YouTuber visits the 'Zone of Death' where a legal loophole allows people to get away with murder
A YouTuber has visited the “Zone of Death” where a legal loophole means that people can get away with murder there.
Tom Scott documented that experience on his YouTube channel, @TomScottGo, where he took his 6.44 million viewers along with him to Yellowstone National Park.
He revealed that in the park is a 50-square-mile area out in the wilderness where you can get away with murder or “any other crimes you might want to commit”.
Advert
Talking to the camera, Scott films himself entering that area, which is known as the “Zone of Death”.
He said: “My point in talking about it, whenever I do, is not to encourage people to do this or to say, ‘Oh, it's great that people can get away with murder’.
“The point is,I think they should fix it.”
The loophole was discovered in 2005 by law professor Brian C. Kalt while working on an essay about the Sixth Amendment.
The amendment to the constitution requires criminal defendants to have a fair and quick trial and Kalt raised the question as to whether there was a place with not enough eligible citizens to form a jury and so no trial could be brought against people who commit crimes in that area.
He later realized that place does in fact exist in Yellowstone.
Scott said: “A few people do live in that section, so it's not literally impossible to put a jury together, but there's probably not enough people to make up an impartial jury to the standards needed.”
While Congress has been aware of the “Zone of Death” for the last 19 years, nothing has been done to resolve the legal loophole.
Scott added: “I am now going to leave, either before someone else decides to commit a crime here, on me, or before I get eaten alive by mosquitos.”
Taking to the YouTube comment section to share their thoughts, one user joked: “I like how he didn't bring a cameraman for this one. He took no chances.”
A second said: “I am 100% convinced that congress will not rectify this issue until someone actually tests it out.”
A third wrote: “The worst thing about moving into that part of Idaho would be that every time a crime gets committed...you get a summons for jury duty.”
And a fourth added: “Not gonna lie, I was kind of hoping Tom was going to break a couple really obscure Idaho laws like riding a merry-go-round on a Sunday or buying a chicken after sundown without the sheriff’s permission.”