[Theforum] RE: Member stats

Madhu Menon webguru at vsnl.net
Mon Nov 19 17:22:47 CST 2001


At 04:45 AM 11/20/2001, spinhead opined:
>Legally (in the US) I believe 'he who is silent is understood to
>consent.'

Not so. While I'm not American, I do have more than a passing interest in law.

Silence cannot be treated as either consent or admission of guilt, and the 
law is fairly clear on that. If I send you an email saying that I'm going 
to ship an IBM mainframe to you, and that if you stay silent, you consent 
to it, that wouldn't be a valid contract. For a contract, you need (among 
other things) both an offer AND an explicit acceptance.

Ditto with crime. The "you have the right to remain silent" right exists 
because silence cannot be construed as admission of guilt.

We really didn't need a law lecture here, did we? :)

Regards,

Madhu

<<<   *   >>>
Madhu Menon
User Experience Consultant
e-mail: webguru at vsnl.net





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