WEBVTT 00:00:01.099 --> 00:00:04.419 Every single year, millions of Americans sign 00:00:04.419 --> 00:00:07.960 a document that could theoretically send them 00:00:07.960 --> 00:00:10.339 to federal prison for up to three years. Yeah, 00:00:10.339 --> 00:00:12.220 it's pretty wild when you actually think about 00:00:12.220 --> 00:00:14.220 it. Right. And you have almost certainly signed 00:00:14.220 --> 00:00:16.280 one yourself. I mean, it's just your standard 00:00:16.280 --> 00:00:18.940 U .S. income tax return. Oh, yeah. Everyone does 00:00:18.940 --> 00:00:23.800 it. Exactly. Under Title 26, Section 6065 of 00:00:23.800 --> 00:00:26.519 the U .S. Code, when you sign that form, you 00:00:26.519 --> 00:00:28.800 are legally declaring that everything in it is 00:00:28.800 --> 00:00:31.820 true. under penalty of perjury. Which is a heavy 00:00:31.820 --> 00:00:34.240 phrase. It is. You don't need a judge in a black 00:00:34.240 --> 00:00:36.740 robe. You don't need a wood paneled courtroom. 00:00:36.979 --> 00:00:38.399 And you definitely don't need to put your hand 00:00:38.399 --> 00:00:41.039 on a Bible. No, you really don't. You are bound 00:00:41.039 --> 00:00:44.119 by these rules just by like participating in 00:00:44.119 --> 00:00:47.200 modern society. So welcome to today's Deep Dive. 00:00:47.320 --> 00:00:49.399 Glad to be here. Our mission today is to really 00:00:49.399 --> 00:00:51.939 unpack a concept you've all seen in legal thrillers, 00:00:52.039 --> 00:00:55.859 but rarely understand in practice, which is perjury. 00:00:56.000 --> 00:00:57.859 Yeah, the Hollywood version is very different 00:00:57.859 --> 00:01:01.020 from reality. Oh, totally. And we are pulling 00:01:01.020 --> 00:01:04.480 all our insights today from a single, incredibly 00:01:04.480 --> 00:01:07.200 comprehensive source. It's a massive, heavily 00:01:07.200 --> 00:01:10.959 detailed Wikipedia article that covers the legal 00:01:10.959 --> 00:01:14.519 frameworks, the completely bizarre history, and 00:01:14.519 --> 00:01:17.500 the high profile global cases surrounding this 00:01:17.500 --> 00:01:20.019 crime. And what becomes immediately clear when 00:01:20.019 --> 00:01:22.519 you read through this material is that the courtroom 00:01:22.519 --> 00:01:25.730 oath isn't like a magical truth serum. Right. 00:01:25.890 --> 00:01:28.209 We tend to view perjury as this simple binary 00:01:28.209 --> 00:01:30.849 switch, like you either tell the truth or you're 00:01:30.849 --> 00:01:33.670 a liar. Good guy, bad guy. Exactly. But the actual 00:01:33.670 --> 00:01:37.230 legal machinery is wildly complex. Perjury is 00:01:37.230 --> 00:01:39.609 actually much, much harder to commit than just 00:01:39.609 --> 00:01:41.510 telling a lie. OK, let's unpack this. Because 00:01:41.510 --> 00:01:43.549 if I tell a flat out lie on a government forum 00:01:43.549 --> 00:01:46.030 or while sitting in a witness box, what exactly 00:01:46.030 --> 00:01:48.870 separates that from federal crime? Well, to understand 00:01:48.870 --> 00:01:50.390 that, you really have to look at the anatomy 00:01:50.390 --> 00:01:53.049 of the crime itself. Like most common law crimes, 00:01:53.230 --> 00:01:55.969 perjury requires two separate simultaneous elements. 00:01:56.150 --> 00:01:58.769 You need the actus reus, which the physical act 00:01:58.769 --> 00:02:00.670 of making the false statement. The actual talking 00:02:00.670 --> 00:02:02.890 or writing part. Right, exactly. And you need 00:02:02.890 --> 00:02:05.290 the mens rea, which is the specific intention 00:02:05.290 --> 00:02:09.090 behind it. So if I just get my facts wrong, even 00:02:09.090 --> 00:02:12.030 if it causes a huge problem, that isn't enough 00:02:12.030 --> 00:02:15.689 to trigger a charge. Not at all. Honest mistakes, 00:02:16.729 --> 00:02:19.819 inaccurate recollections, or just drawing a terrible 00:02:19.819 --> 00:02:22.340 conclusion from a set of facts, none of those 00:02:22.340 --> 00:02:24.840 qualify. Really? Yeah. I mean, if you honestly 00:02:24.840 --> 00:02:27.500 believe what you are saying is true, or if you 00:02:27.500 --> 00:02:30.639 just have a genuinely terrible memory, you lack 00:02:30.639 --> 00:02:33.039 that mens rea. You lack the intent to deceive. 00:02:33.259 --> 00:02:35.439 OK, that makes sense. But there's a third element 00:02:35.439 --> 00:02:38.360 that is just as crucial, and it's called materiality. 00:02:38.650 --> 00:02:40.889 Right, the concept that the lie actually has 00:02:40.889 --> 00:02:43.349 to matter to the underlying case. Yes, exactly. 