the shadows under the trees, behind the rocks, close to where the water lapped against the narrow strand, there was a Great Blue Heron, standing as still as a statue, watching my boat float by.

---
along Town Lake
Austin, Texas USA

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Bruch Schneier on the growing HP spying scandal:

[Schneier/HP]: this is the sort of thing that would get a "hacker" immediately arrested. But if the chairman of the HP board does it, suddenly it's a gray area.

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