dougking...@ said:
Dave, do you really think the sailboat skipper had *ANY* culpability
in this accident?

Dave wrote:
I don't really know, and neither do you.


False.

The problem can be analysed fairly easily:
What action could a becalmed sailboat skipper have taken to avoid
being run down by a powerboat going 40+ knots?
What action could a powerboat skipper going 40+ knots take to avoid a
becalmed sailboat?

If the jury was not instructed to consider the case along these lines
(and they almost certainly weren't, since they didn't even bring
ColRegs into it), then the jury could not possibly arrive at a fair
conclusion. This is a more important issue than whther the sailboats
lights were on (and the exclusion of testimony that they were looks
kinda suspicious), who had been drinking (and the lack of any testing
of the powerboat driver again looks suspicious), etc etc.

Even if the reportage of the incident & trial are all highly biased,
as you claim, the basic facts lead one to believe that this was a case
of the grossest kind of injustice. As a lawyer & officer of the court,
you should be outraged, not smugly self-satisfied. Unless you've been
a deputy sheriff yourself, and once got away with drunken manslaughter
due to cronyism, I really don't quite understand your attitude.

.... What you've seen as extensive
coverage flogging one side's own version of the evidence. I've on many
occasions read one side's brief and decided it looks like a slam dunk in
that side's favor, only to reach a different conclusion after reading the
other side's. And I've done enough advocacy pieces myself to know that even
the weakest case can be made to look good with a bit of creativity and
effort.

And excluding evidence, and instructing juries to ignore facts, etc
etc.
One of the problems we have in this country is that the courts are
getting further & further away from anybody's idea of 'fair.'

Regards- Doug King