Legal opinion of the plot of the movie 'Con Air.'

Discussion in 'Law & Justice' started by chris155au, Feb 28, 2022.

  1. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    Cameron Poe is a US Ranger. He returns home from duty to his pregnant wife who works at a bar. Some jealous thug animal patron initiates a confrontation with Poe but it doesn't escalate beyond words. Later in the car park the thug animal returns with his thug animal pals and confronts Poe. Oblivious to Poe's deadly hand-hand combat skills, they engage him. After initially getting the better of him, Poe absolutely tears them to shreds, to the point where he kills one of them. It seems to be a clear act of self-defence. In the next scene, Poe is before a judge who sentences him to prison. Leaving aside the total absurdity of a jury finding someone guilty in this situation, the judge take the absurdity to the next level in his sentencing speech saying:

    "With your military skills you are a deadly weapon, and are not subject to the same laws as other people, because you can respond with deadly force."
    That's a clear violation of the 14th Amendment surely!

    I have included the video below for context.

     
  2. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    Well it'ss a fictional movie so I wouldn't get too worked up over it
     
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  3. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    Sure, but fictional movies can easily be based on fact!
     
  4. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    Okay then can you find a single example of a case like this that happened in real life?
     
  5. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    It might have been unrealistic at the time of that movie, but something like this could totally happen these days in a Progressive Democrat area.

    I think that part of the film was emphasizing an issue that the writer was already seeing beginning to happen in society.

    This was very likely based on the 1984 New York subway self defense case, where a man was put on trial for attempted murder for shooting four thugs in self defense. It resulted in a strong divide in public opinion at the time.
     
    Last edited: Feb 28, 2022
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  6. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Another thing to consider is that if you were to take on a group of people and kill one of them, even if it was legitimate self defense, there would only be your word about what actually happened during the incident, and multiple adversaries who could be witnesses against you. You will notice that the film leaves the exact legal reasoning for why Poe was convicted as intentionally vague.

    The judge's explanation at the end is not the legal reasoning.

    If you listened to the judge's closing speech in the Arbery case, it is similar, the judge also gives many reasons for his decision, but none of those reasons he explains are actually legally adequate to justify the conviction.

    Don't underestimate lawyers using emotion to sway the opinion of a jury.
    Many people naively assume that most people make their decisions based on logic and that such a process is a simple one, but this is not always the case.
     
    Last edited: Feb 28, 2022
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  7. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Don't take this the wrong way, chris155au, but judging by your posts I have read in other parts of this forum, you totally seem to me like the type of person who could be led to make the wrong decision if you were on a jury and there were a complex case.

    A prosecutor will often try to portray the defendant as a bad person or a bad situation, and is there to try to paint a picture. Humans are not always very good at logically piecing together a large number of details, and rather fall back on a mental process called heuristics. This is where people will perceive something is a reality when use of only pure logic would not actually bring one to arrive at that conclusion. (This is also how magicians can often get away with their tricks)

    The very fact that you seemed to automatically assume the judge's statement in the film was the reason for why Poe was convicted is, ironically, a demonstration of how easily your logical thought process can be misled.
     
    Last edited: Feb 28, 2022
  8. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    How so? I'm guessing that you won't be able to support your claim.

    When did I say that the judge's statement was THE reason for why Poe was convicted? First of all, JURIES convict, not judges.
     
    Last edited: Feb 28, 2022
  9. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    Exactly @kazenatsu. No reply. Pretty standard for you!
     
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  10. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    I can't. That's why I made the thread to see if it has happened or in theory could happen. You seem to think that it is totally impossible. @kazenatsu doesn't agree, citing an example from New York in his first post in this thread.
     
  11. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Look at the St. Louis case of gun-toting lawyers Patricia and Mark McCloskey who ended up getting charged for "brandishing" guns to try to keep a group of protesters away from their property who had broken down a gate to gain entrance.

    (Of course it was a crooked prosecutor. thread with more information about other misconduct that prosecutor did here: prosecutor in serious trouble for case that made Missouri governor resign )

    There are plenty of other stories that have been posted in this forum about people's right to self defense not being respected. It just depends exactly what sort of situation you are asking about.
     
