Imagine a lawyer already knows the guilt of his client, has all the proofs then too why he protects the unethical side, isn't that injustice to the other side.
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Right to be defended: "Article 22 of the Constitution and criminal law guarantee to every arrested person the right to defend by a lawyer."– Mauro ALLEGRANZACommented Jun 13, 2022 at 11:29
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You are clearly confusing ETHICS with MORALITY. They are NOT interchangeable! Ethical is entirely man made & authority based. People I. Authority decide not subordinates. Morality applies universally & not created or governed by mankind. A moral claim Is supposed to be universally true aka objectively true. Morality is not subjective in Philosophy. Outside of philosophy you find that view.– LogikalCommented Jun 13, 2022 at 11:41
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@Logikal Unless you believe in some deity and consider that the origin of morality BOTH ethics and morality are entirely man made. Afaik moral is a system of norms and concepts that argues how one should act and is considered universal. Whereas ethics is philosophical branch that is concerned with the analysis of morality. So often enough they end up being used synonymous.– haxor789Commented Jun 13, 2022 at 12:24
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@haxor You are confusing Psychology with Philosophy. This is a Philosophy forum. That does not mean every idea is a philosophy. That does not mean anything thinking whatsoever is a philosophy. You also confuse AUTHORITY with OBJECTIVE which I clearly stated in my comment. There is only ONE MORALITY. There are thousands of ethical systems. Ethics is based on who is making up the rules & may exclude those elite people. Morality has no exceptions or exclusions to UNIVERSAL rules. Claims that are objective must hold forever their truth value be it true or false. You did not address any of that.– LogikalCommented Jun 13, 2022 at 12:29
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1an ethical lawyer is an oxymoron.– Swami VishwanandaCommented Jun 13, 2022 at 13:21
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2 Answers
According to an answer to this question: What does a lawyer do if they know for absolute certain that their client is guilty?
Lawyers are not permitted to assist in perjury. E.g., allow the client to testify to something he [the lawyer] knows is false.
So the lawyer is not permitted to be unethical in this way.
However, note the comment by phoog. ("The plea is not made under penalty of perjury.")
answered Jun 13, 2022 at 19:15
The problem with this question is that "protection" and "guilt" are terms that might be a lot broader than you might have in mind.
Like you seem to think that the lawyer is giving their all to get any charges removed despite knowing that they are true. But even if there are lawyers who try that and take huge sums of those shenanigans. Their actual job is to ensure due process.
Like depending on the severity of the crime you might have an emotionally charged situation, people have already made their judgement before the trial and the sentence is already written. So the job of the lawyer is to make sure that the accused gets a fair trial. Like is his side of the story being heard and accounted for, are witnesses and evidence in his defense being considered.
Also "guilt" is a very tricky thing because that's not just about "what was done", but also about "why it was done" and "what else could have been done". So it could be that the accused did what they were accused of, but did so under the impression of doing something else. Like what if you're told your situation is hopeless and so you used violent force to escape just to find out that your situation wasn't hopeless at all. That is a very different situation from using violence to cause deliberate harm. And it is a very different situation when judging whether that was a one time event or whether there's more violence to be expected, whether they'd need anger management therapy or whatnot.
It's easy to form a narrative that paints the accused as the most vile and deprived individual and to sentence them accordingly and it's necessary for a good judgement to hear both sides and have everything on the table. And that's a tradeoff between avoiding innocent people being locked up or worse and actually dangerous criminals getting away with it. The latter is not the intended purpose of it but it's a risk you take to avoid the former, which most countries argue is worse, because it inherently undermines the justice systems as a whole.
So not every lawyer who takes up a mandate to defend someone that is obviously guilty is doing so for immoral reasons and is acting immorally.
