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The Elementary Epistemic Arithmetic of Criminal Justice

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2012

Larry Laudan
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Abstract

This paper propounds the following theses: 1). that the traditional focus on the Blackstone ratio of errors as a device for setting the criminal standard of proof is ill-conceived, 2). that the preoccupation with the rate of false convictions in criminal trials is myopic, and 3). that the key ratio of interest, in judging the political morality of a system of criminal justice, involves the relation between the risk that an innocent person runs of being falsely convicted of a serious crime and the risk of being criminally victimized by someone who was falsely acquitted.

Type
Research Article
Information
Episteme , Volume 5 , Issue 3 , October 2008 , pp. 282 - 294
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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References

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