Well, I’m still scraping my jaw off my keyboard after this one.
The AP is reporting tonight that the lawyer for Brian David Mitchell is saying…
"that giving a light sentence to his client - whom he referred to as ‘the perpetrator’ - could send a signal to kidnappers that they should keep their captives alive.
“‘If we can somehow set up some structure where the message gets out that if you bring the girl back alive, that there’s some kind of commutation of the sentence, we may be much better off as a society.’”
Attention, pedophiles: When you’re done raping little children, please deposit them alive at the nearest police department to receive credit for time off for good behavior.
Bonus WTF-material: He’s also suggesting that Elizabeth Smart be referred to by the “married” name Mitchell gave her, Shear Jashub Isaiah.
Disgusting, but not really surprising. I mean, he is the guy’s lawyer. You can’t really expect him to admit, “My client is the scum of the earth. Let’s lock him up and throw away the key.” The guy was caught red-handed; the lawyer’s gotta come up with some angle to try and get his client off, no matter how stupid it sounds. I’m sure he doesn’t really expect anyone to actually fall for it. He’s grasping at straws.
The lawyer for Mitchell is hired to zealously represent his client. He’s not doing scummy things, he’s trying to do what it takes to get his client the best deal possible. He’s doing his job. I don’t think you can fault him for it and it certainly doesn’t piss me off.
That said, I don’t agree with him suggesting Elizabeth Smart be referred to by her married name. That, I believe, will be completely counter productive to his goal of either a) working a deal with the DA or b) bringing the jury around to his client’s side.
Interestingly, the argument he’s making is actually based on a very old one (an old argument which carried the day, and ironically proves that Mitchell’s argument is wrong). Warning: this is all hazy law school memories I’m relying on here, so caveat lector.
Anyway, back in the day, the penalty for pretty much everything was death. Murder – death; rape – death; robbery – death; theft – death; kidnapping – death; and so on and so forth.
A couple of bright thinkers pointed out that this left, say, highway robbers almost no incentive to keep their victims alive. After all, they’re risking the hangman’s noose anyway – why not just go on and kill the only other witness? Heck, that might actually reduce your chances of dangling from a rope.
So it was proposed that crimes should be punished with more of an eye toward their relative severity. And thus was modern sentencing born.
Anyway, Mitchell’s lawyer’ argument is silly in this context; whatever the penalty for kidnapping a child, it is certainly less than the penalty for murdering a child (a capital offense in many states). Mitchell has already “mitigated” his sentence (to use the term loosely) by not killing the girl because he would be subject to much greater penalties if he had killed her.
Isn’t this just one lawyer being a tool , as opposed to everyday lawyers who do good work?
There is a personal injury lawyer who has put adverts on almost evey single page of the Yellow pages, in my phone book. It makes one not want to hire him, as I find it incredibly annoying.
Good luck trying to “set up some structure” that insane kidnappers will take into account when deliberating as to what to do next. They are, after all, INSANE KIDNAPPERS! Should we expect them to do a cost-benefit analysis or something?
I think giving the maximum allowable sentence on ALL charges is the only way to go. Someone that is going to kidnap and kill a child isn’t going to suddenly think “But if I return her/him alive, I won’t get into as much trouble!”. What kind of dolt actually believes any fucking piece of shit that would commit such a crime will even entertain this ridiculous idea?
This whole fucking thing sucks.
And the media in general should be gathered together in a small room and gassed. These fucks just have to know exactly what kind of abuse this poor girl went through. They won’t come right out and say “So tell us, exactly what sexual acts did he perform on her?”. But they certainly have crossed the line of decency on this and are practically drooling all over theirselves as they come up with clever questions trying to get the family to talk about specifics on the sexual abuse. Fuck you media! Fuck you all in the ass with a 50 lb. porcupine! It’s none of your goddamn business what she suffered. It should be enough to know that she had to go through this ordeal. The whole fucking world does not need to know all of the sordid details. Some even seem to imply that she was with this beast voluntarily because of her comments to the police when she was found. :smack:
Journalist have become in my eyes some of the lowest form of life found on earth. Just slightly above the asshole that committed this horrendous crime. Fucking pricks.
