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The 'Perp Walk' Debate: Prejudicial or Legit?

By Mark H. Astarita, Esq.

The WSJ Law Blog is discussing one of my pet peeves - the perp walk - when prosecutors take an innocent person, in handcuffs, and parade him or her before the press for a photo op. It is a disgusting practice, undermines a basic tenant of our constitution, and is simply low class.They just did it to the two Bear Stearns money managers who were indicted yesterday. There is simply no valid reason for this practice, except to humiliate the victim. Defendants surrender themselves with their attorney all of the time, without fanfare. Parading the defendant in handcuffs, in public, when he hasn't even been arraigned, nevermind convicted, is remincent of Medieval public stocks as punishment. But even in those times, the humiliation was for the guilty, not the arrested...continue to full post

Full post as published by SECLaw.com on June 20, 2008 (boomark / email).