This came up as an offshoot of the 'Madeleine McCann' thread in the Conspiracy forum. Basically the old saw got trotted that if the McCann's are innocent why were they reluctant to talk to the police? A variation on the old saw of 'if you've doing wrong you have nothing to fear'; whether it be from the police interviewing you or the NSA reading you e-mails.
Now my contention is that is utter nonsense because it seems to start from the premise that the agents of law enforcement are honest seekers after truth just out to establish the facts of a case.
In the real world this simply isn't so; police officers are just as prone to bias and politicking as anyone else. A good example is the so called 'Plebgate' scandal here in the UK. A government minister tried to ride a bicycle into Downing Street, gets stopped, loses his temper with the police and allegedly calls them 'plebs'. This happens to resonate with press coverage at the time portraying ministers as being a collection of upper class types with privileged backgrounds who have no idea of what real life is like.
The minister denied using that word but a witness came forward confirming police accounts and after a meeting with senior officer the police announced that the minister had refused to provide an adequate account of his version of events. In the end the furore makes the minister resign; so far so typical but then an enterprising journalist gets hold of video showing the incident and there's no sign of the passing witness. The journalist tries to speak with the witness who proves remarkably elusive; in fact they never existed. The 'witness' was an off duty police officer who was nowhere near Downing Street. Worse the minister recorded his meeting with the senior officers and it flatly contradicted their version. The upshot has been criminal investigations into a number of officers and a non-apology about the meeting. You can rad the whole sordid history of it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plebgate
What motivated the police? Well the incident coincided with government plans to make cut backs in UK police services and perhaps the chance to embarrass the government was too good to pass up. The simple truth is that assuming that innocence and honesty are some sort of automatic shield is just wilfully naive
Now my contention is that is utter nonsense because it seems to start from the premise that the agents of law enforcement are honest seekers after truth just out to establish the facts of a case.
In the real world this simply isn't so; police officers are just as prone to bias and politicking as anyone else. A good example is the so called 'Plebgate' scandal here in the UK. A government minister tried to ride a bicycle into Downing Street, gets stopped, loses his temper with the police and allegedly calls them 'plebs'. This happens to resonate with press coverage at the time portraying ministers as being a collection of upper class types with privileged backgrounds who have no idea of what real life is like.
The minister denied using that word but a witness came forward confirming police accounts and after a meeting with senior officer the police announced that the minister had refused to provide an adequate account of his version of events. In the end the furore makes the minister resign; so far so typical but then an enterprising journalist gets hold of video showing the incident and there's no sign of the passing witness. The journalist tries to speak with the witness who proves remarkably elusive; in fact they never existed. The 'witness' was an off duty police officer who was nowhere near Downing Street. Worse the minister recorded his meeting with the senior officers and it flatly contradicted their version. The upshot has been criminal investigations into a number of officers and a non-apology about the meeting. You can rad the whole sordid history of it here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plebgate
What motivated the police? Well the incident coincided with government plans to make cut backs in UK police services and perhaps the chance to embarrass the government was too good to pass up. The simple truth is that assuming that innocence and honesty are some sort of automatic shield is just wilfully naive
via JREF Forum http://forums.randi.org/showthread.php?t=267592&goto=newpost
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