Litigation

Alt and Walsh on the BP criminal prosecutions

By James R. Copland

The Heritage Foundation's Robert Alt and Brian Walsh add to the chorus of critics questioning the Justice Department's announced criminal prosecution of BP, while the spill is ongoing:

It's possible that criminal wrongdoing occurred, but the current approach -- one that all but announces that criminal charges will be brought and then seeks to identify the crime and decide who will be designated as the criminal -- undermines the criminal-justice system and Americans' respect for the law. Whenever high-ranking law-enforcement officials select their targets in this manner, it evokes disturbing echoes of a statement Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz has attributed to the head of Stalin's secret police, Lavrenti Beria: "Show me the man, and I'll find you the crime."

Full post as published by Point of Law on June 09, 2010 (boomark / email).