    Last edited: Feb 28, 2022
  12. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    In other words you concede that that film did not really provide the exact legal reason or justification for why Poe was convicted.
    So your question about "Could this happen?" and "How could this possibly happen?" would require us to speculate and present a list to you of several different possible theories about the details of what could have happened in the story that were not actually shown in the storyline of the film.
     
  13. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    Where exactly did I asked those questions?
     
  14. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    How can we give a legal opinion if we don't know what happened?

    Yes, with what we do know about this story, the events that we do not know about could easily have been such that this man could have been convicted, especially with a biased prosecutor, a biased jury, and a biased judge.

    Society in some big city areas does not have a very strong view of the right to self defense.

    The supposed reasoning could have been that, since this man was so well-skilled, he used excessive force in dealing with the men who were attacking him.
    Yes, that is a little bit of a stretch, but not by too much.
    We already see cases of children in schools being disciplined when they fought back against a bully who was hitting them. The idea being that "violence is not acceptable", even when the other person attacked first. It is a particular type of mentality.

    My point is, yes, this story might be kind of unrealistic, but it is actually only an exaggeration of the type of reality that does exist.

    The judge also might not have believed the Poe was left with no choice but to fight. Even if the attackers initiated the fight and invited Poe to fight, Poe might have been able to avoid getting into a serious fight with them. That fact that one of them ended up getting killed would have meant Poe got blamed for that, since he may have had an alternative choice to avoid fighting back. (Suppose for example Poe got hit, but that could have been the end of the attack if Poe had not fought back)
     
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  15. chris155au

    chris155au Well-Known Member

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    I should have made it clear that what I was really asking was if it is the case that a man such as Poe, because of his military skills making him a "deadly weapon", is "not subject to the same laws as other people who are provoked, because [he] can respond with deadly force." To me that sounds like a clear violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment.
     
    Last edited: Mar 1, 2022
  16. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Thank you for clarifying. In that case, I am not aware of any case like this, and if that were the primary reason it would be unrealistic that he would be convicted.
    However realize that any factor like this can be used as prejudicing evidence in a court. So you take some situation that might not come close enough to be able to convict, and then you throw this in, it could be enough to get a conviction.

    I did watch that film clip you provided. In that exact situation, the man who ended up getting killed had pulled a pocket-knife out and was imminently going to use it. In that situation I think it is unlikely that someone like Poe would be charged with murder in real life, if all the exact facts were known. However, realize that it could be argued that Poe did choose to engage in the fight with the other men, instead of initially trying to avoid them. Even though they were the first to strike, some prosecutor could argue that Poe is partially at fault because one of the men ended up getting killed. That part is not totally unrealistic.
    So, if you removed that pocket-knife part from this story, a man like Poe could end up being convicted by a jury. That is not too unrealistic.
    (Certainly many men might take a plea bargain in this situation, and so it might never even go to a jury)

    You specifically ask about him being treated differently due to his military skills. That would not be the single or primary reason, but that certainly could be a factor.

    You specifically ask about the judge's comments about "not being subject to the same laws". The judge was either talking in a figurative way, not literally, or the judge was not actually following the law in his reasoning because he believed it was not appropriate for this situation. Yes, judges can do that and almost always get away with it.

    Another factor here was that the man he killed was drunk. That is one additional factor that could work against him. Remember, Poe chose to engage in the fight. It could be argued he should not have engaged in the fight with drunk men.
     
    Last edited: Mar 1, 2022
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  17. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Here is the part of the script from the court scene in that film:

    Admit the facts, and enter a plea bargain.

    I will not plead guilty.

    You could get ten years.

    Admit to it, you get four.

    Serve maybe a year.

    Cameron Poe, you have pleaded guilty to manslaughter in the first degree.
    With your military skills, you are a deadly weapon...
    and are not subject to the same laws as other people that are provoked...
    because you can respond with deadly force.
    It is the order of this court that you be remanded to a federal penitentiary...
    where you shall remain incarcerated for a term not less than 7 to 10 years.​


    So that scene touched on a separate issue too. This man was pushed into a plea bargain. He pled guilty so that he would probably be sentenced to less time in prison. But a plea bargain is not a guarantee of spending less time in prison. In this case the judge decided not to sentence him to less prison time. So he ended up pleading guilty and giving up his right to a jury trial for nothing. It was a situation where whatever choice he took, there was a possibility it could cause him to lose either way. It was pointing to an unfairness in the justice system.
     
