It should be noted that giving criminals immunity is the entire damn point of the system.
The point of "immunity" is so that the lower-level criminals lose their 5th Amendment rights, and are therefore compelled to present evidence against their boss. The 5th Amendment in the USA states "Right against self-incrimination", but if you have immunity, you cannot self-incriminate.
So once you sign that immunity document, you can be compelled to speak anything in court. Even if you "forgot", once you sign over, you can be __forced__ to talk.
So yeah, I'm not entirely sure if "immunity given to group X" is a big problem? Its how courts work, its how we pin down the ringleader. Its often less important to get the lackeys, and more important for the officers to focus on the bosses.
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Without the presentation of this evidence, you never get a guilty plea. Remember, in the USA's court system, you need to __prove__ the defendant of wrongdoing.
That means you either need to convince people, or force people, to present evidence in court that's helpful to your case. These people are often insiders, and immunity is extremely useful for getting around 5th Amendment issues.
If you admit to a crime while testifying in a non-criminal matter, you can be charged with that crime and that testimony can be used against you. Therefore you can take the 5th in non-criminal cases - as you have a right not to incriminate yourself in future criminal matters. Therefore non-criminal courts can and do grant immunity against future prosecution (although I'm not sure if it's jurisdictional, ie whether federal bankruptcy court can grant you immunity against future state charges).
TFA is a bout civil immunity though, not criminal immunity.
The first paragraph talks about the board of TWC allegedly knowing about Weinstein paying off people accusing him. One could make the argument that not acting on this knowledge to protect the value of the is an abrogation of their duties as board members.
However the board was granted immunity in Chapter 11, so no such arguments can be advanced in court now.
The consumer does what the marketeers want, which do what the executives want, and round we go. It's a vicious cycle of inefficiency from people trying to get larger parts of the pie rather than growing the pie.
To be fair, this is how causality works. It's not only about who did it. In practice the ball rolls as much because it was kicked as because it is round and because it isn't made of solid lead.
The shareholders will end up with the valuation they end up with, but are immune from prosecution in all but the most explicit and egregious cases.
If they vote in directors, which they suspect will hire a criminal CEO, that’s enough levels of indirection that unless they write a memo explicitly stating to do so (and maybe even then!), the worst outcome for them is the valuation of the company drops to zero and they lose their capital, minus whatever dividends have been pulled out.
That is barring potential criminal conspiracy anyway, which would require concrete actions in furtherance of a conspiracy, which would be difficult to prove without something like that memo.
And yet the owners rely on the market/consumer giving them money to put food on the table and afford a roof over their head. Which is to say, user?id=delusional above was mostly joking.
Maybe because the example they gave on the article they were going after one person crime (rape), and the case that caused outrage is where the guilty bosses are already the guilty bosses and they still got deals.
Would you not see any problem if (still using the article example) Weinstein was given immunity to report on his own rapes?
Also it compounds the rage as it was what happened to all the banks in 2008, all the air cias after 1st covid, etc.
> Would you not see any problem if (still using the article example) Weinstein was given immunity to report on his own rapes?
Weinstein is the boss. So you'd never give him immunity to the case, he's the target.
If Weinstein had a close "ally", who was less important for justice but important to testify for the case... even if that "ally" had crimes associated with him, you'd want to give that "Hypothetical ally" immunity. _THEN_ you force the ally to talk (if the ally fails to talk in court, you throw him in jail for contempt of court, and take away their immunity).
>Weinstein is the boss. So you'd never give him immunity to the case, he's the target.
In the article it says that Weinstein was practically given immunity to personal lawsuits related to the class action. Individual members of the class were able to retain the right to sue him personally in exchange for taking 1/4 of their payout in the bankruptcy proceedings.
Anyway, aside from the specific inaccuracy of what you're saying here, this whole argument is mush-headed slop. You're talking about criminal cases, the article is about bankruptcy proceedings and civil lawsuits against individuals. You might as well say that you'd never give Weinstein immunity because in video games making some enemies fully immune to elemental attacks makes class balance difficult.
> the article it says that Weinstein was practically given immunity to personal lawsuits
Weinstein is in jail. (The victims "could opt out of giving lawsuit immunity to Harvey Weinstein himself - but only if they agreed to reduce their portion of the settlement payout by 75%," which seems fine, this is a civil proceeding and the point of bankruptcy is to draw a line under liability.)
