Criminal Justice

The Torah states that "a matter shall be established based on two witnesses". If we were to follow this law in this country, there would be no Criminal Justice prosecution; plain and simple. As an overwhelming majorette of crimes are prosecuted without two witnesses.

The Talmud teaches that the court has the prerogative to prosecute crimes that don't reach the bar of evidence provided by the testimony of two witness, if they feel that doing so is necessary to establish law and order. In other words, although the ideal bar of evidence is two witnesses, in the real world we usually don't have that luxury.

In the final analysis, is there a difference between the Torah system and the secular system, in this regard, or are both systems settling for a compromised burden of evidence?

Perhaps we can propose the following. In the absence of two witnesses, says the Torah, we can't be certain that the accused is guilty. Now, even if, to maintain a law abiding and safe society, we have no choice but to put the accused in jail, we must remember that maybe we got it all wrong; the accused may be innocent.

If the court convicts based on one witness that don't have the luxury of going home and going to sleep peacefully knowing that they can rely on the Torah that their judgement was just, as they can if the conviction is based on two witnesses. If they lock someone up for thirty years, they must look back at the case from time to time, rethink the evidence, question the verdict, be willing to overturn the ruling.

And, anyone accused of a crime without the testimony of two witnesses, unlike the recent Supreme court decision, should definitely have the right to have their case reexamined with DNA testing. And, unlike the American law, sometimes a Jury's verdict must be reexamined.

I know this may be an inconvenient way to run a justice system, but, sorry, we cant rely on the Torah for a conviction with only one witness; we can only rely on ourselves, and yes, we do make mistakes.