00:02:43.449 --> 00:02:45.289 I can put this into an everyday analogy for you 00:02:45.289 --> 00:02:48.129 listening. If I'm under oath in a courtroom and 00:02:48.129 --> 00:02:50.169 I'm asked about my favorite color and I say blue 00:02:50.169 --> 00:02:52.729 and it's actually red, that is not perjury. No, 00:02:52.729 --> 00:02:55.169 because nobody cares. Exactly. Nobody cares. 00:02:55.189 --> 00:02:56.710 It doesn't change the outcome of the trial at 00:02:56.710 --> 00:03:00.490 all. But if I lie about my age to qualify for 00:03:00.490 --> 00:03:03.330 early retirement benefits, that is perjury. Because 00:03:03.330 --> 00:03:07.129 that specific lie directly influences a legal 00:03:07.129 --> 00:03:10.379 and financial result. Right. It's material. Exactly. 00:03:10.639 --> 00:03:12.740 The lie has to be material to the proceeding. 00:03:13.419 --> 00:03:16.080 But what's fascinating here is how courts have 00:03:16.080 --> 00:03:18.780 historically struggled to prove all of these 00:03:18.780 --> 00:03:21.439 elements at the same time. I can imagine. I mean, 00:03:21.580 --> 00:03:24.199 think about the burden of proof. How do you prove 00:03:24.199 --> 00:03:26.740 what is inside someone's head? Yeah, that seems 00:03:26.740 --> 00:03:29.300 impossible. Right. How do you prove they didn't 00:03:29.300 --> 00:03:32.000 just forget, but that they willfully chose to 00:03:32.000 --> 00:03:34.560 deceive the court? In the United States, the 00:03:34.560 --> 00:03:36.840 baseline for this was actually set by a seminal 00:03:36.840 --> 00:03:39.900 Supreme Court case called United States v. Dunagan. 00:03:40.240 --> 00:03:42.379 Now, I have to push back on this a bit because 00:03:42.379 --> 00:03:45.439 it really does sound impossible. Unless you have 00:03:45.439 --> 00:03:47.979 like an email where the person says, I'm going 00:03:47.979 --> 00:03:50.469 to lie on the stand today. How on earth does 00:03:50.469 --> 00:03:53.090 a prosecutor prove a mistake wasn't just a foggy 00:03:53.090 --> 00:03:55.409 memory? It is incredibly difficult. And that's 00:03:55.409 --> 00:03:57.550 why perjury charges are relatively rare compared 00:03:57.550 --> 00:04:00.229 to how often people, you know, probably lie in 00:04:00.229 --> 00:04:02.289 court. Which is probably a lot. Oh, absolutely. 00:04:02.849 --> 00:04:05.090 But the Donegan precedent established that the 00:04:05.090 --> 00:04:07.509 government has to prove the accused gave false 00:04:07.509 --> 00:04:10.250 testimony concerning a material matter with the 00:04:10.250 --> 00:04:13.169 willful intent to provide false testimony. Willful 00:04:13.169 --> 00:04:16.230 intent? Yes. It cannot merely be a result of 00:04:16.230 --> 00:04:19.189 confusion. The liberation is totally required. 00:04:19.360 --> 00:04:21.639 However, the courts aren't completely helpless 00:04:21.639 --> 00:04:23.939 here either. Right. They've also established 00:04:23.939 --> 00:04:26.019 that you cannot just close your eyes to the truth 00:04:26.019 --> 00:04:29.980 to save yourself. Meaning, willful ignorance 00:04:29.980 --> 00:04:33.060 isn't a get out of jail free card. Precisely. 00:04:33.160 --> 00:04:36.240 If a prosecutor can prove that you purposefully 00:04:36.240 --> 00:04:38.860 avoided looking at your bank statements specifically 00:04:38.860 --> 00:04:40.600 so you could sit on the stand and say, I have 00:04:40.600 --> 00:04:42.699 no idea how much money is in that account. Ah, 00:04:42.699 --> 00:04:45.800 I see. Yeah, the courts can interpret that deliberate 00:04:45.800 --> 00:04:49.980 avoidance as the intent to deceive. You engineered 00:04:49.980 --> 00:04:53.339 your own ignorance. Wow. Okay. That makes sense. 00:04:53.839 --> 00:04:56.939 But if proving intent is this nuanced and difficult 00:04:56.939 --> 00:04:59.980 today, you know, with all our modern legal precedents 00:04:59.980 --> 00:05:01.980 and our deep understanding of human psychology, 00:05:02.480 --> 00:05:05.019 how did courts handle this centuries ago? It 00:05:05.019 --> 00:05:07.019 was completely different. Like how did a medieval 00:05:07.019 --> 00:05:10.410 judge figure out if a witness had mens rea? That 00:05:10.410 --> 00:05:13.509 takes us into the truly bizarre history of English 00:05:13.509 --> 00:05:16.050 common law because, frankly, for a very long 00:05:16.050 --> 00:05:17.990 time the legal system didn't even try to figure 00:05:17.990 --> 00:05:20.250 it out. Really? Yeah, they outsourced the problem 00:05:20.250 --> 00:05:23.269 entirely. The history detailed in our source 00:05:23.269 --> 00:05:26.430 material completely blew my mind on this. It's 00:05:26.430 --> 00:05:29.129 wild. Going back to Anglo -Saxon legal procedure, 00:05:30.069 --> 00:05:33.829 early on the only people who could even technically 00:05:33.829 --> 00:05:38.230 commit perjury were jurors and compurgators. 