Posted on 09/26/2007 12:42:57 PM PDT by shrinkermd
Who says there wouldn't be any plea arrangements? Such an arrange would, of course, be withdrawn if someone withdraws the guilty plea.
The defendant has everything to gain and nothing to lose by going to trial and letting a jury decide.
Depends on the evidence against them. If a person has committed murder, and the evidence is solid, it would be stupid to risk lethal injection when one might get 25 years instead through a plea deal.
If there is little evidence, seems that going to trial would be the right thing to do rather than having someone go to prison for 25 years just because they got scared and plead guilty.
I like at times go to the court house and sit and watch how the system works. Every time a person enters a guilty plea for the 1st time the Judge will ask them if they are sure they want to do that and tell them what the consequences of doing so could be. He will ask if they are entering the plea under duress? A Judge gives every opportunity to not enter a guilty plea. If I recall correctly if they still want to enter guilty they are told if they do so it would be very hard to reverse. So I think the Judge will not be very sympathetic to him.
My points were that
(a) Craig didn't "confess" (as a previous poster claimed);
(b) Hand "signals," in the absence of a verbal solicitation or touching or some kind of indecent exposure, aren't illegal in Minnesota.
BS....guilty as charged. And not the first time either.
Did Craig actually go before a judge to make the guilty plea?
I never heard that he did, so that's why I'm asking. Maybe somebody has a link that will prove one way, or the other.
Just wondering if it's possible he might've entered a misdemeanor guilty plea, the same way you plead "guilty" for a misdemeanor traffic ticket that you know you have NO chance of disputing successfully.
For that kind of offense (misdemeanor traffic violation), you don't have to go before a judge, you just mark "guilty" on the ticket and pay the damn fine.
He was never charged before.
I don't count rumors and innuendo posted on left-wing websites, by gay activists who have an axe to grind, as "charges."
And btw, what was he guilty OF? Meaning, not your opinion, but a specific Minnesota law that he provably violated? Just asking.
"Craig's arrest was confirmed by Nancy Peters, a spokeswoman for the Hennepin County courts. Peters confirmed the Roll Call report that said Craig pleaded guilty Aug. 8 to a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge. Craig was fined $1,000 and sentenced to 10 days in jail, Peters said. However, the 10-day sentence was stayed for a year, meaning that Craig avoids jail time unless he is rearrested on a similar charge within a year."
"Peters said Craig paid $575 of the fine and won't have to pay the $425 balance as long as he meets the terms of his year-long probation, which will be unsupervised."
It is NOT like a traffic ticket. A Judge would have to give out the sentence and set the fine. As far as entering a written guilty plea they do that also along with saying it before the Judge.
Hope you're right. The most arrogant, high-handed people I have ever met have been judges. Let's hope this judge is one of the few sane ones left.
Craig’s attorneys have an idiot for a client.
But it does put to rest a fact I’ve known for decades: Lawyers don’t know the law.
Craig - you moron - you make law all the time. You knew you were pleading guilty to SOMETHING!
This lack of judgement alone should be enough reason to get him out of the Senate with either resignation or in the next election.
I don’t care if he is gay or tried to get something in a bathroom (that alone is incredibly stupid but politicians are just that) or his story is true.
He lacks simple judgement and that disqualifies him to pass judgement on legislation.
That's news to me.
Here is page 1 of the full, 3-page plea deal Craig signed. (To see remaining two pages of that document, click on page "8" and page "9" at bottom of page).
Craig very clearly asserts that he actually did the crime with which he is charged. That's a confession.
Compare this definition to the Craig's signed statement of guilt.
His American Conservative Union rating is 95%. What part of his conservative voting pattern do you think idiotic?
Seems to me he pled GUILTY to disorderly conduct.
My opinion? Hardly. It's fact.
And logic dictates that he copped that plea because he was guilty...certainly not because he was innocent.
Either way, not the behavior one should expect (demand) of a U.S. Senator.
Who cares? He's an idiot for 1) not understanding he was pleading guilty; 2) lying about what he was doing; and 3) lacks simple judgement to a Senator.
But that's Idaho's problem.
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