For example, if a police officer unjustly kills a Black woman in cold blood, and the victim’s cousin’s daughter is a defense attorney who helps get the officer acquitted, would she be morally wrong for defending him?
For example, if a police officer unjustly kills a Black woman in cold blood, and the victim’s cousin’s daughter is a defense attorney who helps get the officer acquitted, would she be morally wrong for defending him?
Yes, it would be wrong, it would be a betrayal of the family. Why would she do that?
That being said, there are good reasons lawyers who consider themselves to be good people defend criminals they consider to be bad people (such as paedophiles). The reason is that by giving them an ironclad defence, they make it harder for the criminal to appeal if found guilty. And if they are found not guilty, it isn’t the fault of the lawyer, it’s the fault of the system for not making a better case. It is a pillar of criminal justice that it is preferable to let ten guilty men go free than it is to convict one innocent man. Of course, we all know the system is not infallible and that the innocent do get convicted anyway, but that is not the intent of the founding of the system; it’s more a product of modern corruption (which isn’t even that recent, it’s actually been going on for decades).