00:05:38.430 --> 00:05:40.610 Which were basically character witnesses who 00:05:40.610 --> 00:05:43.250 just swore to a defendant's general innocence. 00:05:43.709 --> 00:05:46.899 Right. And when actual factual witnesses, like 00:05:46.899 --> 00:05:49.699 people who actually saw the crime happen, when 00:05:49.699 --> 00:05:52.079 they first started appearing in court, they were 00:05:52.079 --> 00:05:54.540 treated with absolute immunity. Yes, they literally 00:05:54.540 --> 00:05:56.439 could not be charged with perjury. You're telling 00:05:56.439 --> 00:05:58.699 me that for centuries, a witness could just get 00:05:58.699 --> 00:06:01.740 on the stand until a blatant, malicious lie that 00:06:01.740 --> 00:06:03.819 could result in an innocent person being locked 00:06:03.819 --> 00:06:07.339 away or even executed, and the legal system essentially 00:06:07.339 --> 00:06:09.040 shrugged and said, well, they took an oath, so 00:06:09.040 --> 00:06:11.980 it must be true. That sounds like a catastrophic 00:06:11.980 --> 00:06:13.750 structural flaw in the justice system. Well, 00:06:13.790 --> 00:06:16.170 to our modern ears, yeah, it sounds insane, but 00:06:16.170 --> 00:06:18.170 if we connect this to the bigger picture of how 00:06:18.170 --> 00:06:20.850 society functioned back then, it makes a strange 00:06:20.850 --> 00:06:24.490 kind of sense. Okay, how so? The roles in the 00:06:24.490 --> 00:06:26.990 courtroom just hadn't fully evolved yet. The 00:06:26.990 --> 00:06:29.290 prevailing legal maxim at the time was literally 00:06:29.290 --> 00:06:32.709 that every witness's evidence on oath was true. 00:06:32.990 --> 00:06:35.509 Because the oath itself wasn't just a legal formality, 00:06:35.550 --> 00:06:39.050 it was like a divine guarantee. Exactly! You 00:06:39.050 --> 00:06:41.430 have to remember the intense religious context 00:06:41.430 --> 00:06:45.519 of the era. Swearing an oath was viewed as invoking 00:06:45.519 --> 00:06:48.660 a literal curse upon yourself. The belief was 00:06:48.660 --> 00:06:51.560 that if you lied after swearing to God, you were 00:06:51.560 --> 00:06:54.040 damning your own immortal soul to hell. So the 00:06:54.040 --> 00:06:57.220 stakes were eternal. Completely. The courts believed 00:06:57.220 --> 00:06:59.740 that the fear of eternal damnation was a far 00:06:59.740 --> 00:07:02.560 greater deterrent than any earthly prison sentence. 00:07:02.699 --> 00:07:04.279 I mean, I guess that tracks for the time period. 00:07:04.420 --> 00:07:07.310 Right. Therefore, if someone was willing to take 00:07:07.310 --> 00:07:09.329 the oath, the court assumed they were telling 00:07:09.329 --> 00:07:12.029 the truth because no rational person would risk 00:07:12.029 --> 00:07:15.129 hellfire over, you know, a property dispute. 00:07:15.209 --> 00:07:17.449 That is fascinating. It wasn't until the 15th 00:07:17.449 --> 00:07:19.629 century that the infamous Star Chamber in England 00:07:19.629 --> 00:07:22.050 finally started punishing witnesses for lying. 00:07:22.850 --> 00:07:25.470 So society essentially realized that people were, 00:07:25.509 --> 00:07:28.050 in fact, perfectly willing to risk eternal damnation 00:07:28.050 --> 00:07:31.079 to win a lawsuit. Pretty much, yeah. So in 1540, 00:07:31.240 --> 00:07:33.360 the English parliament finally cracked down on 00:07:33.360 --> 00:07:36.019 subordination of perjury, which is inducing someone 00:07:36.019 --> 00:07:39.500 else to lie. And then in 1562, they started imposing 00:07:39.500 --> 00:07:42.139 monetary penalties for perjury itself. But the 00:07:42.139 --> 00:07:44.279 punishments evolved to be far worse than just 00:07:44.279 --> 00:07:46.920 fines. Under common law, the penalties ranged 00:07:46.920 --> 00:07:51.120 from banishment to just absolute barbarism. Visceral 00:07:51.120 --> 00:07:53.959 is the word for it. The text details punishments 00:07:53.959 --> 00:07:56.220 like physically severing the tongue of the perjurer. 00:07:56.459 --> 00:07:59.879 Just gruesome. So gruesome. And there's one specific 00:07:59.879 --> 00:08:03.399 case from 1732 that really paints a picture of 00:08:03.399 --> 00:08:06.240 how angry ordinary people were about this crime. 00:08:06.350 --> 00:08:09.410 Oh, the John Waller case? Yes. There was this 00:08:09.410 --> 00:08:11.889 British highwayman named John Waller. He was 00:08:11.889 --> 00:08:14.329 caught lying and sentenced to the pillory, locked 00:08:14.329 --> 00:08:16.529 in the wooden stocks in the public square. Right. 