I was living in Los Angeles during the O.J. Murder Trial, another dubious acquittal.
There is a commonality between the two cases.
One that would argue for the banning of trying cases in the media.
When cases are tried in the media it makes it almost impossible to have a fair trial that is not biased in one direction or the other.
A criminal case isn’t American Idol. The public does not get to vote on these matters using their smart phone.
From the start these highly publicized cases are media circuses, like the gladiatorial combats of ancient Rome. Entertainment vehicles for people to give a thumbs up or thumbs down to.
This makes a mockery of the trial system and turns what should be a courtroom process into a popularity contest.
When the media circus is contested by loud voices on both sides it invariably seems to work in favor of the defendant be that defendant O.J. Simpson or George Zimmerman.
Reasonable doubt has been created by the media.
This becomes an acquittal that leaves one side cheering and the other angry and demonstrating.
At the same time the media can function as a lynch mob and make it impossible for a defendant to win an acquittal no matter how much evidence the defendant has in his/her favor.
I think it might be better if there were little or no pretrial discussion of criminal cases in the media when jury trials are supposedly based on having unbiased juries.
The media circus turns trials in to popularity contests for the talking heads who have weighed in prior to the trial.
