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Comment by gehsty | Hacker News Reader

Always better to humiliate them in court than make a martyr.

Shooting them is what the cartels do, justice would be that he is tried by a jury and sentenced under law.

I can see how there could be a net benefit to shooting them on site, but you can't say for sure that the witnesses etc lives would then be safe.

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site -> sight

Teaching, not nit-picking: "shoot on sight" is the idiom here, meaning shoot as soon as target is visually confirmed. Whereas "on site" relates to location.

This has made me chuckle. Thank you for the lesson. I need a context aware spell checker :) (it was a spelling mistake, not a lack of understanding)

He can be tried and sentenced in absentia. (The problem is, as long as the profit is so insanely high, and the risk is relatively low, thousans will try to take his place.)

I think it is the pictures of a former king pin being tried sitting in a court that prosecutors want, it sends a message that no one is above the law. Being tried in absentia doesn't really tick that box.

Also, you'd imagine witnesses (and maybe juries, judges and prosecutors) would be relatively more confident/cooperative if the guy was in custody.

"it sends a message that no one is above the law." apart from politicians, bankers, etc...

Representative democracy can be done right. An independent Anticorruption Agency with investigatory and prosecutory powers irrevocably granted by the constitution, but with narrow scope, can work wonders.

Of course, above a critical mass of amassed power/popularity, nothing can stop a dictator to simply do re-found the state with a new constitution, but at that point it's very much a coup anyway.

I think he should be used by the governments as a sockpuppet.

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