00:08:16.889 --> 00:08:19.490 But the crowd was so deeply enraged by his lies 00:08:19.490 --> 00:08:22.389 that they essentially pelted him to death. They 00:08:22.389 --> 00:08:24.730 did. He died while being punished for perjury, 00:08:24.930 --> 00:08:27.509 literally killed by an angry mob. Which really 00:08:27.509 --> 00:08:29.370 highlights something fundamental about human 00:08:29.370 --> 00:08:32.429 nature, I think. Lying under oath isn't just 00:08:32.429 --> 00:08:34.570 an offense against another person. What is it 00:08:34.570 --> 00:08:36.690 then? It's a corruption of the communal system 00:08:36.690 --> 00:08:39.950 we all rely on to maintain order. If the justice 00:08:39.950 --> 00:08:42.830 system is a suspension bridge, perjury isn't 00:08:42.830 --> 00:08:45.090 just a dented guardrail. Right. It's someone 00:08:45.090 --> 00:08:48.330 actively unscrewing the main bolts holding the 00:08:48.330 --> 00:08:50.629 cables together. If the truth doesn't matter, 00:08:50.889 --> 00:08:52.830 the entire bridge collapses. That is a great 00:08:52.830 --> 00:08:55.759 analogy. And that deep philosophical view of 00:08:55.759 --> 00:08:59.000 the crime completely dictates how wildly different 00:08:59.000 --> 00:09:01.720 countries penalize it today. Yeah. If a mob killing 00:09:01.720 --> 00:09:04.159 a guy in a pillory shows how seriously the public 00:09:04.159 --> 00:09:08.519 took it in 1732, the modern global stakes show 00:09:08.519 --> 00:09:10.899 that the legal system takes it just as seriously 00:09:10.899 --> 00:09:13.019 today. Oh, absolutely. The baselines are strict 00:09:13.019 --> 00:09:16.179 enough. In the U .S., under federal law, it's 00:09:16.179 --> 00:09:18.740 a felony with up to five years in prison. In 00:09:18.740 --> 00:09:22.159 the UK, it's up to seven years. In Canada, it's 00:09:22.159 --> 00:09:24.720 an indictable offense with a maximum of 14 years. 00:09:24.879 --> 00:09:27.059 But those are just the starting points. Look 00:09:27.059 --> 00:09:29.919 at Australia and New Zealand. In several jurisdictions 00:09:29.919 --> 00:09:32.559 there, the penalty is double going up to 14 years 00:09:32.559 --> 00:09:35.399 or even life imprisonment if the perjury was 00:09:35.399 --> 00:09:38.179 committed specifically to wrongly convict someone 00:09:38.179 --> 00:09:40.460 of a serious offense. And then you have California. 00:09:40.820 --> 00:09:42.879 Yeah, California is a whole other level. Under 00:09:42.879 --> 00:09:46.120 the California Penal Code, if your perjury causes 00:09:46.120 --> 00:09:49.240 the wrongful execution of another person, your 00:09:49.240 --> 00:09:52.240 lie can be construed as murder or attempted murder. 00:09:52.279 --> 00:09:54.799 It becomes a capital offense, meaning you could 00:09:54.799 --> 00:09:57.019 face the death penalty simply for lying on the 00:09:57.019 --> 00:09:59.600 stand. It's literally a matter of life or death. 00:10:00.039 --> 00:10:02.659 The lie is treated as the murder weapon. Exactly. 00:10:03.399 --> 00:10:06.500 But contrast that extreme, highly punitive approach 00:10:06.500 --> 00:10:09.059 with a system like India's, where the underlying 00:10:09.059 --> 00:10:12.200 philosophy takes a totally different almost bureaucratic 00:10:12.200 --> 00:10:15.379 turn. Okay, how so? Under the Indian penal code, 00:10:15.659 --> 00:10:18.179 perjury is fundamentally described as Muted. 00:10:18.360 --> 00:10:20.440 Muted. That's an interesting word for it. This 00:10:20.440 --> 00:10:23.279 is due to section 195 of their Code of Criminal 00:10:23.279 --> 00:10:26.559 Procedure, right? Yes. And to translate the dense 00:10:26.559 --> 00:10:29.019 legal phrasing here for you listening, the rule 00:10:29.019 --> 00:10:31.399 states that a court cannot take cognizance of 00:10:31.399 --> 00:10:34.039 a perjury offense unless the complaint is made 00:10:34.039 --> 00:10:37.740 in writing by the court itself. And taking cognizance 00:10:37.740 --> 00:10:40.419 basically means the legal system formally acknowledging 00:10:40.419 --> 00:10:44.070 the crime. So let me get this straight. If I'm 00:10:44.070 --> 00:10:46.129 in a bitter civil dispute with my neighbor in 00:10:46.129 --> 00:10:48.210 India, and I have absolute proof my neighbor 00:10:48.210 --> 00:10:50.909 just lied on the stand, I can't just call the 00:10:50.909 --> 00:10:52.789 police and file a perjury report against them. 00:10:53.070 --> 00:10:56.009 Correct. You, as the private citizen, cannot 00:10:56.009 --> 00:11:00.230 initiate that complaint. Wow. Section 195 restricts 00:11:00.230 --> 00:11:02.990 police or prosecutors from just acting on your 00:11:02.990 --> 00:11:06.029 accusation. The judge who presided over the case, 00:11:06.090 --> 00:11:09.330 or a superior court, has to be the one to formally 00:11:09.330 --> 00:11:12.129 file the complaint in writing. But why create 00:11:12.129 --> 00:11:14.889 that massive bottle deck? That seems counterintuitive. 