Guilty because I want you to be...
TalkLeft asks :how do you prove your innocence?
How difficult would it be for you to prove your innocence, particularly if you were in a foreign country and the FBI said it was after you? For this 72 year old Englishman, on a wine-tasting vacation in South Africa, it was pretty tough--he spent 20 days behind bars in Durban, due to the FBI's mistake.
There's an update on this story here.
The concept of 'innocent until proven guilty' is an important one and we've been whittling away at it for years, from prosecutors who say they don't care if a man is innocent to the Bush administration's unrelenting attacks on due process and free speech. Even worse, Bond was left to rot in jail because no one could be bothered to do the basic routine checking required to see that he wasn't the person they were after.
The FBI say it's Bond's own fault really for being cooperative and not kicking up a big enough fuss: "One of the problems was that Mr. Bond waived his right to an extradition hearing, part of which would have included a check on his identity," said Nancy Harrera a spokes[woman] for the US attorney in Houston.