Imperial Benevolence of USA towards American Citizens

How America’s Justice System Killed Trust, Silenced Free Speech, and Split a Nation in Two.

Chapter 15.

In America, fear runs horizontally, not vertically. People fear other people instead of people fearing a fair and predictable law.

What happens to a society when the justice system teaches citizens to avoid trusting anyone?

The Ice Cream Talk

Imagine sitting in a Chicago park and talking to a stranger about ice cream. You discuss vanilla or chocolate flavors. You wonder if the gelato place on Michigan Avenue is overpriced. You say nothing more.

Now imagine that six months later you are arrested. At your trial that stranger takes the stand to testify. He is facing charges of his own and needs a deal. He claims that you confessed to him. He tells the jury you revealed the location of the body. He says you confessed while talking in the park.

You never said any such thing. You were only talking about ice cream.

But you cannot prove your innocence. You have no recording of the conversation. There were no other witnesses present. It is simply your word against his word. His word earns him a reduced sentence. Your word earns you absolutely nothing.

In the United States this is not a hypothetical.¹ This is the law. It is the judicial system which dispenses law in place of justice. This is why Americans do not trust each other.

The Architecture of Betrayal

The American criminal justice system runs on informants.² They are called cooperating witnesses or confidential informants. More honestly they are called snitches. The arrangement is very simple. If you face charges you can reduce your sentence by providing testimony against someone else.³ More valuable testimony leads to a better deal.³

This creates a busy marketplace. Real or fabricated information becomes valuable currency. A person charged with robbery can offer testimony about a murder. He may know absolutely nothing about the crime.⁴ If the prosecution finds that testimony useful he walks lighter. The snitch has every incentive to invent and embellish stories. The accused has almost no way to fight back.

Research from Northwestern University shows that informant testimony is a major problem.⁵ It is the leading cause of wrongful convictions in American capital cases.⁵ It is more common than misidentification or bad forensics.⁶ The primary cause is snitches.⁵

The Innocence Project reports the same findings. DNA evidence often proves innocence years later.² Yet the original convictions rested on people who had reasons to lie.

The system does not stop at one snitch. A prosecutor building a case can use several informants.⁴ One testifies that you asked about a specific crime scene. This testimony establishes planning. Another testifies that you discussed selling stolen goods. This testimony establishes motive. A third testifies that you threw a weapon into a sewer.⁷ This testimony establishes disposal of evidence.

Each testimony alone is thin. Together they look like independent corroboration. They describe different parts of the same crime. A jury finds this very persuasive. But all three informants could be lying. They might gather details from police briefings and media reports.⁸ All three have the same incentive of securing their own freedom.

The weapon in the sewer is rarely recovered. The confession need not have actually occurred. The chain is complete without any physical evidence.

Law of USA does not insist that testimony must be “corroborated in material particulars.”⁹ That happens in India.

“No wonder that no one in USA likes to talk to another person freely… if extra judicial confession has such low bar of admissibility, the society becomes an open confession house.”

The Plea Machine

The informant system manufactures evidence. The plea bargaining system manufactures convictions.

Most federal cases in the United States end in guilty pleas instead of trials.² This does not mean all these defendants are actually guilty.¹⁰ It means that going to trial is too risky.

A defendant who loses at trial faces a severe trial penalty.¹⁰ The trial sentence is dramatically harsher than the plea offer. A five year plea offer can turn into thirty years after trial. The message is to accept the deal or face destruction.

Human Rights Watch has documented this coercive practice in detail.¹⁰ Federal prosecutors routinely use mandatory minimum sentences to force pleas.¹⁰ The plea looks voluntary on paper when the judge asks questions.¹¹ However the structural coercion is enormous. The defendant is threatened by a system rather than a person.

For foreign nationals the pressure is even worse. Consider an Indian professional extradited from the Czech Republic.¹⁰ He does not understand the American legal system. His family is thousands of miles away. His lawyer warns that trial could mean decades in prison. A plea deal offers a much shorter sentence. He pleads guilty to avoid the risk. The plea is voluntary on paper but coerced in reality.¹¹ His name was Nikhil Gupta.¹²¹³

The Reversal of Onus

Every law student learns that the prosecution bears the burden of proof. The state must prove guilt beyond reasonable doubt. The accused person needs to prove nothing.

The United States follows this rule in theory. In practice the informant system completely inverts it.⁴ They discharge the burden with snitch. Onus shift on accused to disprove it.¹⁴

A snitch testifying to a confession sounds like direct evidence of guilt.¹⁴ The formal burden remains on the state. However, the onus to ‘disprove facts’ shifts to the defense.¹⁴ The defendant must prove a negative to win.¹⁴ He must show the conversation never happened.¹⁵ Proving this negative is almost impossible without evidence.¹⁴

Indian courts have long recognized this structural danger.⁹ They took an illustration in evidence Act and interpreted it as mandatory law. The illustration said that a co-accused is inherently unreliable witness. Therefore, the Supreme Court mandated independent corroboration for informant testimony.⁹ This applies to all witnesses including those who receive leniency. Extrajudicial confessions undergo rigorous tests and must be corroborated in material particulars.

No such general safeguard exists in the United States.² The system relies on cross examination and jury instructions.³ These measures are simply not enough.

The Open Confession House

We must look at the society this system produces.