00:11:15.190 --> 00:11:17.210 Well, because it answers a vital philosophical 00:11:17.210 --> 00:11:19.950 question. Who is the actual victim of perjury? 00:11:20.110 --> 00:11:23.129 Oh, I see. In the Indian legal framework, perjury 00:11:23.129 --> 00:11:25.590 is not viewed as a personal injury against the 00:11:25.590 --> 00:11:28.049 opposing party. It is fundamentally an administrative 00:11:28.049 --> 00:11:30.490 crime against the justice system itself. It is 00:11:30.490 --> 00:11:32.470 an attempt to usurp the power of the courts. 00:11:32.830 --> 00:11:35.009 Exactly. Because the court was the entity that 00:11:35.009 --> 00:11:37.690 was lied to, the court itself must be the entity 00:11:37.690 --> 00:11:40.289 to recognize the offense and seek prosecution. 00:11:40.429 --> 00:11:42.269 That actually makes a lot of sense. Yeah, it 00:11:42.269 --> 00:11:44.529 stops people from using perjury accusations as 00:11:44.529 --> 00:11:46.990 a weapon to harass their rivals after a lawsuit 00:11:46.990 --> 00:11:50.049 ends. That is a brilliant way to prevent a never 00:11:50.049 --> 00:11:52.960 - cycle. of lawsuits. It really is. But, you 00:11:52.960 --> 00:11:55.419 know, knowing that these penalties exist globally, 00:11:55.899 --> 00:11:59.460 from years in prison to life behind bars to potentially 00:11:59.460 --> 00:12:02.220 execution in California, it completely makes 00:12:02.220 --> 00:12:04.919 sense that smart people and their very expensive 00:12:04.919 --> 00:12:07.860 defense attorneys have spent decades finding 00:12:07.860 --> 00:12:10.860 ways to navigate around the strict legal definition 00:12:10.860 --> 00:12:13.360 of this crime. Oh, absolutely. Which brings us 00:12:13.360 --> 00:12:15.379 to the loopholes. The loopholes. Because the 00:12:15.379 --> 00:12:17.879 law requires both absolute falsehood and clear 00:12:17.879 --> 00:12:21.299 intent, the defenses against perjury can be incredibly 00:12:21.299 --> 00:12:24.059 precise, almost like linguistic gymnastics. The 00:12:24.059 --> 00:12:26.220 most famous example of this in the U .S. is the 00:12:26.220 --> 00:12:28.580 Braunston precedent, right? Yes, exactly. The 00:12:28.580 --> 00:12:31.080 Supreme Court ruled that statements that are 00:12:31.080 --> 00:12:33.700 literally true or answers to truly ambiguous 00:12:33.700 --> 00:12:37.100 questions cannot be considered perjury, even 00:12:37.100 --> 00:12:39.120 if they are deeply, intentionally misleading. 00:12:39.299 --> 00:12:41.519 It's all about literal truth. Here's where it 00:12:41.519 --> 00:12:44.379 gets really interesting. Imagine you were pulled 00:12:44.379 --> 00:12:48.039 over for speeding on a Tuesday. The officer asks, 00:12:48.220 --> 00:12:51.679 were you speeding today? And you respond, I always 00:12:51.679 --> 00:12:54.519 drive the speed limit on Mondays. That is a perfect 00:12:54.519 --> 00:12:56.899 example of this. Right. You might actually drive 00:12:56.899 --> 00:12:59.519 the speed limit on Mondays. That statement is 00:12:59.519 --> 00:13:03.720 a literal truth, but it is totally evasive. regarding 00:13:03.720 --> 00:13:05.980 what you did on Tuesday. Completely evasive. 00:13:06.179 --> 00:13:08.320 According to the Bronsted framework, because 00:13:08.320 --> 00:13:11.519 your statement about Monday was factually, literally 00:13:11.519 --> 00:13:14.039 true, you haven't committed perjury. Yeah. Even 00:13:14.039 --> 00:13:16.580 though your entire goal was to mislead the officer 00:13:16.580 --> 00:13:19.500 about Tuesday. Yeah. And the Supreme Court's 00:13:19.500 --> 00:13:21.919 logic here is actually quite strict on the lawyers 00:13:21.919 --> 00:13:25.559 themselves. I mean... Their view is that it is 00:13:25.559 --> 00:13:29.000 the opposing lawyer's job to ask precise questions 00:13:29.000 --> 00:13:32.480 and demand precise answers. If a witness gives 00:13:32.480 --> 00:13:35.899 an evasive but literally true answer, the lawyer 00:13:35.899 --> 00:13:38.519 needs to follow up and pin them down. It is not 00:13:38.519 --> 00:13:41.159 the court's job to criminalize clever evasions 00:13:41.159 --> 00:13:43.940 if the examining attorney fails to do their job. 00:13:44.299 --> 00:13:47.309 That is wild. But prosecutors eventually got 00:13:47.309 --> 00:13:48.970 tired of people slipping through that literal 00:13:48.970 --> 00:13:50.350 truth loophole, didn't they? Oh, definitely. 