In Other Words

Creating Crime

So now there is an article in the Strait Times about entrapment. A truly frightening business, law in Singapore (both meaning intended). The police can go out, provoke you into doing crime and then throw you in jail for it. The example proposed in the article was of a man who had an ecstasy pill lying around for months, that he wasn’t taking and was then provoked into selling it for 140 dollars to an undercover cop (four times the market price, according to the article). The possession of the one ecstasy pill might just have resulted in him being fined (though a small amount of jail time might have been involved) while the minimum punishment for trafficking is five years and five cane strokes.

That is cop provoked crime and highly morally questionable. If the police officer wouldn’t have offered such a ridiculous price and let the man walk away (as he was doing) then the only crime would have been possession. Now granted, he should not have had drugs, as that’s against the law, but the police should not be permitted to create crime. Provoke, maybe, but create, no.

Fine line in terms of law enforcement, I admit. But a line that makes a whole lot of difference morally. Though it could be argued that if police could create crime then somebody else would be able to create crime as well, we will never know that. ‘Could be’ does not a good argument for law make (that’s just praying on our natural fears and prejudices). That was the entire point of the movie ‘Minority Report’ to draw on some ‘mass media philosophy’.

Let me try throwing it in another light. A man is hungry and dirt poor. He sees a baker put out a load of loafs, but manages to contain himself to only looking at them in desperate hunger. A man comes along, looking all business like and nice and, seeing the hungry man, says ‘don’t worry, its alright, just take some’ the hungry man hesitates, but gets prompted again. Then, when he does he gets arrested by the business looking man saying ‘actually its not alright and your going to jail, ha ha! Got you’

Probably not the best example, but my brain is only on half power at this time of the day. Yes, the hungry man did commit a crime, but only at the prompting of the businessman. The businessman, as a matter of fact, could be held partially responsible for the actions of the poor man, as he provoked them. Of course the Singapore police force has explicitly told the judges that they should not criticize or meddle in their affairs (who needs checks and balances? This is a democracy for god’s sake!) and they will do what ever they blood well please to catch the criminals, including creating them.

Interesting fact: Singapore has the highest number of executions per capita in the world. Beating Iran, Africa, North America, South America, etc. (that while large swaths of the world abhor capital punishment and believe nothing validates killing another person ‘in the name of justice’.)

posted by Symbol @ 18.8.04