Quote:
Originally Posted by HarryT
Shouldn't "the law be blind" when it comes to such things? I feel rather uneasy about the idea that someone should escape prosecution if the cost of the court case would exceed the perceived "cost" of the crime. One of the purposes of the juducial system is surely to act as a deterent, and can it do that if someone can reasonably think "they won't bother to prosecute me"?
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The law is never blind to the cost of prosecuting. While that cost doesn't always outweigh the need to act as a deterrent, it's certainly a strong consideration of whether to pursue the case. Less than half the rapes reported result in a prosecution. (Do you really think that 51% of the people who report rape to the police--not, mind you, who report it to friends and family, or tell nobody until years later, who outnumber those by about 200%--are lying about it?)
Whether or not to prosecute is strongly influenced by how hard it would be to find the perpetrator, and how much evidence is available for a trial.
In this particular case... how would the perpetrator be identified? By IP address, and arrest whoever happens to own the computer that sent in the files? What if it was done at a public computer, like a library? If the uploader is a 20-year-old college student, is society really better of if he's put in jail for several years, or goes bankrupt? What damage did he actually do... is the Rand Institute facing financial ruin because of his actions? (Oh, and who prosecutes? The federal government, because the crime cross state lines? The state that Amazon resides in? The state the perpetrator resides in?)
These are all considerations before any prosecution would happen.