Any conversation can be turned into criminal evidence. This means that every conversation becomes a serious risk. A stranger on a bus or a neighbor could testify against you. Their testimony does not need to be accurate.

The rational response to this threat is silence. People become extremely guarded in their everyday speech. They treat social interactions as potential depositions. They do not joke about crime or discuss sensitive business. They avoid talking to stranger, absolutely. Ask for direction and a hand will gesture without speaking. A visible alibi is created for the CCTV.

Society becomes an open confession house. The walls have ears because any person might become a state informant. No qualification apply.

This is not a traditional surveillance state with cameras. It is an insidious system where surveillance is crowdsourced.² The state does not need to watch you directly. It only offers incentives for people to report you.

The Gun Is Secondary

The conventional explanation for American violence is firearms. There are more guns than people in the country. This correlation is real and very important. But it is not the deepest explanation.

Guns determine the lethality of violence. The justice system determines its rationality. Criminals know the law is negotiable. Sentences can be traded and betrayal is rewarded.³ Therefore, criminals do not fear the law. They only fear rivals and potential snitches.⁸

Deterrence requires certainty, proportionality, and fairness. The American system fails on all three counts. Certainty is low because offenders can bargain. Proportionality is skewed because key actors receive leniency.¹⁰ Fairness is compromised when innocent people are convicted at the behest of professional players.¹⁶

Fear runs horizontally from person to person.¹⁴ People do not fear the law itself. People do not fear the judge. People fear the neighbor instead. They fear being outmaneuvered by others.

Criminals do not expect predictable punishments. They think about managing the fallout through deals. The law is not a wall. It is a simple negotiation of deals offered with carefully chosen words.

The cycle of crime and betrayal continues indefinitely. Guns make robberies lethal. The system makes the robber fearless.

The Death of Free Speech

This situation creates the final and cruelest irony.

The United States was founded on free speech. The First Amendment is the bedrock of democracy. People should speak without fear of reprisal.

But free speech is a social practice. It requires feeling safe enough to speak. The constitution protects you from the government. It cannot protect you from prison snitches. It cannot stop acquaintances from lying about you.

When people fear betrayal they stop talking. They stop talking to each other.

This silence prevents mutual understanding. People retreat into safe political groups. They only associate with like-minded individuals. They marry within their own tribe called political party. This tribe is the only safe space left.

This is how mistrust becomes tribalism.

Political differences now prevent genuine marriage and intimacy. Open conversation across political lines feels too dangerous. Every word is treated as a potential weapon. Voters refuse to engage with opposing arguments. Revealing your thoughts feels like a liability.

The United States is split in half. Families fracture along political lines. Friendships end over policy disagreements. The public square is a dangerous place. Speaking honestly is an act of social recklessness.

Many blame social media or cable news. However, the root cause is much deeper. The justice system has trained citizens to fear open dialogue.

The First Amendment protects the right to speak. The informant system gives firm reasons to remain silent.

The Quiet Catastrophe

The term chilling effect describes discouraged speech. Harsh penalties make people afraid to exercise rights.¹⁰ Journalists might stop investigating corruption due to fear.

The informant system chills ordinary human conversation. It discourages simple talking between citizens. It affects people who do not trust each other.²

In India strangers on trains talk openly. They share family details and political opinions. Their speech has not been weaponized against them.

In America train rides pass in silence. People prefer gestures when not using safe and polished small talk. Weather and sports are safe topics. Deep opinions are avoided because walls go up.

Americans travel abroad and notice the social openness. They experience strangers talking and sharing meals. They are enjoying the absence of domestic fear.²

Traveling to USA

Statistically the United States is not literally the worst on the planet for crime. Yet it is exceptionally violent compared to its peer democracies. We already know that the justice system’s structure contributes to that in indirect ways. So where does a visitor to the USA stand?

Ordinary tourists chatting about sightseeing are rarely targets for such fabricated prosecution. Dangerous zones are near criminal investigations, regulatory disputes, financial issues, or immigration matters. Keep away from local disputes or people involved in such disputes.

Violent crime, especially homicides and shootings, is much higher in the United States than other developed countries. The rates far exceed most other developed nations. All these happen in public places. Especially the places where access is not controlled. One should avoid all such places or keep the visit to a bare minimum.

It is important that the interaction with people is carefully monitored. When visiting the USA do not talk to anyone at all. If you must talk then record every conversation. Remember that the law requires that the accused must somehow prove a negative. It must prove that the alleged confession never happened. It is usually impossible without a recording or third-party witnesses.

But here comes the worst. In some states recording is not permissible without two party consent. Yet in other states only one party consent is sufficient. That complicates this defence strategy.

Best advice would be to avoid visiting such a prosecutors paradise. But who am I to give that advice to anybody. So I withdraw any advice which may have crawled into this article.

A System That Eats Its Own Foundation

The United States has very ambitious ideals. These include due process and free speech. However, the justice machinery has corroded social conditions.

Due process means nothing under this system.

Presumption of innocence fails when fabrications shift the burden.

Free speech fails when people fear each other.

Democracy fails when mutual suspicion prevents dialogue. Citizens cannot deliberate or compromise across tribal lines.

Nobody intended to destroy American social trust. The system grew from separate rational choices. Informants are cheap and pleas save money.² These choices built a very dangerous society.

The gun is only an instrument of violence. The real wound was made in courtrooms.

It happened when an ice cream conversation became a confession. Nobody could prove the truth.

References