Suppressed evidence in criminal justice proceedings

Suppressed Evidence

First Case. No. The passenger's motion to suppress the seized evidence should not be granted. An accurate description of the apprehension by the two police officers and the rocks of crack cocaine they confiscated from the passenger's pocket and body are fundamental evidence of illegal drug use. The passenger cannot claim any right to suppress the evidence because the actual substance was found in his personal possession and constitutes direct evidence against him. Moreover, the apprehension happened in a high-crime neighborhood where drug use is inherent or quite likely. By omitting or suppressing the direct evidence and presenting an incomplete or misleading account or description, the police officers or judge will commit obstruction of justice.

The driver was not arrested because no such evidence was found in his personal possession. The woman who leaned into the passenger's window and handed him an object was not arrested, either, because the police officers could not identify what the object was or tell if that was the plastic bag, containing the rocks of cocaine.

Convincing argumentation is premised on a basic principle that it presents all relevant evidence (Carroll 2003). Some omit relevant evidence to make the argument seem stronger, more convincing or to serve some other purpose. Evidence is suppressed when an arguer intentionally leaves out relevant data and it become a problem because or when there is no way to know if the whole truth is told. Advertisements commit this fallacy most often, such as when they do not inform the public about the dangers of a particular product unless the law requires it. One example is cigarette ads. Evidence is also suppressed when an ad does not inform the public that a competitor's product is equally good or better. Some coal, asbestos, nuclear fuel and tobacco industries deliberately suppressed evidence concerning the health of their employees or their business' health hazards.

A cogent argument must possess both good reasoning and true premises (Atheism 2005). All the included premises not only be true but must also include all true premises. Suppressed evidence leaves out true and relevant information and creates a fallacy. This fallacy is also called a fallacy of presumption in that it creates the presumption that the true premises are complete. Suppressed evidence is also called "unstated evidence (Atheism)." An audio tape case revealed a cover-up of the drug involvement of a sheriff's son who was then already on trial for a video-taped gang rape (Moxley 2003). Police officers suppressed the evidence of Assistant Sheriff Don Haidl's teenage son's smoking marijuana at the time his trial in a 200 videotaped gang rape of a 16-year-old girl in 2002 pended. Official records say that Assistant Sheriff George Jaramillo secretly arranged for and ordered Sgt. Richard Downing to conceal and bury the evidence against the sheriff's son. The Sheriff of the place where the drug bust was conducted released the teenager without arrest and even brought him home, chauffeured. Under the terms of his $100,000 bail for the rape case, a drug arrest would send him to jail immediately.

Second Case. No, the passenger's motion to suppress the controlled substance should not be granted. He or anyone had no right to such a motion, because intentionally suppressing evidence constitutes obstruction of justice, a crime. The police officer was doing routine check-ups of a troublesome bar in a high-crime area and it was his duty to report exactly what he found, especially if there was concrete and conclusive evidence to collaborate his description.

Having received calls from that bar for a full range of crimes from murder to public intoxication, police have the duty and responsibility to spot-check the place as routine and then report every bit of true information they find. The patrolling officer checked the parked out and found the passenger in question, fumbling over something on the floorboard, which the officer suspected was a weapon. He had the other passengers get out and found a twelve-pack of beer, which hid a bag of controlled substance. This controlled substance was the direct evidence against the passenger who attempted to hide it on the floorboard when the officer spot-checked the car. The illegal use of controlled substance is a crime as the illegal use of deadly weapons and a patrolling officer has the duty and responsibility to confiscate and report on all the true details of the apprehension. Omitting or altering complete information, especially when concrete evidence accompanies or substantiates it, is obstruction of justice and a crime.

Suppressing evidence is most commonly committed in advertising (Atheism 2005). Many or most advertising campaigns tend to present the best features of a given product to the public and hide or ignore its negative features or unpleasant information on it. Creationist arguments simply ignore evidence relevant to their claims that can cause them problems. Politics is also often guilty of this fallacy, such as when a politician makes claims without bothering to including unstated or not widely known information on it.

One disturbing case of suppressed evidence involved the safety of genetically modified foods, found by a public interest layer, Steven Druker, among thousands of pages of Food and Drug Administration files (Soil Association 2000). He argued that the company suppressed evidence on the safety of its genetically engineered food products and its claim that these foods are "substantially equivalent" to non-GM counterpart. The company's policy was assailed and declared as "trying to force an ultimate conclusion that there is no difference between foods modified by genetic engineering and foods modified by traditional breeding practices." Technical experts attested to different probable risks that were not presented by the manufacturer. The FDA was later required to reveal its files in a court suit brought against it by the Alliance for Bio Integrity (Soil Association).