Reply #22: Yes.

[txaslftist]

This happens all the time. The big misconception out there is that everyone charged with a crime is guilty, or the cops wouldn't charge them. This is simply not true. Cops sometimes arrest people they know they AREN'T going to charge, simply to defuse a situation or to punish someone for 'taking attitude'. On the street they call this "P.O.P.O" or pissing off a peace officer.

Some 125 people have been cleared off of death row for actual innocence in the past decade or so. That's 125 people who would have been put to death but for the efforts of primarily college students. The presumption of innocence was not put in the law on a whim or on a theoretical basis. The fact is that many people are arrested who are in fact, innocent of any crime.