Mitt
Romney did not randomly choose this pseudonym for his secret Twitter account.
He’s a very deliberate person. So what did he mean by adopting such a
weird name?
I don’t
know, but “Pierre Delecto” sounds lot like “In Pari Delecto.”
What is “In
Pari Delecto”?
It’s a
very standard judicial doctrine that means a court will not interfere to help a
party who is harmed while he breaks the law.
Here is
an explanation from Kirschner v. KPMG, LLP, a mundane court opinion from a New
York state appeals court in 2015. You’ll understand the doctrine after reading
this account:
“The doctrine of in pari delicto mandates that the courts will not
intercede to resolve a dispute between two wrongdoers. This principle has been
wrought in the inmost texture of our common law for at least two centuries (see
e.g. Woodworth v. Janes, 2 Johns.Cas. 417, 423 [N.Y.1800] [parties in equal
fault have no rights in equity]; Sebring v. Rathbun, 1 Johns.Cas. 331, 332
[N.Y.1800] [where both parties are equally culpable, courts will not “interpose
in favour of either”]).
The doctrine survives because it serves important public policy
purposes. First, denying judicial relief to an admitted wrongdoer deters
illegality. Second, in pari delicto avoids entangling courts in disputes
between wrongdoers. As Judge Desmond so eloquently put it more than 60 years ago,
“[N]o court should be required to serve as paymaster of the wages of crime, or
referee between thieves. Therefore, the law will not extend its aid to either
of the parties or listen to their complaints against each other, but will leave
them where their own acts have placed them” (Stone v. Freeman, 298 N.Y. 268,
271, 82 N.E.2d 571 [1948]).
The justice of the in pari delicto rule is most obvious where a
willful wrongdoer is suing someone who is alleged to be merely negligent. A
criminal who is injured committing a crime cannot sue the police officer or
security guard who failed to stop him; the arsonist who is singed cannot sue
the fire department.”
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