Thursday, April 30, 2009

Torture - why not use the RECO Statue

We have all been hearing about the national debate on torture that has saturated the airways and print media. Let me first say that I am not a lawyer but I am knowledgeable enough to have heard about the RECO (Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations) statute. This law essentially says the government convicted a person for just about anything including merely knowing of a crime. Now, this is where I am perplexed. I have not heard it mentioned during this entire debate – WHY?

After noticing this I decided to do a web search. So I visited the Legal Information Institute webpage of Cornell Law School and read the US Code (http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_96.html). It seems to me that much of what I read could apply in this situation. Now I know that this law was enacted to address organized crime figures and kingpins to which I would argue that is really what we are dealing with concerning the development and administration of these policies.

What do you think????

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