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Juries To Law Enforcement: Go Find Some REAL Criminals
Last week, in the state of Nevada, three things happened of which we should all take note.
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In Las Vegas, a jury acquitted a man of marijuana charges which went to trial despite the fact that in a few week,s you will be able to go into a state-licensed dispensary and buy what he was charged with growing for his own use back when medical marijuana users—which he was—had to grow their own.
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In Reno, a jury acquitted a man of murder charges which went to trial despite the fact that the “murder” happened when he caught a couple of methheads trespassing in his vacant rental property and thought they were going to shoot him with what turned out to be a flashlight once the lights came on. It never occurred to the prosecutor that the defendant was engaged in an act of self-defense despite the fact that he was in his own property and was the only person authorized to be there.
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Also in Reno, a Judge denied a writ of habeas corpus sought by a young man who was charged by that same prosecutor with false imprisonment with a deadly weapon in spite of the fact that the act occurred in his third floor apartment, the “victim” came over the balcony, and it was the defendant who called 911 after effecting a citizen’s arrest–which means in all probability that this case will also go to trial.
On the internet version of the Las Vegas Review Journal’s story about the first case, a commenter said that juries are sending a message to prosecutors and police: GO FIND REAL CRIMINALS!
That is correct.
There is no reason, based on the Reno murder trial and a similar verdict several months ago, that a jury in the third case will not tell the prosecutors the same thing.
The judge who denied the habeas petition did so on the basis of “marginal or slight evidence” that a crime was actually committed and said, after an hour-and-a half-hearing, that she was obligated to construe what little evidence—which is to say almost none—there was in the “most favorable” light to the state.
Kind of makes a mockery of innocent until proven guilty, doesn’t it?
The problem with such nonsense is that trials are expensive for both the taxpayers and defendants. I’m willing to bet that before the three cases I described above are all accounted for, the better part of a million and a half dollars will have been expended, lives will have been changed, and defendants will have been wrongfully exposed to years of prison time for no reason. And, as a side note, in the Las Vegas case, some $51,000 was seized (and there is some doubt that the defendant is going to get it back easily because, get this: there is no law that says that just because you have been found not guilty of a crime, you get your money back.)
A prosecutor’s job is to seek justice. Justice is not achieved when some douchebag DA doesn’t have the guts to say that there is no case here because the accused did not violate any law.
You know what is achieved?
The taxpayers get screwed. Because prosecutors have finite resources, and every time they commit to a trial for a loser like one of the cases I listed above, they have let some truly violent criminals slide. If it looks egregious enough (translation: they look stupid enough), they come to the legislature and ask for more money because they need more resources.
And it’s not just the state of Nevada.
Last week, while Barack Obama was telling us that ISIS (which he insists is ISIL) isn’t a problem, the Department of Justice went after that criminal cartel in…Switzerland. The guys who run the soccer federation, FIFA, because they shook down the South Africans using US Banks for $10,000,000 to locate a World Cup event there.
Never mind the fact that one of Obama’s first acts was to try something very similar to get the International Olympic Committee to consider Chicago. Also last week, they indicted former House Speaker Dennis Hastert for structuring withdrawals of his own money from a bank to put together a bunch of money to pay off some guy who was extorting him. No charges were filed against the extortionist.
We should put signs at Ellis Island saying: “Welcome to the United States of America, where Everybody is a Criminal.”
Despite the best efforts of the bureaucracies we enable with our tax dollars, you cannot put a cop on every corner.
Our system depends on voluntary compliance. Voluntary compliance only happens when there is respect for the system.
How can you respect this system?
The views expressed in this opinion article are solely those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by WesternJournalism.com.
This post originally appeared on Western Journalism – Equipping You With The Truth
Source: http://www.westernjournalism.com/juries-to-law-enforcement-go-find-some-real-criminals/
