Client Confidentiality:
I watched a recent 60 minute segment with an unsettling feeling. This man had been behind bars for 29 years for murdering a security guard. The trouble is, two other lawyers knew from the start he was innocence as a client of their own, who they were defending on different unrelated charges, confessed to the murder. According to some sort of legal cannon of ethics they were not to divulge this confidential information. So they didn't and an innocent man was convicted, and missed the death penalty by the vote of two jurors. Meanwhile, the real killer agreed in writing that his lawyers could release the confidential information after he died. He recently died, so now the identity of the real killer has been revealed.
Client confidentiality can be understood----up to a point. I can see if a defendant admits to his lawyer that he really did commit the crime, that this should be kept confidential. True, he might be found not guilty and get away with a crime. But the line should be drawn right there. I don't think anyone should be granted confidentiality on major crimes such as murder, rape, sexual assault, and maybe a few other crimes, period. If I am being defended by a lawyer on one charge, let's say aggravated battery, and I start bragging to my lawyer that I also killed some other person, then---by law---the lawyer should be required to notify the authorities. Same with a priest in a confessional. If someone admits they murdered someone the priest should be required by law to notify the authorities. Anyone who murders someone, or blew up a building etc., should not be entitled to legal confidentiality protection from anyone they admit the crime to except the lawyer defending them against the charge if they are in the court system for trial. And perhaps that should apply to spouses too, at least for these certain kinds of crime.
No one should have to spend 29 years in jail for a murder they didn't commit because of some client confidentiality which permits a criminal to admit the crime to certain individuals and have that admission be legally protected. Only a lawyer, once the case is in the court system, should be given that legal confidentiality. We need to put an end to such low-lifes running to some priest, or their spouse, or their lawyer and admitting---sometimes bragging---about their crime, and having client confidentiality. Maybe that is why so many kids have been abused by priests---the abusing priest goes to a confessional with a supervisory priest, admits their actions, and then the supervisory priest, respecting client confidentiality, doesn't report the abuse to anyone. To me this is outrageous.
While this is in large part bias, to me---if you commit any of these kinds of crimes mentioned---their ought to be absolutely no person you can turn to and expect confidentiality. The law should be just the opposite. If someone tells you they murdered someone, and you don't go to the police, you should be charged as an accessory to the crime.
I know----I forget----we no longer change established traditions. Why, this is the way it has been for years, it is the way things are, relax. Hell, I'd vote for Obama just for the hell of it---to see what he might do. We already know what all the others will do---nothing----and they have been around for decades.
