I think Kate’s Law is simply an anti-illegal immigrant measure being pounced on as an opportunity, and that mandatory sentencing is a bad idea.
That being said, wasn’t it Obama who once said something to the effect of, “Never let a crisis go to waste (as a chance to promote a political platform?)” After Sandy Hook, I believe.
It was a Rahm Emanuel quote from 2008/2009.
You never want a serious crisis to go to waste. And what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you think you could not do before.
-Rahm Emanuel
First of all, what I said was, never allow a good crisis to go to waste when it’s an opportunity to do things that you had never considered, or that you didn’t think were possible.
-Rahm Emanuel
Oregon has minimum sentencing for the most serious of crimes … rape, murder, arson … however the People won’t fund the added prison space … so once our prisons were full the local DA’s had to quit charging people with these crimes …
Well done, folks, well done indeed …
That’s why federal crimes are the best kind of crimes. China is paying for our prisons with its bond purchases, and there’s no limit. If China steps out in a humph, we can sell bonds to Japan or our own FRB. Interest rates will rise, as will inflation, but so what? The best kind of people have financial advisers who know how to protect the best people’s copious assets from the scourges of inflation. Suffering among the lower breeds can be blamed on the Chinese, Mexicans, Muslims and liberals.
And with no oversight, federal prisoners can be served dogfood on a steak-lobster budget. Win, win.
Look at stock prices. CCA’s stock prices plummeted in the late nineties and have never recovered. Cornell, CSC, and Wackenhut lost so much money they went out of business. GEO Group, which bought up most of these companies, is also in financial difficulties.
Those developments show only that private prisons weren’t as profitable as hoped in a world in which regulation existed.
In a world in which regulations are disposable, profit becomes not just possible, but assured.
Privatization is the gift that keeps on giving for the top 1%–the working classes pay higher taxes, which go into the pockets of the privatizers. They are then free to spend as little as they wish on the prisons, schools, Veterans, etc.
Who’s going to stop them? Trump won’t–he’ll be getting his own cut. Congress won’t–they will be either directly or indirectly paid by the privatizers (who may be their own family members in some cases). The Supreme Court? Don’t make me laugh.
Who’s going to stop them?
Updating this thread:
Kate Steinle trial: Jose Ines Garcia Zarate found not guilty of murder in fatal pier shooting
They apparently believed his defense:
It’s a tough one, but without an actual eyewitness to the moment of the shot I can easily see agreeing with the jury here. Reasonable doubt is pretty easy to raise when there is a ricochet and no motive.
It’d be extremely difficult to intentionally murder someone with a ricochet. If the ricochet wasn’t in doubt, they shouldn’t have charged him with murder in the first place. They should have charged him with involuntary manslaughter.
Then it would have been said that was further proof they are “soft” on “illegals”. Outraged reaction makes for bad legal decision making.
Am I missing something? The reports I’m looking at – here’s one from CNN, but I can give you a second and a third and a fourth – say that he was charged with, and just now acquitted of, involuntary manslaughter.
The jury was given the choice of 1rst or second degree murder or involuntary manslaughter. The prosecution for most of the trial was pushing for second degree murder, but apparently in their summation went a step further and made an argument for 1rst degree murder.
He was, however, convicted of being a felon in possession of a gun.
Judging from this link, which seems to be a great article on the specifics of the ballistics investigations related to this event, seems to indicate that the ricochet was pretty well established. The ricochet point was far closer to Zarate than Steinle, only about 15 feet away from him. The prosecution tried to argue it was a “skip shot” resulting from Zarate’s inexperience and/or anxiety, but that seems like a real stretch to me that someone intentionally aiming a gun would end up shooting the ground a short distance in front of them.
That would seem to eliminate the murder charges. Even for the involuntary manslaughter charge, does it make sense that Zarate would pull a trigger to shoot the ground a short distance away? An accidental discharge may actually be the most believable of these scenarios and I could certainly understand not believing any of the charges were met beyond a reasonable doubt.
More accurately he was charged with murder with the jury having the option of involuntary manslaughter as a lesser conviction. He was convicted of neither, so yes, he was acquitted of involuntary manslaughter. But what I meant was that IMO he should have been charged directly with involuntary manslaughter, without the murder charge. With the prosecution arguing for involuntary manslaughter at trial, and the ricochet being an element of the case rather than an element of the defense, they’d have a better chance of conviction. And beyond the courtoom, in terms of “the actual truth”, it seems highly unlikely to have been murder, factually speaking.
I support Kate’s Law and I support tougher measures to restrict illegal immigrations.
That said, I’m not sure that the San Francisco jury was wrong.
Agreed.