Abbie Hoffman Moment

Abbie Hoffman Moment

Abbie Hoffman Moment

In The Skyway While Black

Here's a video that was taken in St. Paul, Minnesota, in January of 2014. It shows a black man being arrested because he waited in a public place, a skyway, for his children to get out of school. Someone had called the police to complain that there was a black man in the skyway, and the police responded, as if it were an actual emergency. Then, after finding no crime in progress, they took the man to jail, leaving his children with no one to take them home. The person who attempted to record the whole incident was forced to reclaim his cell phone, by the way. It was unlawfully confiscated. Here's the ACLU guide for snapping pictures and video in public places.

To those who really don't understand why there were riots in Ferguson, Missouri because of Michael Brown's death, or why is it important to hold police officers in Baltimore, Maryland accountable for the death of Freddie Gray, just remember that digital photography has become the great equalizer.

Where's The Real Killer, Alabama?

This past week, an innocent man was freed from death row in Alabama, after being held hostage by the judicial system for nearly thirty years. After a murder in 1985, a trial, involving actual evidence, apparently was not important. Ballistics from the alleged murder weapon, as in whether or not the bullets actually came from the gun police randomly decided COULD have been the murder weapon, were never even requested by the prosecution. The defense had only a limited amount to spend on expert testimony, and no one cared. Anthony Ray Hinton spent thirty years on death row for a crime he did not commit.

Prosecutors are not held to very high standards. There is a prosecutor in Northeast Kansas whose son damaged her vehicle by driving it through a neighbor's crops, and when the neighbor complained and the vehicle wouldn't run properly, she attempted to accuse a random constituent (who happens to be an older woman who has never worked on cars) of sabotage! No demand for responsibility on the part of her own son! She even fixed the vehicle her son damaged and gave it back to him, allowing him, once again, to prey upon the neighbors' fields, gardens, and mailboxes! But that's small potatoes compared to Hinton's case, and others like it, that have been bungled, not only because of prosecutorial misconduct and indifference, but enabled by the level of comfort felt by the general public when the wrong person, in an inordinate number of cases, a black person, is convicted of a crime he or she did not commit. In this case, no one even looked for the actual perpetrator, who apparently got away with murder. How many more murders could this person have committed in thirty years?

Half a life behind bars cannot actually be repaid to Mr. Hinton. Neither can a damaged reputation or thirty years worth of lost opportunities. How will the prosecution go about attempting to make right any murders committed by the real killer in this case, who was never prosecuted? Was the racist indifference worth it, Alabama?

Through Time And Space To Talk To You

I wish I could chase away your memory of that day on the wings of the wind, and send the whole thing down the current, through the rivers of time, forever. No one deserved it. I cannot imagine which is worse, untimely death, or living under such a shadow. Keep the faith, Junior. I believe in your innocence.

Public School Teachers In Kansas And Religion

Precedence In Case Law To Allow Strangulation?

I was just informed by a rather persistent troll that because of a recent Kansas court case, one in which yours truly was a witness, there is now a precedent to strangle our relatives, friends, and neighbors. My troll is very, very upset because the defendant demanded his right to a trial, presented his case, and won. The charges were false, as nearly as I could tell, from what I witnessed of the incident. A desire to see an innocent man sent to prison is certainly disturbing, but such tends to be the manner of Christianity in the Midwest. The troll has even proposed hosting a party for such violence, offering that it is now legal. Hopefully, this was not a threat.

Precedence in court cases refers to cases in which existing law is interpreted either in a new way, or cases to which the court determines that existing law applies in situations where it traditionally has not applied in the past. This allows new or expanded interpretations of existing law, and sometimes different resulting actions or court orders. The prevailing decision will set a "precedent". All of this is based upon actual law. The laws, themselves, do not change. Crime does not become legal this way.

A decision by a judge or by a jury that a defendant is not guilty of criminal charges does not set a precedent for that crime to become legal. This is where my troll lacks understanding. In a criminal case, the argument is not about whether or not the crime is legal, but about whether or not the defendant actually committed the crime. A verdict of not guilty only serves to absolve the defendant of any false charges, it does not change the law.

The defendant in this case finds it unusual that certain people who had flown under the banner of "friends", mostly employees at the sorry-assed excuse for a local public school in his town, have not congratulated him because he won his case. Even more nauseating are teachers who continue to tell children, including those in close association with the defendant's children, that he is guilty, in spite of the decision by the court was that he is not guilty. These teachers practically climbed over each other to badmouth the defendant before trial, yet upon acquittal, refuse to apologize or tell all to whom they have unjustly gossiped that they were wrong. The superintendent was unaware of the court's decision until recently. Shouldn't these Christian teachers, who never miss an opportunity to force their religion on others, admit they made a mistake and try to amend all the damage they have done? Or does Jesus only initiate assholes to join his petty and ridicules churches?

Insight

 

 

Cat v. Christmas Tree

I'm not really in your tree! I'm innocent!

 

Derrick Deacon Is Finally Free

Derrick Deacon just got released from prison in New York, after serving almost twenty-five years behind bars for a murder he did not commit. After new testimony and new evidence surfaced, Deacon was granted a new trial. It took a jury all of nine minutes to find Deacon "Not Guilty" with the new evidence. Congratulations to Derrick Deacon for standing up for himself all these years, but why did he get convicted in the first place? It seems that the district attorney's office in Kings county, New York, didn't have the balls to go after a gang member who shot a teenager during a robbery, so police arrested a homeless man, Deacon, instead. A young woman by the name of Colleen Campbell saw the actual killer, and told law enforcement. While she did not know the identity of the actual killer, she knew who Deacon was, and that he did not commit the murder. This should have been sufficient, in the absence of any other evidence, to rule Deacon out. but not so fast......gangs are dangerous and notorious for vengeance, and homeless people do not put up much of a fight when coerced and pushed around, and Kings County needed a conviction, right? A homeless man is much safer to victimize than a gang member, so the prosecutor saw to it that Deacon was arrested and prosecuted for the crime, instead of the guilty party. When Campbell didn't want to convict an innocent man, investigators and prosecutors threatened to have her children removed from her home!

"Deacon's case raises troubling questions about how he was convicted in the first place. The Village Voice reports that Deacon was convicted after investigators coerced a witness named Colleen Campbell, who knew he hadn't commited the crime.

At Deacon's retrial, Campbell said authorities had threatened to take her kids away if she testified that she knew Deacon wasn't the killer, according to the Village Voice. Another witness testified that Deacon did commit the shooting, which was enough to convict him."......Mike Krumboltz, Yahoo News.

Since when does testifying in court, or not testifying in court, or telling the truth, for that matter.....equal child abuse or child neglect? This stunt of threatening the children of witnesses in order to gain untruthful testimony seems to be a prosecutor's ace in the hole, these days! Is this the true role of Child Protective Services, assisting prosecutors in the attainment of wrongful convictions by threatening to hold hostage the children of witnesses? That might help explain why caseloads are bursting at the seams, and why Child Protective Services isn't always available to the child who actually needs them! Taxpayers are forced to pay them to enforce the whims of crooked court officials! Sad, but apparently true.

Twenty-five years of an innocent man's life.