The "blanket immunity" in the HN title misleadingly refers to Board members being released from liability.
> this is a civil proceeding and the point of bankruptcy is to draw a line under liability.
This is a bankruptcy proceeding regarding the liability of Weinstein's company. What's that got to do with Harvey Weinstein's, the living person's, liability, other than the fact that you can convince a judge to waive it? Much less the people who served as the company's BoD?
> What's that got to do with Harvey Weinstein's, the living person's, liability
Weinstein the person caused the company’s liability. The insurers paying out for the latter are also connected to the former. They won’t agree to a bankruptcy plan that leaves them on the hook for further litigation.
>Weinstein the person caused the company’s liability
His actions on behalf of the company, and the actions of others also acting on behalf of the company. He is just one of the individuals whom one could reasonably expect to be held liable in a civil suit.
>They won’t agree to a bankruptcy plan that leaves them on the hook for further litigation.
They will if a plan that doesn't absolve these covered individuals of liability is not offered, or is not able to be offered. And if they don't agree to a plan, oh well.
Remember that if there's a policy choice between allowing this practice, which allows for a liability cap to be negotiated in bankruptcy court , or disallowing it, the insurers have every reason to rattle their sabers about refusing bankruptcy or going out of business, because the status quo benefits them greatly. So they might say they won't agree to any other plan, but that could be just talk until you refuse to offer them such a sweet deal.
> Without the presentation of this evidence, you never get a guilty plea.
Firstly, I don't necessarily agree that you could never get a guilty plea. The government has lots of resources and the threat of scrutinizing you and going after you for years is a significant pressure. For sure this can be abused, but my point is only that this blanket assumption that the government just has to grant immunity or throw up its hands seems like a false choice.
Secondly, total immunity is a pretty broad guarantee though. Why not trade a maximum penalty for that evidence, instead of no penalty at all?
>Firstly, I don't necessarily agree that you could never get a guilty plea. The government has lots of resources and the threat of scrutinizing you and going after you for years is a significant pressure
Realistically speaking government resources is still limited. They can bring the hammer down on Julian Assange because he's a high profile person they want to make an example of, but that approach isn't scalable for every mid level manager that they want to investigate.
> Why not trade a maximum penalty for that evidence
Because of 5th Amendment issues.
If there's a penalty associated with talking about evidence, then they'll just plead the 5th Amendment. Only with total immunity can you bypass the 5th Amendment and _FORCE_ them to talk.
Sorry, I don't see how that follows. A guarantee that "you will only get sentenced for X years regardless of what you admit" does not seem meaningfully different if X is zero or one.
edit: not meaningfully different with respect to the 5th, obviously it's meaningfully different with respect to "justice", as getting off scott free rubs many people the wrng way.
I don't understand. Any immunity deal entails revealing criminal behaviour. That is an admission, and admission is the whole reason immunity is granted.
Edit: the point being that the limit on their sentence is contingent on not pleading the 5th.
> Any immunity deal entails revealing criminal behaviour.
You are mistaken.
Lets say "Alice" is the boss you're after, and Bob is a close associate of Alice, and Bob _MIGHT_ have committed a crime. Nobody knows if Bob is actually a criminal (and indeed, Bob is in that weird grey-zone of the law, skirting legal issues and just barely being legal). You give Bob immunity so that he's more comfortable in testifying in court. "Just in case" his actions constitute a crime. Especially if Bob knows something about Alice (just in case Alice is "The Boss")
Immunity doesn't "entail" criminal behavior. It just entails likely criminal associations (which is NOT a crime). Immunity protection ranges from everywhere from "Completely innocent but they wanted immunity, so might as well give it to them", to "Completely guilty, but getting their testimony will get bigger fish", and everything in between. Its a tool, like any other tool it has proper and improper uses.
But the context here aren't cases where the individuals in question are in a gray area, they're individuals that definitely were accessories to/covered up or participated in criminal activity but then get immunity in order to get the big fish. This is exactly what Huett was describing in the opening paragraphs of this article.
What does the 5th Amendment have to do with offering someone a plea deal on some count in return for testimony, and immunity for other things that come up in that testimony?
Lets say Weinstein was the target. Then all the executives around Weinstein are the lackeys. So you offer immunity to the lackeys (aka: the executives in the inner-circle) so that you get Weinstein.
Offering immunity to the low-level janitor doesn't do any good. You need someone high-enough that they're in the "inner circle" of the target. Someone with real dirt on your target.