  18. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Let's say that you are sober and you choose to engage in a fight with a man who is drunk and whose rational thought processes are impaired. During the fight, that man is losing, and then in desperation he pulls out a knife. If you then kill him, it could be argued that you are somewhat responsible for that death, because he was under diminished capacity to rationally think, and so is not totally responsible for his own actions, because you did play some part in causing the situation to lead to that. Some might argue that that man was not entirely responsible for his own death for pulling out a knife because he was drunk.

    It would also create less sympathy in the eyes of a jury if one man who was highly skilled at fighting took on three men who were heavily drunk to the point of almost being incapacitated, than if it was just one average man who had fought against three other average men.

    So yes, this puts Poe in a bad situation, and we really feel sorry for him, but at the same time it is very common for people and the justice system to assign responsibility for a death that happens, and view someone else as accountable even when that death was not originally intended. Poe might be seen as responsible because he did not do more to try to avoid the fight in the first place with the three drunk men.

    It is also very possible the accounts of the witnesses did not convey to the police or prosecutor exactly the extent of the situation to which Poe felt he had no choice but to fight.

    He does walk away from the open door of the car towards the other men who want to fight with him, but this is partially understandable because he doesn't want the fight to occur near the car which might damage it, and he wants to stand in the way between the other men and his girl and car he is trying to protect.

    So the question is when does movement towards a certain direction become a sign of provocation, when there is also an alternate and understandable reason for that movement in that direction.

    This might not have been considered in the court, and then the judge just took the testimony of the witnesses that Poe had moved forward towards the other men as evidence that Poe voluntarily entered into the fight.
     
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  19. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    It looks very much to me like they brought the fight to him.

    A reasonable person would conclude that they were not going to let him get in that car and get out of there in time.

    And quite probably Poe himself was drunk
     
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  20. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    It seems to me there could easily be a discrepency between the way the witnesses described the situation and the exact circumstances and situation that actually existed.

    In this type of situation, the account of the witnesses could easily portray the picture that Poe had voluntarily decided to engage in the fight. He took a few steps towards the men who wanted to fight him, and he ignored the pleading of his girlfriend who wanted him to quickly leave.

    Even though the actual situation was more complex then that and he could have had good reason to think that he had no choice other than to fight in that situation.
    (The men might have chased him and caught up to him before he could drive away in the car, and then it is probable they might have tried to damage the car if he was in it)

    I personally think he should have had the legal right to enter into that fight in those circumstances, but I do think there are many people who would think he should not, and would want to hold him responsible for the result of a death that happened in that fight.

    Those people would argue he should have tried to get away, and not express through his actions what could be perceived as a willing intent to engage in a fight. Even though doing so might have put him, his girlfriend, and his car at additional risk.
     
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  21. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That is entirely what this case might hinge on, in my opinion.

    I of course agree with you. But I think there is a big segment of the people in society who could see things differently.

    Some people might argue he still should have tried to get away, and that we can't know for sure those drunk men were going to try attacking him if he had tried to verbally diffuse the situation or had tried to escape and flee out from there as fast as possible.
     
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  22. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    And that he was quite possibly drunk too.... If that applies one way it applies the other way too
     
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  23. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    If two drunk people fight and one of them ends up killing the other one, usually the surviving person will be blamed.
     
  24. kazenatsu

    kazenatsu Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    This is actually a somewhat complicated case. If a person is provoked by a drunk person, and then does anything back that could be perceived as a provocation by that drunk person, then even if that drunk person then does something that could justify a response of an action in self defense, the person who did the slightest thing to provoke the drunk person could be seen as partially responsible for the situation, if severe injury or death results.

    Especially if the other person dies, there is a common human psychological tendency to view only the person who is still alive and can be punished as responsible.
    (In my opinion this is not logical, but it is a very common psychological response people in society often have)
    The responsibility that would have been seen as shared by both of them is then disproportionately shifted onto the survivor.

    The drunk person could be viewed as not entirely responsible for their actions, and so another person who was not drunk (or much less drunk) and involved in the situation could be viewed as more responsible. (This is definitely the case in alleged cases of date rape)
     
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  25. FatBack

    FatBack Well-Known Member

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    In a sane world that was not clown world insanity..... Being drunk is no excuse to go and pick a fight.

    And if you get your ass kicked well that's on you
     
    Last edited: Mar 1, 2022

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