Tag: Law and Disorder

The Justice System at Work

What happens when a secret compound is discovered where kids are being held against their will, abused, neglected, and training to shoot up schools? The responsible parties are allowed to walk because the government prosecution team couldn’t be bothered to schedule an appointment:

Two judges dismissed charges Wednesday against the defendants in the New Mexico compound case that has drawn headlines for weeks for its lurid and racially charged details, in a major blow to the prosecution.

Judge Emilio Chavez said that he had no choice but to release the three defendants, Lucas Morton, Hujrah Wahhaj and Subhannah A. Wahhaj, because the office of District Attorney Donald Gallegos failed to schedule a court hearing to prove they had probable cause for their arrest within 10 days, as state rules stipulate, according to court representatives and defense lawyers.

I’m generally not a conspiratorial minded individual but in this case I wouldn’t be surprised if District Attorney Gallegos received a phone call from an agent of a federal three letter agency who informed him that the individuals his people arrested were federal assets (either as part of an idiotic federal law enforcement operation or an equally idiotic foreign proxy war, not that Gallegos would have been told either way) and that the case against them needs to be mishandled (because the story gained too much press for the charges to merely be dropped). It seems extremely unlikely to me that a district attorney would fumble the opportunity to make a name for himself by going after reviled criminals who received wall-to-wall national media coverage.

Security Theater Is Expensive

During the Super Bowl Minneapolis was effectively turned into a giant prison camp. Barriers were erected, snipers were positioned, Humvees were cruising around, and heavily militarized law enforcers from numerous agencies were marching around. While all of that security theater may have looked impressive, it was also expensive:

The department is expected to spend $175.6 million for the fiscal year, coming in at $1.9 million over its $173.7 million budget, according to new projections from the city’s finance department. The projections were a part of a second quarter 2018 financial report presented to the Ways & Means Committee on Tuesday.

“The Police department expects to come in $1.9 million over budget due to payments to other agencies and overtime related to the Super Bowl and SWAT for the X-Games,” read an earlier draft of the report released on Monday. In the final version that was presented at Ways & Means, the wording was revised to “large planned events.”

It’s a good thing that Minneapolis has so many tax cattle to make up for this shortfall. It’s also a good thing that the National Football League was able to subsidize its security expenses by shoving a huge chunk onto the tax cattle. And let’s be honest here, you can’t put a price on the the convenience of the super wealthy tax cattle being able to attend the big game without the hassle of flying to it on their personal jet.

Taking a Plea Bargain Doesn’t Imply Guilt

Reality Winner, who has a rather unfortunate name considering her current circumstances, has plead guilty to alerting the public to surveillance being perpetrated against them by the National Security Administration (NSA):

A former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor who admitted passing secret information to the media has been sentenced to more than five years.

Reality Winner, 26, had faced up to 10 years in prison, but this was reduced to 63 months under a plea deal.

I won’t use the word guilty in her case because I think that it’s time to admit that if somebody is found “guilty” because they took a plea bargain, they probably only admitted guilt because they were under duress and since no trial occurred, they weren’t proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.

Imagine being trapped in a similar situation. Say a prosecutor is threatening you with 10 years in prison if you’re found guilty by a legal system that is heavily stacked against you. However, the prosecutor is willing to cut you a deal. If you make their life easier by admitting guilt, you will only suffer five years in prison. Can you say for certain that you would choose to take your case to court?

Spend a bit of time really considering the scenario. The court where your case will be tried is part of the same government that you’re accused of wronging. The judge who will preside over your case is also an employee of that government. The prosecution will try to get any jurors who might be sympathetic to your cause removed from the pool and the judge will then lie to the jurors by instructing them that they must rule on the letter of the law. Oh, and the agency that you’re accused of wronging controls one of the world’s largest surveillance apparatuses and there is no telling how much information they have about you (this is especially important because the reason you’re accused of wrongdoing is that you were trying to inform the public about the agency’s illegal use of its surveillance powers). It’s easy to see why an accused individual might consider that an unwinnable situation.

People take plea bargains all the time because they look at situations like this and realize that their chances of winning are almost nonexistent, not because they’re actually guilty of the crimes they’re accused of perpetrating.

Airport Law Enforcers Arrest Actual Criminals

Readers, I have a rare story for you today. Airport Law enforcers at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport actually arrested honest to gods criminals:

A federal air marshal “flashed a gun in flight,” prompting police to remove him from the plane upon arrival at the Twin Cities airport and handcuff him on the tarmac along with a fellow marshal, authorities said Tuesday.

It would be nice if this was the beginning of a trend where local law enforcers make the lives of Transportation Security Administration (TSA) personnel as miserable as they make the lives of air travelers. Sadly, I doubt this is the case.

As for the air marshals, they were likely verifying the hair color of a passenger who was caught staring at a noisy child in a cold and penetrating manner during a previous flight.

Failing to Cover Your Ass

One of Trump’s cronies, Michael Cohen, has plead guilty to charges against him. In a move that should surprise nobody, after pleading guilty Cohen decided to snitch on his former client:

US President Donald Trump’s former lawyer, Michael Cohen, has pleaded guilty in a New York court to violating campaign finance laws.

He said he had done so at the direction of “the candidate”, for the “principal purpose of influencing [the] election”.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is why you only conspire with individuals who, after your goals are achieved, will commit suicide by shooting themselves in the back of the head… with a shotgun… twice.

