Hammond Family
Posted on 01/04/2016 3:52:15 PM PST by combat_boots
The media are focused on the “Bundy Militia” angle to the standoff in Burns Oregon, where Aamon Bundy and brothers have taken over a Malheur Wildlife Refuge Headquarters to draw attention to the plight of the Hammond family (Full Complex Back Story Here).
However, a little research (HatTip NeverTooLate) into the original legal battle reveals a rather startling update.
Hammond Family
The initial, and regarded by many as overreaching, federal prosecution resulted in a federal court judge Michael Hogan assigning a 3-month sentence and 1-year sentence for Dwight Lincoln Hammond Jr (73) and his son, Steven Dwight Hammond (46) respectively.
Even federal Judge Hogan stated the prosecution under “terrorism statutes” itself was an overreach and he refused to assign ridiculously high sentences for behavior that almost every rancher has conducted for generations.
Those sentences were fulfilled by the father an son duo in 2013 with Steven Hammond exiting prison in January 2014.  However, it was a decision by a U.S District Attorney named Amanda Marshall which called for an appeal to the sentencing:
"Amanda Marshall: Former U.S. Attorney for Oregon. Marshall recommended that the federal government challenge the Hammonds; original prison sentences. By law, the convictions come with mandatory five-year sentences, but U.S. District Judge Michael Hogan in 2012 balked at the punishment and instead sentenced Dwight Hammond to three months and Steven Hammond to one year.
Marshall called Hogan's punishments "unlawful." The solicitor general authorized a rare appeal of an Oregon judge's order. The appeals court sided with the prosecution, and the Hammonds returned to federal court last year to face a second sentencing. At that hearing, U.S. Chief District Judge Ann Aiken ordered the pair to finish
(Excerpt) Read more at theconservativetreehouse.com ...
I agree that the judge needs to be held to account but don't see why the convicted lawbreakers shouldn't serve the full sentence mandated by law.
The winners make the rules, My FRiend. And if you think that it is bad now, wait 6 months from now. The seeds sown in 2008 have now matured and the fruit is ripe and ready for the reaping.
You have a point.
Then again, it’s not like it’s the armchair critics’ ranches or homes now, is it.
“First, they came for the Bundys,...
indeed. doers do their duty as they see it and accept the responsibility for their actions. others don’t care to do much of anything for anybody but themselves, mostly out of fear.
Not withstanding the fact it's a draconian law, improperly imposed, it's been over 2 years since their sentence was fulfilled.
This is an immoral miscarriage of justice, imho.
Yes indeed. If Trump gets elected, I really fear there will be hell to pay.
He’ll be a dictator like owebowma, but he will be our dictator, right?
All numbers point to a Shrillary presidency however. I am just buying a gun every now and then, and some ammo, and some dry food.
Just being prepared.
Judge retired right after the decision.
They were sentenced in 2012, this smells.
Appeals take a while.
That's really the point. Our legislators and one of our Presidents, in their wisdom, enacted a law that prohibits plea bargaining punishment below a minimum level.
Many of us have problems with minimum sentencing laws but it's really missing the point to blame a prosecutor or the courts for upholding the law. Blame your Congress.
I have to believe a lot of FReepers might have a different take if this was a bunch of BLMers who took over some federal facility to protest mandatory minimum sentences for dealing crack.
How can this not be a form of double jeopardy?
Actually, I think the Hammonds should not have been charged at all.
Troll.
Post the BLM map of the coast states. Every other section of land up the coast to Canada.
Bttt
Who prosecuted the trial - the Bush Administration or Obama?
BO has packed everything with his loyalists.
Perhaps, but without being on the jury and hearing both sides I don't think any of us can say for sure.
What I do know is that they were found guilty by a jury of their peers and ultimately sentenced according to the law.
Seriously? Good Lord some authoritarian "conservatives" are as obtuse as the most blockheaded progressives.
My understanding of double jeopardy is that you can't be tried twice for the same crime.
This is different, though is smack of being sentenced twice for the same crime.
Even though there were mandatory sentences, which I'm not sure I agree with, the judge is the one who erred here not the accused.
I', no lawyer, but do have and understanding of some law.
Was is Clarence Darrow that said that the law is an ass?
This case seems to prove it.
And the fact that you come down in support of activist judges upholding laws that they agree with and not the ones they don't agree with doesn't surprise me either.
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