Ashcroft Intensifies Campaign Against Judges' Soft Sentences

The Wall Street Journal ^ | Wednesday, August 6, 2003 | LAURIE P. COHEN and GARY FIELDS

[TroutStalker]

Stepping up the Justice Department's battle with federal judges over sentencing guidelines, Attorney General John Ashcroft has directed government lawyers to report on judges who give out softer sentences and to start appealing those sentences in far higher numbers.

The move, circulated in an internal memo last week, was anticipated under a measure known as the Feeney amendment, adopted by Congress in April to strengthen judges' adherence to new, stricter sentencing guidelines. Many judges, including U.S. Chief Justice William Rehnquist, view the new rules as a further attack on their independence.

[wideawake]

When judges complain, you know a good thing is a-happening.

[Lunatic Fringe]

I agree that sentencing guidelines appear to violate the separation of powers. So I propose this....

The executive and legislative branches of government will not impose sentencing guidelines when the judiciary stops creating laws and rights out of mid-air.

[John Beresford Tipton]

"Against Soft Sentences"

Bull Shiite-no, it is "getting tough on citizens"

This is not about Soft Sentences. This is about increasing the leverage that the local US Attorney has over suspects/defendants before there is even a trial.
Note that it was the DOJ who came up with the Feeney amendment, "Mr. Feeney himself says he was simply the "messenger" of the amendment bearing his name, which was drafted by two Justice Department officials.

WTF:
The Congress, "our representatives" are merely the "Messengers" of Ashcroft?????

Was that flushing sound "Our" Constitution going down the Crapper?

Most criminal cases end in a plea bargain. So to extract the maximum number of convictions it is in the local prosecutor's interest to "overcharge".

Saying "these crimes here total up to 30 years, but if I let you plead guilty to a lesser charge it is only 3 years" have much greater force, on the innocent or the guilty, if he can add "Though the statutes did not have this in mind for 30 years if the jury finds you guilty,Feeney/Ahscroft makes the judge give you the whole 30" increases the extortionate effect.

And remember these people have not been convicted of anything.

When Congress uses words like "reform", "improvement", "technical correction", "equity" they are trying to push bills that often contain none of these qualities, but can be embraced by the ignorant or trusting.

There are tens of thousands of criminal provisions on the books. It is up to the US Attorney to use good judgment and exercise discretion in deciding what "crimes" to prosecute and what charges to bring. But a US Attorney has the personal goal of making his own record look as good as possible. So there are only two ways a US attorney can be dissuaded from overcharging:

1. the jurors will say, "Life for *that*, give me a freeking break." But jurors are voting in the dark, they do not know what the sentence is for "Count 3 of the indictment". And they are not allowed to be told. That is why we often hear of jurors saying that had they only known what the mandatory sentence was, they never would have voted the way they did.

2. the judge who hears what the case is about, and not merely reads what statute the defendant is charged under will say, "I know what this case is about and the sentence was never meant by the legislature to cover a case like this.

This "Reform" by Feeney/ Ashcroft does away with the power of the judge to make those judgments. Hello, isn't "Judge" supposed to be part of the job description"?

It greatly increases the power of the prosecutors to either overcharge, or to extort from a possibly innocent defendant a plea to a lesser sentence, so as to avoid draconian penalties if the prosecutor charges him under a bevy of harsh laws not intended to cover the fact pattern.

That there are too many such laws and that a prosecutor can pick his victim and then find the law to nail him is well known. Justice Jackson, a former US Attorney General and later Justice of the Supreme court wrote:

"With the law books filled with a great assortment of crimes, a prosecutor stands a fair chance of finding at least a technical violation of some sort on the part of almost anyone. In such a case, it is not a question of discovering the commission of a crime and then looking for the man who committed it, it is a question of picking the man, and then searching the law books, or putting investigators to work, to pin some offense on him."

Also, this Feeneyn amendment was tacked on to the Amber Bill. Oh, that it fool 'em,it must be okay, after all "It's for the children."

And "Our" president, the "Conservative" George Bush signed this?

If the founding fathers came back they would have many worth targets to put their boots up.

[Wolfie]

Just remember, Republicans support a decentralized governement, unless of course, things don't go their way.

[Wolfie]

Now if only he could do something about those pesky juries that don't convict.

[MrLeRoy]

When judges complain, you know a good thing is a-happening.

Yeah, that Rehnquist is a known Commie. </sarcasm>

[MrLeRoy]

Wod_list (http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/involved?group=124) ping

[jmc813]

WOD Ping

[Gianni]

Just remember, Republicans support a decentralized governement, unless of course, things don't go their way.

No no, we were in favor of decentralized gov't when they were in charge... it makes no sense now that we are here.

[MrLeRoy]

You have to either laugh or cry.

[Gianni]

You have to either laugh or cry.

The minimum sentence for laughing (at a Republicrat) is two years or 3000 hours of community service.