00:13:50.570 --> 00:13:53.370 So Congress expanded the prosecutor's toolkit 00:13:53.370 --> 00:13:57.549 by introducing Section 1623 of the United States 00:13:57.549 --> 00:14:01.129 Code. And this covers mutually incompatible statements. 00:14:01.450 --> 00:14:04.850 Right. Under Section 1623, the government realized 00:14:04.850 --> 00:14:07.750 it was just too hard to prove exactly which statement 00:14:07.750 --> 00:14:10.190 was the lie. Because they'd have to prove the 00:14:10.190 --> 00:14:12.970 underlying fact. Exactly. So now they don't have 00:14:12.970 --> 00:14:15.639 to. If you make two statements under oath that 00:14:15.639 --> 00:14:17.879 are so completely incompatible that at least 00:14:17.879 --> 00:14:21.139 one of them must necessarily be false, that contradiction 00:14:21.139 --> 00:14:23.940 alone is enough for an indictment. So if I swear 00:14:23.940 --> 00:14:26.000 on Monday the light was red... and then swear 00:14:26.000 --> 00:14:28.019 on Tuesday the light was green. The prosecutor 00:14:28.019 --> 00:14:30.200 doesn't have to prove the actual color of the 00:14:30.200 --> 00:14:32.799 light. The impossible contradiction is the crime. 00:14:32.899 --> 00:14:34.740 It's essentially trapping you and your own logic. 00:14:34.860 --> 00:14:37.759 Pretty much. But there's also a fascinating defense 00:14:37.759 --> 00:14:40.539 built into the U .S. system designed to encourage 00:14:40.539 --> 00:14:42.980 people to eventually do the right thing, which 00:14:42.980 --> 00:14:45.059 is the defense of recantation. Yeah, this is 00:14:45.059 --> 00:14:47.039 an interesting one. If you get on the stand, 00:14:47.379 --> 00:14:50.019 tell a lie, but then get cold feet and admit 00:14:50.019 --> 00:14:52.759 you lied during that exact same proceeding, you 00:14:52.759 --> 00:14:54.919 can sometimes save yourself from prosecution. 00:14:55.129 --> 00:14:57.730 It proves that the ultimate goal of the system 00:14:57.730 --> 00:15:00.750 is to get to the reliable facts, not just to 00:15:00.750 --> 00:15:03.769 punish people. Ideally, yes, the goal should 00:15:03.769 --> 00:15:07.269 be truth, but the reality of how the laws applied 00:15:07.269 --> 00:15:10.330 can be much darker. And this is where we get 00:15:10.330 --> 00:15:13.610 into the highly controversial perjury trap. Which 00:15:13.610 --> 00:15:15.850 sounded completely like entrapment when I was 00:15:15.850 --> 00:15:19.110 reading it. It walks a very fine line. A perjury 00:15:19.110 --> 00:15:21.669 trap is a specific tactic where a prosecutor 00:15:21.669 --> 00:15:24.529 calls a witness to testify before a grand jury, 00:15:25.029 --> 00:15:27.509 not because they're genuinely trying to gather 00:15:27.509 --> 00:15:30.870 facts to solve an underlying crime, but explicitly 00:15:30.870 --> 00:15:33.570 hoping to draw a perjurious statement out of 00:15:33.570 --> 00:15:35.509 that specific witness. So they ask questions 00:15:35.509 --> 00:15:37.330 they already possess the answers to. Exactly. 00:15:37.389 --> 00:15:39.190 They have the documents, they know the truth, 00:15:39.309 --> 00:15:41.629 but they ask the witness anyway, hoping the witness 00:15:41.629 --> 00:15:43.629 will lie to protect themselves or someone else. 00:15:43.789 --> 00:15:46.539 Wow. If the witness lies, the prosecutor suddenly 00:15:46.539 --> 00:15:49.580 has a clean, easy perjury conviction, even if 00:15:49.580 --> 00:15:51.759 they never had enough evidence to charge anyone 00:15:51.759 --> 00:15:53.840 for the original crime they were investigating. 00:15:54.279 --> 00:15:57.399 That is intense. And to see how these traps, 00:15:57.600 --> 00:16:00.580 these literal truth loopholes and these incredibly 00:16:00.580 --> 00:16:03.179 strict definitions play out in reality, we really 00:16:03.179 --> 00:16:06.419 just have to look at the rogue's gallery of notable 00:16:06.419 --> 00:16:09.379 figures accused or convicted of this crime. Yeah, 00:16:09.379 --> 00:16:12.139 it's a long list. It proves that no amount of 00:16:12.139 --> 00:16:15.330 wealth fame, or status makes you immune to the 00:16:15.330 --> 00:16:17.830 mechanics of the law. Let's look at some of the 00:16:17.830 --> 00:16:20.809 convictions. You have elite athletes, like American 00:16:20.809 --> 00:16:23.789 track and field star Marion Jones, who was sentenced 00:16:23.789 --> 00:16:26.389 to six months in prison in 2008 for two counts 00:16:26.389 --> 00:16:29.250 of perjury. You have musicians, like the rapper 00:16:29.250 --> 00:16:32.029 Lil Kim, who received a year and a