Anonymous rips Finch's post:
Is Finch out of his mind when he writes that the judges are afraid of the Herald. Does this man practice in Dade County?If Judges were so afraid of the Herald why would they offer 90 percent of the career criminals who don’t face minimum mandatory sentences the bottom of the sentencing guidelines right before trial?IF they were so concerned about the Herald, why would the Judges engage in this charade in which they switch calendars with each other so that their colleague can offer defendant's a low ball plea offer and they can still max the guy after trial and not seem vindictive?If the Judges were so concerned about the Herald, Why, As Rumpole has noted, Would they sentence someone with no prior arrests to jail because they went to trial?If Judges were so concerned about the Herald why would they try to brow beat all the parties into settling every case without a trial?
Which brings me to a second thought. Why do people who don’t want to try case or decide anything become Judges in the first place? I know the money the retirement blah blah blah but really you gotta do a lot of unpleasant things to get elected and stay elected. You have to grovel for money from people who will no doubt appear before you. You have to go to a lot of rubber chicken dinners and go to a lot of kiwanis club meetings. You have to subject yourself to the embarrassing JNC process and interviews with the Herald. Why go through all that headache if you really don’t want to do what Judges are supposed to do in the first place?
Which brings up a third issue which I think you ought to address rump-- Should Judges even offer pleas at all before trial?
Rumpole Responds: A well thought out reply indeed. I am intrigued about the second point you raised: Some Judges switch calendars so their colleagues can engage in plea negotiations. Then, if the client elects to go to trial, the trial Judge is not bound by the low plea offer.
As fair minded observers, we must see both sides of this issue: On the one hand, as defense attorneys, sometimes we welcome a little judicial intervention with a plea offer a little less than what the prosecutors are offering, to settle the matter. On the other hand, if the client is cantankerous enough to ignore our best advice and proceed to trial, why should the trial judge be bound by the courtesy they extended with the better plea offer to begin with?
We personally have never seen anything nefarious behind the ol’ calendar switch.
This whole issue of trials and sentencing is very complex indeed. To bad our robed readers refuse to enter the fray, even anonymously.
Your comments about chicken dinners and the Kiwanis Club are bound to rub Judge Rosinek the wrong way. He likes the Kiwanis Club meetings and the food they serve. That’s why he’s in drug court. So many rubber chicken dinners have made him very sympathetic to the sufferings of other people with similar addictions.
As to the Herald, we think it has been very clear since the late 80's that a Herald endorsement for Judge is like an oral contract- neither is worth the paper they are written on. We are not blasting the Herald for once, just observing that the sophisitication of politics has passed the Herald's ability to affect a judicial race.
As to Judges even making plea offers, we do have some ideas. We will post them shortly. We try to keep the posts short enough for the attention span of our robed readers who are persuing this while also doing an arraignment calender (so we've heard...snicker snicker snicker).
See You In Court.
I personally hate the calendar "bait and switch" because, invariably, both Judges run late...by the by, any truth to the rumor that Areces sentenced a first time offender to 30 years on a 1st degree grand theft (or something like that)?
ReplyDeleteLove the blog. Keep the faith.
Glad someone else sees it as bait and switch. It is a fraud. Rump, Whether you think a judge who rejects a plea offer should not be bound by that offer is not relevant. The law, which we all must follow (I know its a drag sometimes), is very clear that there is something inherently vindictive about a court offering a 3 year plea before trial and then sentencing the guy to 30 after trial. And playing bait and switch doesnt change that becuase you still have a judge offering a plea and then another Judge will inevitably learn that the defendant rejected a plea. Judges may not like this caselaw because it hurts them in keeping thier auidts low which after all is the most important consierdation in the adminstration of Justice. That being the case our Jurists have devised bait and switch.
ReplyDeleteBest policy to ensure that no one gets vindictively sentenced is to have judges not engage in any plea discussions at all.
Rump, I know you might throw yourself off a building becuase its been done this way since you got out of law school with David Weed but that doesnt make it just. In many states judicial plea bargaining doesnt occur and caseloads are managed defendants go to trial and dont get punished for excercising a fundamental right.