Getting Close to the Action

Body cameras have proven to be a bust as far as holding law enforcers accountable. However, they have provided law enforcers with a wonderful tool that provides prosecutors additional evidence when they record a regular person doing something illegal and unexplained malfunctions when they would have recorded a law enforcer doing something illegal. With that kind of success it’s not surprise that law enforcers want to get even closer to the action:

MAPLE PLAIN, Minn. (KMSP) – Instead of equipping officers with body cameras, the West Hennepin Public Safety Department is mounting cameras on its officers’ guns.

The department announced the rollout of the new technology Thursday. With no buttons to press, the camera automatically starts recording as soon as the gun leaves the holster.

“And it will not turn off while you and I are talking until it is put back into a holster,” said Gary Kroells of the West Hennepin Public Safety Department.

The camera automatically starts recording when the gun leaves the holster, which means it will conveniently miss everything that lead up to the shooting. And the law enforcers can cheer and high-five each other as they watch the close up take of the back of the handcuffed dude’s skull explode in amazing high-definition! Win-win!

If You Shoot Somebody, Perform CPR and You Can’t Be Charged

I’m sure you’ve heard a number of legal urban legends. A prevalent one from my youth was that a law enforcer had to stop following your vehicle after you took a third right turn. Another similar urban legend is that the ruling of a court is illegal if the flag in the courtroom has a gold border because that makes it a maritime flag and the court a maritime court. I now have another one to add to the list: you cannot be charged with murder if you perform CPR on the person you shot:

Attorneys for the former Minneapolis police officer say his attempts to revive victim with CPR vindicate him.

Do you hear that? It’s the sound of desperation. It’s the sound of a lawyer who has a client that is so irredeemable that he doesn’t believe that he can make a valid argument in a court of law. Would it surprise you to know that the lawyer who made this argument is the Officer Noor’s lawyer? I didn’t think so.

Suing the Baker: Episode Two

Remember when advocates for religious liberty were cheering the Supreme Court when it ruled in favor of Jack Phillips, the baker who refused to bake a cake for a same-sex wedding due his religious beliefs? Remember when I pointed out that the ruling had nothing to do with religious liberty because the court ruling related to a technicality, the arguments being put forth by either the defendant or prosecutor? That minor detail that so many people skipped over ensured that this was inevitable:

The Christian baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex couple and was vindicated by the Supreme Court earlier this year is mounting another legal challenge this week after refusing to bake a gender-transitioning cake.

Shortly after the Supreme Court agreed to hear baker Jack Phillips‘ case, an attorney requested he create a cake that was pink on the inside and blue on the outside to represent a gender transition from male to female.

As a Christian, Mr. Phillips would not make the cake since it conflicted with his beliefs, which was his same reasoning for refusing to bake the same-sex couple’s wedding cake.

The state of Colorado has come after Mr. Phillips again, suggesting state law requires him to bake the gender change cake.

Since the Supreme Court didn’t make a ruling on the arguments presented, the issue was never legally resolved, which pretty much guaranteed that somebody else would take Phillips back to court for the same reason.

It’ll be interesting to see how this case turns out. Will it reach the Supreme Court again? If so, will the Supreme Court once again rule on a technicality to dodge the controversy that will be the result of any ruling based on the arguments presented? If it rules on a technicality again, will we see a third episode (hint: we will)?

Dream Job

I never thought that I’d say this but I may be moving to Venezuela. It turns out that the socialist government there has brought back my dream profession:

Political and economic crises are exploding from Venezuela to Nicaragua to Haiti, sparking anarchy and criminality. As the rule of law breaks down, certain spots in the Caribbean, experts say, are becoming more dangerous than they’ve been in years.

Often, observers say, the acts of villainy appear to be happening with the complicity or direct involvement of corrupt officials — particularly in the waters off collapsing Venezuela.

“It’s criminal chaos, a free-for-all, along the Venezuelan coast,” said Jeremy McDermott, co-director of Insight Crime, a nonprofit organization that studies organized crime in Latin America and the Caribbean.

While I’m sure these pirates are being condemned by the Venezuelan government, the two groups are actually doing the exact same thing except the former doesn’t have as much pomp or as many rituals.

The Body Camera Didn’t Record the Summary Execution Because It Was Hacked

The aftermath of DEF CON when the high profile exploits discussed at the event hit the headlines is always fun. Most of the headlines have focused on the complete lack of security that exists on electronic voting machines. I haven’t touch on that because it’s an exercise in beating a dead horse at this point. A story that I found far more interesting due to its likely consequences is the news about the exploits found in popular law enforcer body cameras:

At Def Con this weekend, Josh Mitchell, a cybersecurity consultant with Nuix, showed how various models of body cameras can be hacked, tracked and manipulated. Mitchell looked at devices produced by five companies — Vievu, Patrol Eyes, Fire Cam, Digital Ally and CeeSc — and found that they all had major security flaws, Wired reports. In four of the models, the flaws could allow an attacker to download footage, edit it and upload it again without evidence of any of those changes having occurred.

I assume that these exploits are a feature, not a bug.

Law enforcers already have a problem with “malfunctioning” body cameras. There are numerous instances where multiple law enforcers involved in a shooting with highly questionable circumstances all claimed that their body cameras malfunctioned simultaneously. What has been missing up until this point is a justification for those malfunctions. I won’t be surprised if we start seeing law enforcers claim that their body cameras were hacked in the aftermath of these kinds of shootings. Moreover, the ability of unauthorized individuals to download, edit, and upload footage is another great feature because footage that reflects poorly on law enforcers can be edited and if the edit is discovered, officials can claim that it must have been edited by evil hackers.