| > then it's telling for the attorney to argue for the former, since it indirectly implies that their client will likely be found culpable I think this is a very, very dangerous way of reasoning. It is the duty of your attorney to try to provide you with all the legal protections you are entitled to, regardless of whether you are guilty or not. That's why those protections were put in place to begin with. > Furthermore, if the defendant is found guilty there is a likelihood that their punishment will not be appropriate for their current age People (at least on civil law countries) are judged using the state of affairs of when the crime was committed, not when the case is heard. There are very many reasons for this: it might have been legal back then and not now, it's the defendant's fault to not have been put on trial when still a minor, etc. > It's a fun problem to reason about mathematically, but it's totally irrelevant to the case in my opinion. I absolutely understand your feeling. However technicalities are not less important in law as they are in computer code. If we had a way to establish fairly, without bias whether someone is "adult enough" other than with this arbitrary 18.00 limit we would have used it. But we don't, and even you say "a couple of days are not going to have a considerable impact" but then only apply that one way (towards a harsher sentencing) but the other (maybe she is still not an adult?) |