Monday, February 19, 2007

Harmless error.

I've always been baffled by the term "harmless error" in the legal world. An appeals court will often find that an error has been made, but will find it harmless.

When a term in a statute is not defined by the legislature, the courts often look the dictionary definition. In the same spirit, I look to see what "error" means. Error is defined as: "a deviation from accuracy or correctness; a mistake." The definition goes on and provides the legal definition of error as: "a mistake in a matter of fact or law in a case tried in a court of record."

And so I am left to wonder, yet again... Is an error really ever harmless?

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