In the pursuit of justice, due process ought to be valued above the discovery of fact.

I will now make the potentially controversial statement that finding an innocent person guilty is equally injust as finding a guilty person innocent. As justice is giving each person what he or she deserves as constituted by the law, and as the law constitutes (generally speaking) that breaking the law should be punished and following the law should not be punished, finding an innocent person guilty is injust but is only as injust as finding a guilty person innocent. By means of this and other rebuttals, I will attempt to weaken my opponent's well-crafted points about why due process ought to be valued above the discovery of fact. Rebuttal of Contention 1. Due Process best leads to consistent justice All the rights mentioned exist, and must be upheld lest there be unfair practices. Truly Due Process has commitment to legality. However, I disagree that that commitment to legality makes it best lead to consistent justice. In cases where a guilty person is brought to trial, they must indeed be offered Due Process. This Due Process is a legal right that they are granted, and is under what the law sets forth. However, the person is also guilty, and therefore should also suffer the punishment specified by law. If they are not made to suffer punishment, then that is an obstruction of justice. Due Process and the legal punishments for violations of the law are not able to be fully reconciled; have Due Process the final control then it is inevitable that someone guilty will walk free because they cannot be proved of their guilt. For this reason, it is important to discover facts regarding the situation, in order that the true nature of the crime might be identified. Should a person actually be innocent, they will not suffer a punishment if priority is given to discovering the facts that will surely prove their innocence. Rebuttal of Contention 2. An absence of Due Process leads to injustice It is possible that an absence of Due Process might lead to injustice, but so can it's presence. By it's existence, it can inhibit proving a guilty one guilty, which is as injust as it would be were it not present. With it's unstable nature and ability to preserve justice for some while creating injustice for others, it should take a backseat to the more reliable methods of fact. I am certain I can find an example of this somewhere, but people are much more eager to trumpet cases in which innocent people are proved guilty rather than those where guilty people are proved innocent, as it is often more difficult to decisively prove someone guilty than innocent. Rebuttal of Contention 3. Valuing discovery of fact over Due Process leads to injustice It was never implied that a discovery of fact outlook supports the violation of the laws. Breaking the laws to uphold them isn't very effective, as such a discovery of fact outlook would have to put an emphasis on legally discovering facts without doing illegal searches or cruel and unusual punishment. Facts are already used in the pursuit of justice (how could they be avoided? ) and have proved themselves obtainable through legitimate means. Therefore, tactics such as legal searches of private property or cruel and usual punishment might be employed to glean facts. Although my opponent claims that "Even if the evidence needed to convict that person is found his rights have been infringed upon, and justice therefore already lost. ", if evidence exists that would indicate the person's guilt, failing to find him guilty is an equal failure of justice, however this failure of justice would have a guilty person freed as innocent. I have realized a little bit late that as Con, my position is that Due Process does not need to be valued above the discovery of fact (as opposed to discovery of fact needs to be valued above Due Process). Therefore, I will conclude my argument in this round by saying that Due Process can cause at least as many injustices as it avoids, and therefore should not be valued above the discovery of fact. Also, more good luck to my opponent :)