day for lying 00:16:32.029 --> 00:16:34.549 to a grand jury about a shooting outside a radio 00:16:34.549 --> 00:16:36.789 station. You also see it heavily in the financial 00:16:36.789 --> 00:16:39.580 sector. Bernie Madoff was found guilty of perjury 00:16:39.580 --> 00:16:42.279 in 2009 as part of the fallout from his massive 00:16:42.279 --> 00:16:45.220 Ponzi scheme. Of course. And crucially, it happens 00:16:45.220 --> 00:16:48.480 within the justice system itself. Former LAPD 00:16:48.480 --> 00:16:50.960 detective Mark Furman entered a no contest plea 00:16:50.960 --> 00:16:53.200 to a perjury charge related to his testimony 00:16:53.200 --> 00:16:55.500 during the O .J. Simpson murder trial. Yeah, 00:16:55.620 --> 00:16:57.740 our materials note that the Furman situation 00:16:57.740 --> 00:17:01.440 was one of the most seminal, high profile occurrences 00:17:01.440 --> 00:17:04.640 of police perjury in modern history. Definitely. 00:17:04.880 --> 00:17:07.460 There is even a specific slang term for it within 00:17:07.460 --> 00:17:11.759 the legal community. Testiling. Testiling. It's 00:17:11.759 --> 00:17:14.880 when officers stretch the truth, manipulate timelines, 00:17:15.420 --> 00:17:18.119 or outright lie on the stand specifically to 00:17:18.119 --> 00:17:21.220 ensure a conviction they feel is justified. It's 00:17:21.220 --> 00:17:23.599 a huge issue. But it's not just convictions that 00:17:23.599 --> 00:17:26.359 shake things up. The mere allegation of perjury 00:17:26.359 --> 00:17:29.019 can alter the course of history, especially at 00:17:29.019 --> 00:17:30.880 the highest levels of government. And you see 00:17:30.880 --> 00:17:33.579 this constantly across the entire political spectrum. 00:17:33.980 --> 00:17:35.880 Absolutely. And, you know, looking at our sources, 00:17:35.960 --> 00:17:38.099 we have to just report the facts neutrally here. 00:17:38.480 --> 00:17:40.279 Former President Bill Clinton was accused of 00:17:40.279 --> 00:17:42.960 perjury in 1998, which was the direct catalyst 00:17:42.960 --> 00:17:45.119 for his impeachment by the House of Representatives. 00:17:45.119 --> 00:17:47.740 Right. While no criminal charges were ultimately 00:17:47.740 --> 00:17:50.960 brought, he accepted an immunity deal upon leaving 00:17:50.960 --> 00:17:53.539 office that included a suspension of his law 00:17:53.539 --> 00:17:55.559 license. And on the other side of the aisle. 00:17:55.980 --> 00:17:59.660 Exactly. Similarly. Lewis Scooter Libby, a high 00:17:59.660 --> 00:18:01.900 -ranking official in the George W. Bush administration, 00:18:02.460 --> 00:18:05.079 was convicted of perjury and obstruction of justice 00:18:05.079 --> 00:18:07.839 in connection with the Plame affair. You also 00:18:07.839 --> 00:18:10.200 see these allegations frequently aimed at the 00:18:10.200 --> 00:18:12.519 intelligence sector. Oh, for sure. Michael Hayden, 00:18:12.759 --> 00:18:15.259 former CIA director, faced heavy scrutiny and 00:18:15.259 --> 00:18:18.039 accusations of lying to Congress in 2007 regarding 00:18:18.039 --> 00:18:20.299 enhanced interrogation techniques. And there 00:18:20.299 --> 00:18:22.299 was James Clapper, too. Right. James Clapper, 00:18:22.440 --> 00:18:24.200 the former director of national intelligence, 00:18:24.460 --> 00:18:27.140 faced intense public accusations of perjury after 00:18:27.140 --> 00:18:29.539 telling a congressional committee in 2013 that 00:18:29.539 --> 00:18:32.980 the NSA did not collect data on millions of Americans. 00:18:33.099 --> 00:18:36.119 A statement that was later contradicted by massive 00:18:36.119 --> 00:18:39.210 intelligence. Exactly. But just as the allegations 00:18:39.210 --> 00:18:41.910 can ruin a career, those precise loopholes we 00:18:41.910 --> 00:18:44.910 discussed earlier can save one. Take Andy Colson, 00:18:45.150 --> 00:18:47.190 a British journalist in political aid. Oh, the 00:18:47.190 --> 00:18:49.789 phone hacking scandal. Yes. He was completely 00:18:49.789 --> 00:18:51.829 cleared of perjury charges stemming from the 00:18:51.829 --> 00:18:54.049 News International phone hacking scandal. Why? 00:18:54.750 --> 00:18:56.890 Specifically because the Scottish court ruled 00:18:56.890 --> 00:19:00.819 his false testimony was immaterial. Wow. immaterial. 