In this day and age of ubiquitous video footage the use of the term "alleged" gunman is ridiculous. How does it make sense?

Posted by Kiss_It_Goodbyeee@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 20 comments

I do understand this was brought in decades ago to avoid the presumption of guilt when reporting on news stories. But, come on, we've all seen the footage in this case and many others. How can they be classed as "alleged"? He was caught at the scene, he definitely had guns on him, and he definitely shot a security person.

When there's no ambiguity in the story, how does the use of "allegedly " make any sense?

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GuiltyWarning86@reddit

You can’t prove from a small snippet that there wasn’t someone shooting from the grassy knoll.

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eggs_and_ham_i_am@reddit

You'd think America would have learnt it's lesson by now and got rid of all and any grassy knolls. The risks are to high.....

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Proof-Lavishness7100@reddit

I mean, it's exactly what the secret service's job to do. They work out a route and risk-analyse anything, like grassy knolls.

We do similar in the UK, notice anytime that the Royals are coming into town, every man-hole cover has a seal on it

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Kiss_It_Goodbyeee@reddit (OP)

That's a helluva a shot to hit someone in Washington from Dallas!

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Fine-State8014@reddit

It's just a legal thing

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FornyHucker22@reddit

Absolutely. Like if a rapist is found not guilty even tho he did it, that doesn’t mean he is innocent. Legal terms and reality are 2 separate things

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Fine-State8014@reddit

Yep not guilty just means it couldn't be proven. Not innocence.

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Kiss_It_Goodbyeee@reddit (OP)

I mean, that's not true at all. If it can't be proven and you're found not guilty then you are innocent. However, it does not mean you didn't do it.

Likewise, through a miscarriage of justice you can be found guilty of something you didn't do.

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Fine-State8014@reddit

Again it's a legal thing. Not guilty and innocent are not the same.

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caniuserealname@reddit

Because they haven't been convicted of a crime, and there is a legal presumption of innocence until the point of conviction.

Media claiming someone committed a crime prior to conviction is, legally, libel/slander. In an ongoing case this is especially dangerous as such claims could be argued as affecting the trial by creating a bias towards guilt, which could affect rulings or provide cause for appeal.

Media do have a defense if the claim they're making is substantially, or unnaturally true, but that would likely mean getting a legal team to judge each and every case individually to ensure they're covered, which would be a ridiculous effort for the sake of occasionally not saying the world "alleged"

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Kiss_It_Goodbyeee@reddit (OP)

Yeah, that's fair.

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eeyorethechaotic@reddit

I mean in this day and age of AI, video is becoming more and more meaningless. In order for something not to be "alleged", it has to have been proven in a court of law.

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Kiss_It_Goodbyeee@reddit (OP)

The AI bit is a fair comment.

I absolutely do get the legal technicalities, but he is a lone gunman, caught during the act with the offending weapon in his possession.

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eeyorethechaotic@reddit

And once he's been found guilty, people can stop using "alleged."

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FornyHucker22@reddit

It’s just legal terms but we can say he is guilty on the basis we saw it happen on video. news reporting sites just cannot.

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LichenTheMood@reddit

I saw video of the most blurry ass cctv of a blob running in a hallway past other blobs. Then a different video of a bunch of folks in a room hearing pops. But for the surrounding context they could be of two totally seperate locations and points in time.

It's weird you are so convinced by this one. The state of the video evidince so far has been fairly minimal. At least compared to many other crimes.

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anonoaw@reddit

I mean the big one is that you literally are considered innocent until proven guilty by a court of a law. Until you are convicted, you are innocent, even if the evidence appears overwhelming.

Beyond that, video can be incredibly easily edited, generated entirely by AI, or otherwise made unreliable. Obviously in this specific case I’m not saying that’s happened, but it’s becoming less and less possible to rely on images and videos as irrefutable proof without further investigation into them.

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