[ExI] ex post fucto

[spike]

In the US legal system (and probably all the others that matter) if the
penalty for a crime increases after the crime has been committed, the perp
is penalized under the previous system, when the crime was actually
committed.  This legal concept is known by the Latin phrase ex post facto,
after the fact.

 

What if some technology is invented which causes a crime to be detectable,
long after it is committed, such that the probability of being caught rises
dramatically?

 

Do avoid the temptation to jump to easy cases; murderer or rapist leaves DNA
at the scene, we later track the bastard.  That one is easy because we have
zero point zero sympathy for murderers and rapists.  Too easy, no moral
dilemma.  Catch 'em!

 

But consider a case where a harlot gets pregnant.  There has never been a
penalty because there is no way to know who dunnit where there may be
hundreds of candidates.  But now the harlot's daughter grows up, and can
spend a hundred bucks and figure out who is her father with some
persistence.  The client is fucked after the fact.  The potential for
harmful wordplay is great (and welcomed) but do give this some thought
please.  The harlot's daughter can sue the client for child support long
after the fact, she could blackmail or extort payments, she could claim (in
court) he loved her mother, made her all kinds of promises, broke her heart
and so forth, when the client has exactly no memories of ever having met
this perhaps now-expired woman.  The harlot's daughter isn't carrying the
burden of proof; she is a DNA match.  Is not the client on the hook for
child-support payments?

 

After all this time, it is just now occurring to me that DNA testing may
enable crime or cause enormous disruption.  I think I overlooked that
because I lived such a tragically G-rated life throughout my misspent youth
(dammit.)  

 

Ethics hipsters, do offer me some guidance here, or share your thoughts and
ideas.  

 

spike

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