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Its very common in criminal court to give immunity to mob bosses, to get dirt on even bigger mob bosses.
Making an article saying "Only mob bosses get immunity" is counterproductive. That's the damn point of the grant-immunity system. You grant it to criminals to help catch other criminals.
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Lets put it this way: lets say there's some innocent bystander who happens to know what is going on. Police / Investigators don't even offer immunity to them, because they committed no crime, so there's no point offering immunity. You just ask the innocent dude to come to court and answer a few questions / testify on what they know.
Article title is "How corporate chiefs dodge lawsuits over sexual abuse and deadly products". The HN guidelines ask "Please use the original title, unless it is misleading or linkbait; don't editorialize."
Collusion among judges, lawyers, and prosecutors helps explain this phenomenon. This collusion occurs due to "revolving door". None of these parties (judges, lawyers and prosecutors) receive any bribes--so it is legal. However, the system is set up in a collusive way: lawyers for defendants become judges; prosecutors become a big law partner, representing defendants; etc.
This is likely a big part of it; take a trip to any traffic court in a medium sized town early in the day and you're almost certain to see some exceptionally chummy lawyers and judges hanging out.
Judge "Walrath argued that the majority of women who supported the deal might receive nothing in a settlement if she denied the legal shields because insurers refused to pay without them and the studio had only $3 million to dispense to all creditors. The settlement’s collapse would leave Weinstein’s accusers with only the dicey prospect of pursuing further litigation."
This is a story about insurance claims in bankruptcy. To the degree there is scope for reform, it's in exempting insurers from liability in cases of sexual misconduct. The downside: there will be less cash and a longer route to settlement for victims.
The entire point of bankruptcy proceedings is to arrange a final resolution of outstanding claims when there aren't enough assets to cover them. Someone is going to get screwed, because the money simply isn't there, including the money that would be used to pay for ongoing D&O (directors & officers) insurance that would pay civil claims against directors for actions taken in the course of their employment.
Kind of wish the article would go into more details about the immunity agreements in question. Its hard to make a judgement on if these cases are inappropriate without knowing the details.
Some of the stuff in the article strike me as totally fine though. Like complaining that a legal settlement has too much legalese in it. Like, really?
I feel like the article is being rather misleading in that regards. Like its talking about sexual assualt, at a glance it sounds like they are talking about the criminal act of the assualt itself, but they are actually talking about if the board of the company was negligent in preventing their employee from doing the crime (i think, the article is unclear on that)
pointless. Most of those things are not crimes (mismanagement, bankruptcy) unless you can start the civil case for damages first to find the fraud that then becomes criminal. It's a well thought of plan.
> unless you can start the civil case for damages first to find the fraud that then becomes criminal
Someone can correct me if I am wrong, but when you go to bankruptcy court, you actually have to reveal all of your finances and justify why you need to declare bankruptcy? You can't just preliminarily declare bankruptcy in anticipation of damages - you actually have to damages assigned by a court.
And it seems like a huge waste of everyone's time in the bankruptcy process if the judge says "oh yeah - anyone can now tack on a lawsuit and I'll see you back here every single time".
Bankruptcy is a deal with the court on restructuring or insolvency. Both parties have to agree. They will simply not take the deal if the risk is high for them.
The article specifically mentions this objection. Many of the plaintiffs don't agree and the settlement is forced on them anyways by the judge. In fact, even people who aren't involved in the lawsuit at all, and so never agreed or disagreed, can get nailed by this.
The point of "immunity" is so that the lower-level criminals lose their 5th Amendment rights, and are therefore compelled to present evidence against their boss. The 5th Amendment in the USA states "Right against self-incrimination", but if you have immunity, you cannot self-incriminate.
So once you sign that immunity document, you can be compelled to speak anything in court. Even if you "forgot", once you sign over, you can be __forced__ to talk.
So yeah, I'm not entirely sure if "immunity given to group X" is a big problem? Its how courts work, its how we pin down the ringleader. Its often less important to get the lackeys, and more important for the officers to focus on the bosses.
---------
Without the presentation of this evidence, you never get a guilty plea. Remember, in the USA's court system, you need to __prove__ the defendant of wrongdoing.
That means you either need to convince people, or force people, to present evidence in court that's helpful to your case. These people are often insiders, and immunity is extremely useful for getting around 5th Amendment issues.