Posted on 02/15/2004 8:43:20 PM PST by TERMINATTOR
LEWISTON, Idaho (AP) - Some prosecutors say a federal law is forcing them to deal domestic violence cases down to lesser charges.
Under the law, passed in 1996, anyone convicted of a misdemeanor crime of violence against a spouse or partner will forever lose the right to own a gun.
Nez Perce County Prosecutor Daniel Spickler said the federal law clashes with Idaho's gun culture and leads many domestic violence defendants to hold out for lesser charges that would not invoke the ban.
"A law that is perfectly appropriate for New York City or Los Angeles is probably not equally effective in Lewiston, Idaho," Spickler said.
To keep their guns, people accused of domestic violence plead guilty to disturbing the peace. In return for the guilty plea, prosecutors can force abusers into treatment.
Prosecutors make the deals because domestic violence cases are often tough to win at trial, Spickler said. If a flat-out dismissal is the only other option, the deal looks better than nothing.
Over the past five years, 121 of 698 of the county's misdemeanor domestic violence cases, or 17 percent, were reduced to disturbing the peace.
A host of obstacles stack up against prosecutors of domestic violence cases. A battered woman sometimes will lose her nerve, change her mind or lie when forced to testify in open court. There may be no witnesses to the abuse, and if the victim fought back, police may have arrived to find both victim and defendant throwing punches.
Spickler estimates 85 to 90 percent of domestic violence cases involve an uncooperative victim. The federal law revoking gun rights from abusers only makes matters worse, Spickler said, because people who otherwise might have pleaded guilty to domestic violence to avoid a trial will fight to keep their guns.
"A large percentage of the population has an extremely vested interest in their firearms. It is part and parcel of the life in the Intermountain West," he said.
That is no reason to change the federal law, said Kathy Tuttle, a victims' advocate for the Lewiston YWCA.
"Hunting is a way of life in Idaho," Tuttle said, but "I don't think I could ever say the gun laws should be relaxed."
It simply makes no sense to allow abusers to keep their firearms, Tuttle said.
"Weekly, I hear about guns being used to control, threaten or terrorize," she said. "To me, domestic violence isn't just about the injury. It's about the loss of control in their life."
But the prospect of losing gun rights poses a problem all across Idaho, said retired Magistrate Michael Redman of Twin Falls. Over the past year, he visited 24 of Idaho's 44 counties, talking to local officials about domestic violence.
"If defendants and defense attorneys are well-versed in the federal legislation, then they will be very slow to plead guilty," he said. "The end result is that it (the gun ban) is providing the opposite result as far as the law is concerned."
Why do defendants ever plea out to these charges, then? There are other penalties to a domestic violence conviction than loss of gun rights, after all. You'd think if the defendant's options were really dismissal or confessing to some lesser crime he would just choose dismissal.
If the prosecutor really has no threat of conviction on any charges, the problem is simply weak cases, not gun control. You'd think the prosecutor would be loathe to press *any* of these cases if the evidence were really so weak, much less press for a change in federal law to get more plea bargains.
Not that I'm in favor of more gun control, mind you. The argument against gun control attributed to prosecutors here is just bizarre, though.
If you hold out for trial, you can't afford to go shooting anymore.
If you're a junkie or something, your represtntation is free. Good people get de shaft.
My last jury duty there was a case where a man was accused of misdemeanor crime of violence against a spouse. I told the court that I'd be hard pressed to vote for conviction because the Second Amendment rights were too important to lose and gun grabbers should be aware that they have gone too far in too many areas. I was not selected for the jury.
"Hear" seems to be the operative word. Before this federal law, it was still a felony to point a gun at someone. But felonies are tougher to prosecute. So the liberals want felony-level loss of rights for gun owners guilty of misdemeanor beefs. Except for police, thanks to the Lousenberg Bill.
You totally misrepresent this episode. First your use of the word "fight". At no time was there a fight shown on "Cop's," involving either of the two.
What was shown was the elderly lady hitting the male in the back of the head with an open hand, in a playful way. After it had become clear that he had caused her dentures to become dislodged from her mouth while feeding her a piece of chesse, (probably not in the gentlest manner) but, there was no fight.
The little jerk who pushed his girlfriend away so he could use the phone was arrested.As he should have been.
Unknown to most people, it seems, if another person touches you, or otherwise lays a hand on you with out your consent in a violent manner, that is assault.
That is what the cops saw, a male, twice, violenty pushing a female he was cohabitating with. Hence assault on a domestic partner.
One 62 year old lady who wanted to explain to the cops what had happened was grabbed by the arm and forced to the police car with more force than the previous arrests.
You mean the 62 year old female suspect of assualt and battery with a deadly weapon against her own child, refusing to cooperate with the police?
I don't know what planet you live on, but if someone is willing to take a knife to one of thier own children in a jealous rage, that person needs to be removed from the situation as quickly as possible, with as much force as needed. What was shown was minimal. I give the cops credit in thier reaction to a possibly deadly situation to remove the threat.
I remember one officer who escalated a fight and he knew he was being filmed. I can't imagine how bad he could be when he wasn't being filmed.
Bad cop. Not bad cops, but why would you believe me. You have your mind made up.
The one thing I learned from the program is if you're having marital problems, never, ever call the police to straighten it out.
If your marital problems include calls to law enforcement then you have a bigger problem. Law enforcement is the least of your problems
Not once did the police arrest the wrong person.
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