Obligation

I was wondering...
If somebody claims, to you, to have killed somebody, or robbed from a store, or commmited any other crime, for that matter.. Do you have a LEGAL obligation to tell the police?

Also, Seperatly, Views on whether you would tell or not, despite law.

 

I think so, although I am unsure. Not telling the police could be classed as assisting the crime. Similarly, here at Sythe, if you do not report someone when you know they are a ban evader etc. you can be punished.

 

In the US it is against the law to not go to the police if the person admitted to you of committing murder.

Personal Opinion - If they deserved it then I would not report it.

 

Technically i do believe that any knowledge of any crime without informing the authorities is considered a form of being an accomplice.

 

If you're aware of a crime committed then you can actually be charged with being an accessory. Depending on the crime, I think you can actually go to jail too.

 

It's true. If a friend of mine admitted he killed someone to me, I would be liable to go to jail if anyone ever found out I had that information and did not report it.

Personally, I would keep it to myself. I know I am usually the one to take the moral high road but I do have a past that influences decisions like that.

 

Yes you do have a legal obligation if you think that they have committed the crime.

Example.

Psychiatrist - Client privilege.

The Psychiatrist is under a legal obligation to maintain that privilege under virtually ALL circumstances. However if he honestly thinks that his client has told him of an intent to commit a crime, eg. Murder.
Then he is obligated to tell the police.

The paradox here is that should he waive privilege and his interpretations were wrong, then he could face breaking that privilege. On the other hand, if he doesn't break privilege, and his fears were true, then he would have trouble on his hands.

 

this only applies if they tell you they ARE GOING TO commit a crime.
if they are telling you of a crime they have committed i do not think they need to tell the police. they only need to tell the police if they are an imminent threat to themselves or others.

a doctor would not need to tell anyone if they are simply telling them of crimes they have committed. actually, airing past crimes to therapists is common and necessary for effective treatment.





i do not tell the police anything. I would not tell them if i knew my mother would go on a killing spree.
they are,in a lot of cases, the biggest and worst gang. they hide under the veil of legitimacy.
how much drugs and money go missing from evidence lockers? lots
the police have no compassion. a few years ago they released a homeless man out of the drunk tank. they dropped him off at a corner in below freezing temp. he froze to death.
the police are currently on a tazer spree. a few years ago they killed a man in the airport in my ciry. it was all over the news.

also, let the police try and prove that you knew about such things. knowledge is hard to prove. it is in most cases his word against yours. him being a criminal, in most cases.

 

Correct, I said the wrong thing =,=

Not sure whether a doctor would be obligated to tell.
I'm not familiar with that type of therapy, although I do know lots of therapy techniques that ultimately harm the patient more than help.

 

very true. a lot of treatments do more harm than good.
for example, it was thought that getting PTSD sufferers to speak of their trauma would provide catharsis and help their symptoms.
it turns out that all it did was cause them to ruminate over their traumatic experience. their symptoms worsened.

then again, with this information we know more than we did.
yes, psychology is a new science and we are doing just a little bit better than shooting in the dark. many treatments are misguided. much of academia gets in the way of connecting with the client enough to base a treatment on relevant factors. ex. i evaluated a program that based its treatment on the assumption that addiction was caused by lack of work.

but again, we know more than we did before due to our blunders.
the field of psychology is getting more reliable, but it is a slow process.

 

So, I will attempt to repeat myself in a difference context, and have 2*examples.

Example One:
Somebody tells me they killed somebody else.

Example Two:
That somebody then exclaims they were only joking.

In which, if any, would you be OBLIGATED to tell the police. Basically, if somebody says They killed somebody, are you obligated to tell the police? And if somebody tells you they killed somebody, and then says they were joking.. how about then?

 

I'm pretty sure you can get in trouble

 

it would depend what kind of situation it was, but yeah just a casual i robbed the dairy kind of thing id suppose you would have to report to the police asap.

 

You're not required to tell them anything, nor are you required to give them your name or any information whatsoever. You can demand witness protection and anything said is to be held in full confidence, failure to do so can result in huge law suits, especially in the case of murders as it puts the witness at risk.

I know that's the case in Canada, America probably isn't much, if any, different.

 

If you are at the scene of the crime and don't say anything I believe their is some stuff that can happen to you. But just from someone telling you these things no if you say nothing, nothing will ever happen to you.

 

Legally, I believe there is some obligation. If your name gets brought up in court, there could be repercussions. As far as morality goes, I wouldn't snitch =P

 

you have no obligation to tell them anything. also, it is incredibly hard to prove that you know something in the first place. you could just state:

"not that i recall"

it is not a crime to forget something.