Ender and Dewey, there’s “representing one’s client,” and then there’s “continuing to antagonize a victim and her family,” and the attorney’s comments fall under the latter. I’m not trying to bash lawyers here, but this guy is just sick. If he wants to claim Mitchell’s loonier than shit, that’s fine, but requesting that Smart be referred to by the married name Mitchell gave her is akin to mentally raping her and the family.
kp, I appreciate your compassion on this, but start your own damn thread if you want to piss on the media. It’s not pleasant, but it is in the realm of a legitimate question to ask (without going into salacious details) whether Smart was sexually molested. You want to live in a fantasy land and believe that she wasn’t, that’s fine. But if that’s what happened, then that needs to come out in media reports and in the trial. And the reports I’ve read have been pretty clear that even if Smart apppeard reluctant to be rescued, it can be attributed to Stockholm Syndrome. None of the reports I’ve seen have come close to impying that Smart had free will in this matter.
Kindly point out where in my post I suggested otherwise.
All I did was provide an interesting tidbit of legal history, and then explained why the attorney’s argument is seriously flawed. I honestly don’t see anything in my post that commented one way or the other on the propriety of the attorney’s conduct.
I agree, but I don’t agree.
Let’s take the second one first. Sometimes “representing one’s client” means “antagonizing someone.” That’s the nature of the job. That doesn’t mean you must antagonize someone. I’m not saying that at all. What I’m saying is that a lawyer must do all that he or she legally can to help the person being represented. If that means others are annoyed, then that is what happens. The line of defense isn’t drawn at someone else’s perturbed factor.
But that said, I think you missed the point in my original post where I happened to agree with you on this. I think calling Elizabeth Smart by her “married” name does nothing but alienate all those from whom the lawyer needs sympathy . It is, IMO, a bad strategy because I see no upside from it. It is a bad thing to do not because it may aggrevate the victim, but because it hurts his client.
I think the lawyer, if he really did say that Elizabeth should be referred to by “her married name,” crossed well into territory other than “zealously representing his client.”
Dewey, I thought kidnapping was a federal capital offense if the victim was taken across state lines. (Little Lindbergh law, I believe?)
Couldn’t Mitchell get the needle for this in a federal case?
Mitchell probably demande that the lawyer make that asinine request about what to call Elizabeth, but, still the lawyer should have told him to cram it up his ass. It hurts both his client and the victim.
If his lawyer did a piss poor job wouldn’t that be grounds for a new trial?
Right now, the circumstantial evidence of BDM’s prior employment with the Smarts, the ID made by the sister and the fact that he was actually caught with the girl in his company make the possibility of acquittal seem very remote to someone as untrained in legal matters as I am. There is probably some even more damaging evidence included in his post capture statements. It would seem that the best the lawyer could do is somehow try to make the case that Elizabeth left of her own free will and plead for leniency. The free will thing seems barely tenable and still leaves BDM open for prosecution under some other statutes I’m sure. So, what’s the poor fella who’s supposed to give a quality defense for BDM to do?
I mean,
Remember that if it’s half-assed or non-existent then BDM gets a new trial and the question repeats itself.
Maybe the married name thing is part of a free will defense of some sort. She did have ample opportunity to escape/ expose her identity. The little sister did wait two hours before notifying the parents, and only remebered that the kidnapper looked just like Emmanuel after several months had passed. IF Elizabeth did go willingly, these odd actions of her little sister and Elizabeth’s apparent lack of desire to escape or reveal her identity suddenly seem sensible.
I’d sure hate to have to try and sell a jury on the idea.
If she was transported across state lines, and it appears she was, it would be a federal case. But death penalty doesn’t apply unless the kidnappee is murdered. (18 USC 1201)
What SmackFu said, to which I’ll add I haven’t yet heard of federal charges being brought in this case – I was under the impression that this would be a Utah prosecution.
