Posted on 03/06/2015 10:01:35 AM PST by Theoria
Aaron Harvey was leaving his Las Vegas apartment to get some food one day in July 2014, when, suddenly, “man, Seal Team 6 came out of nowhere, pretty much. Guns drawn, dogs, helicopters.”
It was the U.S. Marshals, who’d come to take Harvey back to San Diego.
“They told me that I was wanted for murders in the state of California,” Harvey said. “I laughed. I started laughing. I told ‘em, ‘You’ve got the wrong guy.'”
Harvey isn’t charged with murder, though. That’s precisely why his case is so controversial.
District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis is using an obscure criminal statute, Penal Code section 182.5, for what appears to be the first time ever in California to prosecute a group of 15 San Diego men, including Harvey. The DA has admitted that some of the men had nothing to do with the underlying crimes at the heart of the case – a series of shootings by Lincoln Park gang members in 2013. Rather, they’re charged with conspiracy for belonging to the same gang as the shooters. For that, they could go to prison for life.
It’s guilt by association, basically, and if federal law is any guide, it’s perfectly constitutional.
The law says a person who “willfully promotes, furthers, assists, or benefits” from a gang crime can be charged with conspiracy. The benefit Harvey received out of the shootings, according to the DA, is street cred. If someone in the gang commits a crime, the reasoning goes, the whole gang gets a boost to its reputation.
“They’re saying I benefited because my stature, my respect, went up. I didn’t even know I had any stature. I don’t understand how someone can benefit from something they don’t even know exists,” said Harvey.
(Excerpt) Read more at voiceofsandiego.org ...
Sigh.
Some people have no sense of nuance. (Please don’t ask, I’m not interested in explaining it to you.)
Really, I thought the article was guilt by association. In the article it says that the prosecution is basing their fact off of picture from Facebook. Tell me how he was abetting a capitol crime. Lets say I’m at a bar and someone snaps a photo of me, and there you are in the background talking to a random person. Does this mean we’re friends. No. He is being charged with a crime based on a b.s. law. If he is a criminal by all means throw him in prison. But putting our tax dollars into a prison being filled with innocent people is not justified and anyone who thinks it is had better hope the same doesn’t happen to them, because it easily could.
So you’re saying he is not a member of the gang involved in the drive-by shooting? You should contact his attorney and offer to vouch for his character.
I could quote a certain Star Wars princess, but the comparison would be too obvious.
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