True. Alert, aware citizens could also help prevent theft, drug-trafficking, kidnapping, child endangerment and so on…none of which are likely terrorist dry runs (well, maybe they do finance with drugs, but they’re hardly alone in drug dealing).
Neither did many of us who were right across the street, at least until later. Yet no one who was there and is still around started talking about a “suicide by train” individual being a terrorist experimenter. Maybe we’re more jaded; local subway and rail crossing suicides are common enough that the story only gets buried deep in the paper (unless you get a confluence of events, such as in CA).
I thought it was crazy enough that the D.A. was pushing murder charges; the death penalty? That’s fuckin’ nuts. To get a murder conviction, they’re going to have to prove that this guy knew that his Jeep Cherokee could derail a train, or that a reasonable person would have known that. I sure as hell didn’t know that – I’m still thinking that if it weren’t for this “push train” configuration, it wouldn’t have derailed. So how is the jury going to find him guilty? Where’s the element of malice? Where’s the intent? Where did the D.A. go to law school?
On top of that, the guy may have been incapable of conceiving that the train would derail – inability to perceive the consequences of one’s actions is a classic criterion for legal insanity.
It’s impossible to back down now; it’ll be political suicide to let the guy plead down, or to reduce the charges. So they’re going to go in and try to get a murder conviction, and nothing but, and the jury will let him walk. That, or the judge will vacate the decision. The same thing happened with a similar act of prosecutorial idiocy in San Francisco (remember the dog-mauling case?).
IANAL, but I think the act of parking his jeep on the tracks was a felony and whenever somebody is killed while a crime is being committed, even if that was not the intent, then the accused can be charged with murder.
Concur. And they tell the news outlets the maximum possible sentence, which always gets repeated, versus the most likely sentence. Adds another level of fear to the negotiations.
Wrong. obstructing a train WITH THE INTENT TO DERAIL IT is a felony. If they can prove that he even knew a Jeep could derail a train, they might have something. Merely interfering with a train is a misdemeanor.
or look up:
CALIFORNIA CODES
PENAL CODE SECTION 217.1-219.3
Normally, that’s good strategy; I’m not sure, though, that it’s so smart to raise those expectations immediately in the wake of such a tragedy. People will get kinda pissed if he pleas down to manslaughter.