Dear "kind of law student"

It's not "parsing" to point out that fact was left out of the post from the original article. Doug Barry's post is attempting to paint this as the police arresting a woman just because she wore a peacoat and tight jeans, as if the police are just going around arresting random women for wearing seemingly ordinary…

Oh, please. Every time that quote has been used by anyone who knows what they're talking about, it's linking back to the Holocaust. Spare yourself future humiliation, and do some research.

But IT DID NOT MAKE IT INTO CASE LAW. It was thrown out. That's what everyone keeps trying to point out to you. If it made it into case law, that would indeed suck. But it did not, because the system worked.

SOME cops do a lot of shitty things. You're missing my whole point—that painting them all as bad does, in fact, negate the good things they do.

I have no way of knowing if she was convicted. But the fact that the cops were gunning for her specifically means that this is not a general threat to women all over New York. THAT is my point.

"You are essentially arguing in favor of the officers who arrested her."

And the judge does not seem to have taken her history into account. So, the system worked in checking the power of the police in this instance.

I have said over and over again that she should NOT have been arrested. The fact that I think this article was irresponsibly written does not somehow mean that I advocate for people being arrested willy-nilly. There are nuances to this - just because I think Doug Barry is a bad writer doesn't mean I think cops should…

Java , please stop. I'm not a law student, just married to a lawyer and grew up with lawyers in the family, and even I know you're being ridiculous.The defendant has a history of prostitution, but our law guarantees your history in no way affects guilt in the present. It was thrown out immediately. End of story.

There is always going to be unfairness and injustice and judges and juries and prosecutors and police not following the law. The system is not perfect and until human beings are, it never will be. Not every anecdotal injustice is a sign of the system breaking down though.

Nope, that word means exactly what I think it means.

Oh holy fuck. This is not comparable to the Holocaust.

Oh my god. Did you seriously just type that out and post it? Wow. I retract my original skepticism. Please, be my lawyer! You are amazing at this!

Ok, I really hate comments like this. Painting all cops with one stroke is not helpful.

And that's a good way of looking at it, I agree. I just don't think it was necessary for Doug Barry to leave out the fact that *she actually is a prostitute* in order to make a broader statement about our culture. But I cringe every time I see his name on a post anyway, so I can't say I'm surprised.

Okay, when you say "I'm kind of a law student" I'm going to assume that you mean "I'm not at all any kind of law student, I just want to make myself sound more authoritative."

I'm a lawyer, and you are definitely overstating this. Police are constantly pushing the bounds of probable cause, and judges are constantly enforcing those bounds; it's a day-to-day event that does not deserve alarmism. And no, we are not worse than a Middle Eastern country. We are not anywhere near that.

That's exactly what happened, if you read the original article. They are not just randomly arresting women wearing pea coats.

Placing bets on her actually being a well known sex worker to the officers, and they trumped up the charges because whilst they knew exactly what she was doing at the time they didn't have direct evidence and were looking for an admission in interview.