Wide Stance Court Stalls On The Law

The Court in Minnesota has issued it's decision denying Larry Craig's Motion To Withdraw Guilty Plea. It is certainly not unexpected, and I am not surprised in the least. Craig is not a sympathetic defendant here, and for good reason. I think that he was indeed doing exactly what he was accused of. I still think the decision, and indeed the initial charging of the crime, is, and was, legally wrong. While Craig's behavior in the bathroom absolutely could be viewed as consistent with the homosexual cruising lewd behavior he was accused of, it could also be consistent with harmless and innocuous behavior. I don't like Craig one bit, and good riddance to him, but I think it is questionable whether his conduct supported a charge, and see no way it could be seen as proof beyond a reasonable doubt in a fair court of law. Beyond that, I believe that Craig knew what he was doing in entering his plea, and was just hoping it would slide through the cracks; so, again, not much sympathy there. That being said however, I still think his plea was legally and Constitutionally deficient in it's advisement of right to counsel and factual basis for a finding of guilt on the charge he was found guilty of. These are technical legal arguments, and I do not expect most lay people to fully understand them or agree with them; but as a lawyer, I absolutely consider the plea to be so deficient that it should be set aside. I might also note that I do not even reach further technical arguments under local Minnesota statutes that I also think support the proposition that the plea was defective statutorily. Bottom line, I think it was wrong, but couldn't happen to a more deserving guy.

Despite what many people would believe, and the Court seems to accept, the fact that the cops advised Craig of Miranda, or the prosecutor made some comment in a note or phone call, is irrelevant to the argument I am describing. There are simply legal requirements as to what information, and how it is to be delineated, that must be contained within the four corners of the plea document and the official court record of the acceptance of the plea. There was no formal record, whether by court reporter transcription or audio recording, made in this case. In fact, there was no court proceeding, it was simply sent in by mail and considered done. The law should apply equally to those we don't like as those we do like; here, there is no question in my mind whatsoever that the plea proceeding was legally deficient. I fully understand why people either don't understand these arguments, or don't want to believe them, but I stand by them completely.

I understand that many, if not most, may disagree with me; but I still maintain that the plea was deficient as to containing a Constitutionally adequate waiver of counsel and proper factual basis. I also believe that the court improperly bootstrapped extraneous evidence from the police report as support in making it's predetermined decision. The police report was not made a formal part of the factual basis in the plea document (and it often is made a formal part on the record by verbal reference in the transcript, of which there is none here, or by words formally adopting and incorporating it in the actual plea document, again, none of which are present here). This is a very long memorandum authored by a line level county misdemeanor judge in an attempt to support a predetermined incorrect decision if you ask me. The plea form and process supplied by the prosecutor and court here is as lame and goofy as I have ever seen. I have never seen any as bad, in any court I have ever been in, even for a broken taillight petty offense traffic ticket. Oh well, no big deal, the Constitution and due process rule of law do not mean diddly squat anywhere in this country anymore; no reason it should here either I guess.

There's more: "Wide Stance Court Stalls On The Law" >>

Free The Juice!

The Washinton Post has coverage of the latest O.J. Simpson bogus persecution:

Investigators questioned O.J. Simpson and named him a suspect Friday in a confrontation at a casino hotel room involving sports memorabilia, but the actor and former football star denied breaking into the room.
Simpson told The Associated Press he went to the room to get memorabilia that belonged to him.
Simpson said he was conducting a "sting operation" to collect his belongings when he was escorted into the room at the Palace Station casino. Police said he was a suspect in a break-in at the hotel.

To paraphrase Pink Floyd, "Hey, leave the Juice alone". It appears quite possible, maybe even likely, from known facts, that Simpson did indeed murder his wife, Nicole, and Ron Goldman. He should have been convicted. But the police did such a deficient, duplicitous and malicious job investigating him, and the LA County Attorney's Office such a beyond pathetic job of prosecuting him, that his acquittal really was, in a perverse way, justice. The simple fact of the matter is that under well established principles of Constitutional and criminal law, the case against Simpson should never have gone to trial. The case should have been dismissed on a Motion to Dismiss for fundamental prejudice to his Constitutional rights via search and seizure, as well as evidence destruction, violations.

