Working on databases from prison

From your link:

> The defendant, Preston Thorpe, appeals his conviction for possession of a controlled drug with intent to sell

He may have done other things, but his conviction was for possession with intent, and that seems to be why he's locked up. It doesn't make anything else he's done acceptable, but in America he's innocent until proven guilty, and it doesn't seem he was found guilty of assault.

I feel ok that there's a distinction between legal rulings and other circumstances of the case that I as an internet person can use my judgement to understand.

Just because someone is guilty or not doesn't separate other facts of the case.

In an extreme example: I'm ok with the court letting someone off who murdered someone, because the police didn't follow proper procedure wrt evidence/confessions/witness testimony. Our legal system should be held to the highest standard when convicting someone of a crime. That doesn't stop me from believing that the defendant actually did the crime or not.