Do we really want to live in a society where people are not prosecuted because the family of the victim forgave them? So if two people commit the same offence, Person A is not prosecuted because the victim's family forgave him but Person B is because the victims family did not? Was offender B just unlucky on victim selection? The rule and application of law should not be based on the feelings of the victims family. Did the dead person forgive them?
We certainly don't want to ignore them, given they have the most immediate understanding of the situation and entitlement to guilt.
We don't allow plaintiffs to sue without standing. Why do we allow DAs to prosecute without a victim?
The state has a justification to pursue crime, but it seems like that should be limited when there's (no victim) or (victim who disagrees with prosecution).
Is the dead person not a victim? If someone is murdered and their family is like good I hated them anyway does that nullify the existence of a crime? Are we basing prosecution now on the character of the victim? That's a pretty quick path to deciding that certain victims have no value in society.
The dead person is a victim, and in a perfect society we'd just execute the killer. 1:1.
In reality, the justice system is imperfect, inequal access to defense, imperfect identification of killers, etc.
All murder is bad.
But I'd certainly say murdering a good person is worse than murdering a bad one. And if a family, who on average has more incentive to think well of the victim than anyone, doesn't... should that be ignored?
I hear what you are saying but honestly yes it should be ignored. For reasons of both fairness but more importantly I want justice to be blind. I don't want the police or prosecutors to be able to decide that person A was a dick or was a republican or a democrat or white / black so his murder is not as important. It could also lead to situations where the murder of a rich person is prosecuted more harshly than that of a poor one as the rich person donated so much to charity. The law has to be blind and based on clearly defined parameters.
But I feel like discretionary prosecution is already breaking blindness.
And furthermore, perversely-incentivized blindness. Get a high conviction rate, by throwing the book at people charged with "PR bad" crimes, regardless of the individual, and as long as they aren't politically connected and potentially useful in your future political career.
Compared to that motivation of your average DA / USA, "How surviving family feels" doesn't seem worse.
I agree with you in regards to how the current system is not blind and discretionary prosecution is a negative. I am all for pretty much anything that removes a prosecutors ability to give a pass to a preferred class of offender. By that I generally mean police officers. Giving them an additional power to decide the value of a victim based on their family or their biased opinion of goodness is not a net positive and just further greys the area. I hear what you are saying and actually sympathize with it but I think the solution should be to focus on removing as much discretion as possible as it just gives prosecutors and law enforcement decision making power they should not have.
If the entire chain of command is responsible, but only one person responsible for the poor result pays a real price, then is it really justice at all?
I'm not saying the rest of them should not be prosecuted if there was fault further up the chain as well. I agree they should be. In this case the nurse clearly breached many protocols and delivered the killing action so she bears responsibility. If there is a systematic failure then they should pursue that too. Justice is not a decision that well we could not get them all so no point prosecuting anyone.
Consider this: someone drives without paying proper attention and kills someone. It's time for victim impact statements, and relative after relative asks the court for lenience on the driver because the victim was a drunk and a wifebeater, the world is better off without him.
Not sure that that is a good idea, justice is about more than just those immediately affected by a crime
This was driven purely by the state prosecutor.