The Juice is a broken and dishonored man. The only reason he is in the public eye is because the moronic and salacious public wants him in the public eye and the immoral lazy press complies. Quit paying attention to O.J. Simpson, and for god sake quit paying attention to the deranged raving lunatic Fred Goldman, who may be the only creature in this whole mess as troubling as Simpson. Free the Juice; and free us from hearing about him. Please.

There's more: "Free The Juice!" >>

Airport Stall Law

It should be noted that Sen. Larry Craig has filed his motion to set aside the plea agreement in Hennepin County. Here is Craig's Motion

It looks like a very strong motion to me. I would give at least 50:50 odds, if not a fair amount better, that Craig gets this plea withdrawn. That should make for an interesting pickle for the GOP leadership, especially Mitch McConnell in the Senate, who has his own gathering storm on the homosexual hypocrisy front.

My collegue, the Socratic Gadfly. has written "it’s anti-gay GOPers like Craig, including anti-gay, but actually gay or bisexual, GOPers who lock themselves in their own sexual closets, who have made this a crime anyway." That sounds all flashy and everything, but that is just flat out wrong. Whether this is a crime or not is controlled completely by the authority of the Minnesota statutes which, quite frankly, speak for themselves.

I am not a fan of Sen. Larry Craig (R-Airport Stall), nor am I a fan of what he is accused of doing, nor even the belligerent conduct he has engaged in by the unequivocal facts to date. What I am an unmitigated fan of, however, is the orderly and proper rule of law pursuant to Constitutionally permitted legal and judicial process. With a plea form defective on it's face on the Constitutionally protected issue of right to counsel, with no proper record (audio or written), and with no proper factual basis for the plea accepted in this case; if one truly cares about the rule of law, it is hard to argue that this plea should stand. I predict it will not.

There's more: "Airport Stall Law" >>

Springtime In Paris

Ah mon ami, the sights, the sounds, the excitement, the aroma - its springtime in Paris. Hilton's life that is. What a buggered up mess. First John Ashcroft, now Paris Hilton; I am starting to feel sorry for both of them. And that thought is killing me, but there you have it. Paris Hilton is a self important twit; she deserves neither the attention nor hatred she engenders.

But, let me say this loudly and clearly. Paris Hilton is getting preferential treatment she does not deserve. She is getting fucking crucified, and no other regular citizen would have been pounded within even a fraction of what she has received. In Arizona, which has some of the stiffest DWI laws in the country, a first time DWI defendant, caught driving on a suspended license, under these same circumstances attendant to Hilton, would be commonly sentenced to serve the remainder of a ten day sentence on the DWI, which is nine days (any defendant must serve at least 24 hours in jail), and would probably have two days added for the driving on a suspended license charge. Most likely, the two day sentence would be made concurrent with the nine days, so she would be incarcerated for nine days. They have given Hilton 45 days and made a total hash in the process.

This podunk city court judge in California puts Lance Ito to shame in the unethical showboating department. The guy ought to be reprimanded. Seriously. The media ought to be ashamed of themselves. The people watching the media ought to be ashamed of themselves. This is a rotten, putrid barrel of apples all the way around. It pains me to say this, but FREE PARIS, ITS A BUM RAP, MAN!

I leave you with "Springtime For Hitler" from The Producers. No, not the new production silly; from the original with the incomparable Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder. Zero Mostel was an amazing talent. He was blacklisted in the McCarthy Red Hunt era and never fully recovered. This is what happens when false security becomes more important than real freedoms. We are in such an era again; fight back!

UPDATE: I am now informed that Ms. Hilton was not even convicted of a DWI in the first place. It was pled down to a reckless driving charge. The situation is now doubly insane. No other similarly situated defendant, and there are probably hundreds per week in LA County, would get more than four days incarceration. You do not have to like, nor be sympathetic to, Paris Hilton to understand that this is a raw and unconscionable deal. Anybody, anywhere, that tells you different simply does not know what they are talking about on criminal law at this level.

There's more: "Springtime In Paris" >>