Posted on 01/22/2014 3:13:37 PM PST by Clintonfatigued
So it wasnt surprising when, in July 2011, the Fullerton political establishment rushed to the defense of officers who had beaten a 130-pound homeless schizophrenic named Kelly Thomas. The public saw the published photo of Thomas horribly swollen and bruised face, yet the mayor went on TV saying he had seen worse injuries in the Vietnam War and that it was unclear what killed Thomas, who died in a hospital days after the whomping.
We also learned that police officers confiscated the video camera of a bystander and were allowed to watch the surveillance video of the incident and essentially get their stories straight before giving their statements. It looked, sadly, like business as usual.
But then something happened to awaken that dormant idealist. Local residents were outraged and began a series of peaceful protests never mind that the mayor compared them to a lynch mob. Two local businessmen organized and funded a successful recall of council members who they viewed as culpable in downplaying the incident. Then a district attorney with a law-and-order reputation pressed charges against two of the officers, which is a rarity.
The public could see what happened on the released transit-station video: Officer Manuel Ramos confronted Thomas, slipped on a rubber glove and said that he was going to f him up. Thomas was generally cooperative, yet the painfully long beating and Tasing session began. Thomas begged for his life, but was left in a pool of blood.
There were signs that justice might prevail, but in the ensuing months, the police union helped defeat council reformers. And in the final chapter recently, an Orange County jury issued not guilty verdicts for ex-officers Ramos and Jay Cicinelli. The latter already is pushing to bereinstated to the department.
(Excerpt) Read more at humanevents.com ...
Are the cops threatening and intimidating the juries? They are the ones giving the verdicts.
This verdict left me speechless. The evidence was there for all to see and the jury still let them get away with murder. The only good news is that the psycho-cops got fired. I hope the family of the victim goes after their pensions.
I don’t know. It’s mind-boggling.
Do you think the verdicts here were legitimate and credible?
The way cops are these days, they intimidate everybody. I don't even make eye contact with them, and my son is a cop.
How can they sleep at night?
When the officers who beat Rodney King were acquitted by the jury in Simi Valley, then President George H. Bush demanded, and got, a federal trial.
So, when is Obama going to demand a federal trial of these Fullerton cops? Do I hear the sound of crickets?
I've heard that the lawyers (and judges) actively discriminate against such people in [potential] jury-pools.
How is that not a violation of the 5th (and 6th) Amendment?
These Police Officers violated the civil rights of Kelly Thomas by beating him to death.
Why won’t his parents file a Complaint with the F.B.I. to have this crime investigated?
Where I reside in Connecticut.We just had a number of Police officers who served with the East Haven,Connecticut P.D.Tried and convicted of violating the civil rights of some illegal aliens.These Illegal aliens did not get beaten to death by those officers.
But they were convicted just the same.
Its time for the Justice Department to investigate this vicious crime and put those Fullerton Police Officers where they belong,Behind Bars for life.
I was wondering about “double jeopardy” myself when the Rodney King cops were tried a second time.
I guess “political correctness” trumps the Constitution.
Whoever, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, willfully subjects any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured or protected by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or to different punishments, pains, or penalties, on account of such person being an alien, or by reason of his color, or race, than are prescribed for the punishment of citizens, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than one year, or both;
and if bodily injury results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include the use, attempted use, or threatened use of a dangerous weapon, explosives, or fire, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both;
and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, shall be fined under this title, or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.
http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/242
The fifth amendment reads as follows:
Amendment VIt is perfectly reasonable to hold that the underlined means some particular action, rather than some particular law; if the latter is taken then there is nothing to prevent a prosecutor from taking every detail of some incident and charging them separately until a conviction is secured. While this does accurately describe the prosecutorial/judicial system today, it fundamentally alters the role of the Jury by stripping them of the power to judge the [whole] law in the incident.
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Thus, opening up a new channel of prosecution for "the same offence" as suggested would be a violation of the 5th amendment; moreover, the law immediately previous to the one cited would be violated by the prosecution (and judges agreeing to hear the case).
18 U.S. Code § 241 - Conspiracy against rights
If two or more persons conspire to injure, oppress, threaten, or intimidate any person in any State, Territory, Commonwealth, Possession, or District in the free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege secured to him by the Constitution or laws of the United States, or because of his having so exercised the same; or
If two or more persons go in disguise on the highway, or on the premises of another, with intent to prevent or hinder his free exercise or enjoyment of any right or privilege so secured
They shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than ten years, or both; and if death results from the acts committed in violation of this section or if such acts include kidnapping or an attempt to kidnap, aggravated sexual abuse or an attempt to commit aggravated sexual abuse, or an attempt to kill, they shall be fined under this title or imprisoned for any term of years or for life, or both, or may be sentenced to death.
Ping
(a) The dual sovereignty doctrine provides that when a defendant in a single act violates the “peace and dignity” of two sovereigns by breaking the laws of each, he has committed two distinct “offences” for double jeopardy purposes. In applying the doctrine, the crucial determination is whether the two entities that seek successively to prosecute a defendant for the same course of conduct can be termed separate sovereigns. This determination turns on whether the prosecuting entities’ powers to undertake criminal prosecutions derive from separate and independent sources. It has been uniformly held that the States are separate sovereigns with respect to the Federal Government because each State’s power to prosecute derives from its inherent sovereignty, preserved to it by the Tenth Amendment, and not from the Federal Government. Given the distinct sources of their powers to try a defendant, the States are no less sovereign with respect to each other than they are with respect to the Federal Government. Pp. 87-91.
(b) The application of the dual sovereignty principle cannot be restricted to cases in which two prosecuting sovereigns can demonstrate that allowing only one sovereign to exercise jurisdiction over the [474 U.S. 82, 83] defendant will interfere with the second sovereign’s unvindicated “interests.” If the prosecuting entities are separate sovereigns, the circumstances of the case and the specific “interests” of each are irrelevant. Pp. 91-92.
(c) The suggestion that the dual sovereignty doctrine be overruled and replaced with a balancing of interests approach is rejected. The Court’s rationale for the doctrine is not a fiction that can be disregarded in difficult cases; it finds weighty support in the historical understanding and political realities of the States’ role in the federal system and in the Double Jeopardy Clause itself. Pp. 92-93.
455 So.2d 905, affirmed.
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=us&vol=474&invol=82
innumerable and indefinitein practice rather than being
enumerated and specific. (The War on Drugs is a great example here, the federal government claimed the ability to regulate intrastate commerce in Wickard, and non-commerce in Raich, so there is now no aspect of life which is not tied into the
interstatecommerce clause.)
The fundamental problem is that socialist statist (otherwise known as communism) brainwashing throughout the 20th century has taught people to see the government and it’s officials as beneficent servants of the people acting in everyone’s best interests. Therefore, jurors do not want to “interfere” with the police who are acting in everyone’s best interest by protecting them from “bad people” like Mr. Kelly. So, it becomes easier to excuse the police when they are simply “overzealous” in protecting us.
Naturally, these jurors would not want to be responsible themselves for dealing with Mr. Kelly. These same people see the police as being responsible for their personal safety; so, they want the police out there protecting them no matter how the police accomplish that protection.
These people would be horrified to discover that the police have no legal responsibility to keep any individual safe. They do not realize that the reason that the police have no legal mandate to protect them is that the law correctly places the responsibility for protecting individuals on the individual, not the government or it’s agents.
As a result of socialist brainwashing, many people are too willing to trade their liberty for a false sense of security provided by the government which is what Ben Franklin warned us against. Libertarian thought which correctly emphasizes individual liberty in conjunction with individual responsibility is the best defense against that brainwashing.
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