Adversarial process at work. Each side works against each other as hard as they can within the bounds of law and the jury (or just judge, depending) decides.

It's ridiculous, but the defense attorney working as hard as possible against the prosecution. If there's even a tiny hope of it working it's worth trying.

Oh god, your comment is making me go down a path I hadn't ever considered before. For whoever reads this in the future, just know that @elbucho pushed me to do it.

She's in the house of representatives but yeah

Oh, look, it's another non-apology "apology":

"I’m sorry that he got hurt"

That's what you say when you back into someone in a volleyball game or something. Paul Pelosi wouldn't have been "hurt" (and ended up in hospital for most of a week) if a crazy guy hadn't broken into his house, tied him up, and hit him with a hammer.

For the record, an actual and sincere apology for a major wrong consists of saying you're sorry for what you did, you know what you did was wrong, that what you did affected the other person in negative ways, you apologize for the injury(s) suffered, you offer some kind of restitution or compensation, you promise to avoid the action in future, and you take concrete steps toward avoiding that action.

"He wasn't my target and I'm sorry that he somehow mysteriously and inexplicably got injured when I broke into his house, tied him up, threatened him, and hit him with a hammer and I just don't understand how that happened" is not an apology.

Maybe saying “much better” was over the top. But I think the headline makes it sound like he only expressed remorse about hurting the wrong person, instead of the fact that he expressed overall remorse.

It's like the mass-shooters. They're all just "mentally ill", until they finally get their facist state, at which point the "mentally ill" suddenly become the SS.