Ashcroft Wants List of Lenient Federal Judges

Fox News ^ | 8.7.03

[mhking]

WASHINGTON

[Asclepius]

"The independence of the federal judiciary serves the nation well."

God save us from our judges.

[meyer]

I'm not sure if this is bad or good, but I suspect that in the long run, it is bad.

[Ethyl]

Sens. Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass., Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., and other Democrats have introduced a bill to essentially undo the Feeney amendment and instead wait for the Sentencing Commission study.

"Congress needs to undo the damage that the Justice Department is doing to the federal criminal justice system," Kennedy said. "The independence of the federal judiciary serves the nation well."

Well, if these two idiots are opposing it, it must be a good thing. nuf said.

[John Beresford Tipton]

"Against Lenient Sentences"

Bull Shiite-no, it is "shake down 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, including one jogging around Crawford, Texas.

[meyer]

Well, if these two idiots are opposing it, it must be a good thing. nuf said.

Point well taken. On the other hand, even two blind liberals may find a nut occasionally. :)

[blam]

US Judges Scrutinized Over Lenient Sentencing

[skr]

It's telling judges who want to depart from the guidelines "that you will be put on a list and you will be watched," said Ryan King, research associate with The Sentencing Project (search), a nonprofit group seeking alternatives to prison. "We're no longer judging a case on the merits."

It's telling the judges that they need to be able to back up their decisions. Actions have consequences, not only for the criminals, but for those with the enormous power and responsibility that judges have.

[=Intervention=]

Your paranoia is showing.

"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 "

There is no evidence of a quota that the feds have to meet. Most criminal cases is a separate bag from "cases pursued by the feds". Normalization of sentences for the same crime SERVES justice; it does not undercut it. Justice should be uniform.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

G*dd*mned judges! How dare they take mitigating circumstances into account!

Ol' Beaver-face Ashcroft is really starting to get intrusive!

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

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.

Was the Feeney amendment approved under Ol' Beaver-Face Ashcroft's watch?

[mrsmith]

This is outrageous!

The idea of judges obeying the law!
Why, it's as weird a concept as Senators obeying the Constitution.

[John Beresford Tipton]

Yes.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

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, including one jogging around Crawford, Texas.

I'll be sooooooooooo glad not to vote for HIM again in 2004!

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

It's telling the judges that they need to be able to back up their decisions. Actions have consequences, not only for the criminals, but for those with the enormous power and responsibility that judges have.

Ah, but will that be the actual effect? Wouldn't it be easier to vote all the DemonRATs up for election out of the Senate so we can get better federal judges? Oh, that's right, we'd have to temporarily anesthetize all the dingbats first, and that would be expensive. However, I'd rather not have to worry about the DOJ breathing down my neck everytime I take mitigating circumstances into account, were I a jerdge...

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

I'm shocked, just shocked!

[wideminded]

Ashcroft Wants List of Lenient Federal Judges

Why doesn't he also want a list of harsh federal judges?

[Rudder]

Ashcroft should spend more effort prosecuting the Clintons and keeping illegal aliens out of the country and off the welfare dole.

Instead he's trying to lock anyone who's smoked a joint.

[F16Fighter]

"Ashcroft is exactly the kind of 'wannabe dictator' that deserves no role in the government of a democratic republic."

Are you high?

I could only hope Ashcroft was able to wield the kind power you imagine in your paranoid delusions.

Thump, thump, bang, whoosh...Is it John Ashcroft?? BOO!