[Proposal] Criminal Powers Amendment (September 2018)

[McChimp]

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Criminal Powers Amendment (September 2018)

Proposed By: McChimp

Preamble

This amendment of the Twelfth Mandate of Lazarus grants the delegate greater power to impose justice on those the Court of Lazarus has gathered damning evidence against.

Section 1. Amendment of Article II

(1) After subsection 7, insert:
 

[table][cell]

(8) The Delegate may impose upon a person a punishment permitted by law, including revocation of citizenship, restriction of ability to vote and/or hold office, ejection and/or banishment from Lazarus and other measures, should the Court confirm by two-thirds vote that the person has committed a criminal offence. The person must have had reasonable opportunity to defend themselves against the charges during a Criminal Review. The Assembly may overturn or reduce such punishments by three-quarters vote.

[/cell][/table]

Section 2. Amendment of Article V

(1) After subsection 6, insert:
 

[table][cell]

(7) The Court may conduct Criminal Reviews in order to determine whether a person has committed a criminal offence. Procedure for such Criminal Reviews may be established by law.

[/cell][/table]

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The criminal code proposal appears to have gained some momentum but as the constitution currently stands there is no suitable infrastructure for one to be enforced. Unless the constitution is amended, the delegate shall have to get confirmation from the CLS (an already immensely powerful institution) in order to carry out sentences. It seems a touch optimistic to presume that the executive, the Court and the CLS will all be in agreement so this allows the delegate to act on court findings independently of the CLS.

On first reading, it may seem like it makes the delegate judge, jury and executioner but in reality this is not so. If two justices are not convinced that a crime has been committed, they can refuse to confirm the report to the delegate. Even then, the delegate can only apply punishments within the bounds of the Criminal Code. This system does mean that the delegate does get to veto a verdict, maintaining the delegate's ability to ensure that common sense is applied as the mandate originally intended.

More detailed court procedures and rules could be detailed by law, allowing the nitty gritty to be more easily amended than a section of the constitution.

[Amerion]

It looks good. I've just made some minor edits to the formatting and slight changes to the wording.

[spoiler=Proposed changes]

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Criminal Powers Amendment

Proposed By: McChimp

Preamble

This amendment of the Twelfth Mandate of Lazarus grants the delegate greater power to impose justice on those the Court of Lazarus has gathered damning evidence against.

Section 1. Amendment of Article II

(1) After subsection 7, insert:
 

(8) The Delegate may impose a punishment on a person in accordance with the law, including revocation of citizenship, ejection and/or banishment from Lazarus and other measures, should the Court confirm by two-thirds vote and present a report containing compelling evidence that the person, having had reasonable opportunity to present evidence themselves, has committed a criminal offence. The Assembly may overturn such decisions by three-quarters vote.

 

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[/spoiler]

[McChimp]

Proposed changes have been incorporated into the OP.

[Amerion]

You just taught me a better way to format insert quotations

[McChimp]

You just taught me a better way to format insert quotations

Tables include an implicit [align=centre], so you'll need to respecify the alignment you want inside it. if you just use [cell] outside of a table it splits your post in half and looks really cool.

[New Rogernomics]

You just taught me a better way to format insert quotations

Tables include an implicit [align=centre], so you'll need to respecify the alignment you want inside it. if you just use [cell] outside of a table it splits your post in half and looks really cool.  

Well the neat thing about myCodes is that you can do this:
[spoiler][/spoiler]
So potentially we can create html codes for lots of things.

[McChimp]

Well the neat thing about myCodes is that you can do this:
[spoiler][/spoiler]
So potentially we can create html codes for lots of things. 

That's a really cool way of doing that

[Cormac]

The amendment completely undermines the purpose of the provision being amended, which was to give the Delegate and the CLS flexibility so they could remove disruptive individuals without being constrained by poorly defined crimes and nonsense court rulings. This amendment would force our community to potentially go through the kind of crap TSP goes through, where people can disrupt the community, drive people away from the region or even the game, etc., and not see any consequences for long periods of time, if ever, because they didn't technically commit any crime. Why would we want that? Where's the benefit?

I'm 100% against this. We don't need a criminal code, and we don't need a criminal court. It will just lead to unchecked disruption of the community and turn us into another toxic waste dump like TSP and other so-called "democratic" regions.

[McChimp]

The amendment completely undermines the purpose of the provision being amended, which was to give the Delegate and the CLS flexibility so they could remove disruptive individuals without being constrained by poorly defined crimes and nonsense court rulings. This amendment would force our community to potentially go through the kind of crap TSP goes through, where people can disrupt the community, drive people away from the region or even the game, etc., and not see any consequences for long periods of time, if ever, because they didn't technically commit any crime. Why would we want that? Where's the benefit?

I'm 100% against this. We don't need a criminal code, and we don't need a criminal court. It will just lead to unchecked disruption of the community and turn us into another toxic waste dump like TSP and other so-called "democratic" regions.

This amendment does not alter or remove the section empowering the delegate to do the same things with the approval of the CLS.

[Cormac]

The amendment completely undermines the purpose of the provision being amended, which was to give the Delegate and the CLS flexibility so they could remove disruptive individuals without being constrained by poorly defined crimes and nonsense court rulings. This amendment would force our community to potentially go through the kind of crap TSP goes through, where people can disrupt the community, drive people away from the region or even the game, etc., and not see any consequences for long periods of time, if ever, because they didn't technically commit any crime. Why would we want that? Where's the benefit?

I'm 100% against this. We don't need a criminal code, and we don't need a criminal court. It will just lead to unchecked disruption of the community and turn us into another toxic waste dump like TSP and other so-called "democratic" regions.

This amendment does not alter or remove the section empowering the delegate to do the same things with the approval of the CLS.  

I misread and didn't realize this doesn't amend Article II, Section 6 of Mandate 12, so my apologies for that. I don't understand the point of this amendment though -- why would the Delegate ever want to use this process instead of the simpler process in Section 6, and why would we ever want the Delegate to use this process when the simpler and less drama-filled process could be used? I don't understand why there is interest in a criminal code or criminal court at all.