00:19:00.920 --> 00:19:03.859 Even though he lied, the lie didn't meet that 00:19:03.859 --> 00:19:06.380 strict materiality requirement to be considered 00:19:06.380 --> 00:19:08.920 perjury under the law. Which goes to show how 00:19:08.920 --> 00:19:11.539 vital that three -part anatomy of the crime really 00:19:11.539 --> 00:19:14.380 is. Absolutely. But there's one more layer that 00:19:14.380 --> 00:19:16.759 high -profile figures, corporate executives, 00:19:16.880 --> 00:19:20.039 and powerful people often fall victim to, and 00:19:20.039 --> 00:19:22.680 that is subbernation. Right, we mentioned that 00:19:22.680 --> 00:19:26.740 briefly earlier. Under 18 USC section 1622 in 00:19:26.740 --> 00:19:29.720 the U .S., subbernation of perjury, which is 00:19:29.720 --> 00:19:32.380 the act of inducing someone else to lie, carries 00:19:32.380 --> 00:19:34.799 the exact same weight and potential prison time 00:19:34.799 --> 00:19:37.720 as committing perjury yourself. So a CEO can't 00:19:37.720 --> 00:19:39.819 just tell their assistant to go take the fall 00:19:39.819 --> 00:19:42.980 on the witness stand. Exactly. For powerful individuals, 00:19:43.059 --> 00:19:46.200 having an underling lie for them is just as criminally 00:19:46.200 --> 00:19:48.279 dangerous as taking the oath and lying themselves. 00:19:48.319 --> 00:19:50.750 That makes total sense. just has to prove that 00:19:50.750 --> 00:19:53.470 you positively induced the false testimony and 00:19:53.470 --> 00:19:55.349 that you knew the statement the person was going 00:19:55.349 --> 00:19:58.349 to make was false. So we've traveled from ancient 00:19:58.349 --> 00:20:01.430 Anglo -Saxon courts where witnesses were immune 00:20:01.430 --> 00:20:03.430 from prosecution because of the fear of divine 00:20:03.430 --> 00:20:06.269 wrath, to the brutal mob justice of the pillory, 00:20:06.650 --> 00:20:08.650 to California's modern death penalty stakes, 00:20:09.069 --> 00:20:12.650 to the nuanced literally true loopholes navigated 00:20:12.650 --> 00:20:15.029 by highly paid defense attorneys. It's quite 00:20:15.029 --> 00:20:17.950 the journey. We've seen that perjury is so much 00:20:17.950 --> 00:20:20.630 more than just telling a fib. It's a deliberate 00:20:20.630 --> 00:20:24.190 material deception accompanied by willful intent 00:20:24.190 --> 00:20:26.789 that threatens the foundational structure of 00:20:26.789 --> 00:20:29.309 the justice system. It really is the ultimate 00:20:29.309 --> 00:20:31.809 crime against the process of finding the truth. 00:20:32.009 --> 00:20:34.650 If the courts cannot trust the evidence presented 00:20:34.650 --> 00:20:37.670 to them, the entire mechanism of justice grinds 00:20:37.670 --> 00:20:39.910 to a halt. So what does this all mean for you, 00:20:40.009 --> 00:20:41.529 the person listening right now? The next time 00:20:41.529 --> 00:20:43.390 you're filling out a government form, or you 00:20:43.390 --> 00:20:45.849 click I agree on a digital legal document, or 00:20:45.849 --> 00:20:48.549 you sign your income taxes in April, remember 00:20:48.549 --> 00:20:50.869 the anatomy of this crime. Definitely keep it 00:20:50.869 --> 00:20:53.359 in mind. You don't need a judge in a black robe 00:20:53.359 --> 00:20:56.099 looking down at you from a bench to be held to 00:20:56.099 --> 00:20:58.500 the highest standard of the law. The mechanism 00:20:58.500 --> 00:21:02.339 of perjury and the expectation of absolute material 00:21:02.339 --> 00:21:05.119 truth is woven into the fabric of everything 00:21:05.119 --> 00:21:08.109 we do. It is everywhere. And you know, examining 00:21:08.109 --> 00:21:10.730 all of this leaves us with an important, almost 00:21:10.730 --> 00:21:13.430 uncomfortable philosophical question to consider 00:21:13.430 --> 00:21:16.130 regarding the balance of power in our legal system. 00:21:16.289 --> 00:21:17.890 Oh, I know where you're going with this. We discussed 00:21:17.890 --> 00:21:20.390 the perjury trap earlier, where a prosecutor 00:21:20.390 --> 00:21:23.470 intentionally maneuvers a witness into lying, 00:21:24.029 --> 00:21:26.799 not to solve a crime, but simply to charge them 00:21:26.799 --> 00:21:29.339 with the manufactured crime of perjury. It's 00:21:29.339 --> 00:21:31.759 a total paradox. It is. Because if the entire 00:21:31.759 --> 00:21:33.980 underlying purpose of the justice system, from 00:21:33.980 --> 00:21:36.700 the ancient oaths to modern evidence law, is 00:21:36.700 --> 00:21:39.519 to uncover the truth, is it ever ethical for 00:21:39.519 --> 00:21:42.039 that same system to intentionally manufacture 00:21:42.039 --> 00:21:44.539 a crime of deception? Exactly. If the courtroom 00:21:44.539 --> 00:21:46.859 oath is supposed to be society's perfect filter 00:21:46.859 --> 00:21:49.160 for the truth, what happens when the government 00:21:49.160 --> 00:21:51.779 uses that filter as a weapon? Something for you 00:21:51.779 --> 00:21:53.799 to chew on long after the audio stops playing.