Tuesday, November 27, 2018

WHO DECIDES IF MULLER LIED? & RED LIGHT CAMERAS TOSSED IN DADE

BREAKING: JUDGE LEIFMAN TOSSES RED LIGHT CAMERAS. TICKET CLINIC PREVAILS! CLICK HERE.
In a procedure that has caught even Rumpole by surprise, Leifman bypassed the circuit court appellate division (Sorry Judge De La O) and sent his decision directly to the 3rd DCA (Motto "The Federalist Society Rocks!"). Who knew there was such a procedure? 

Here's the opening paragraph of an opinion piece in The Hill.

(For those of you who wear robes to work, The Hill is one of the pre-eminent news organizations covering Capitol Hill, which for those of you who wear robes to work, is the metonym used to denote the Senate and Congress in our nation's capitol)

Prosecutors call them cooperating witnesses. The rest of the criminal justice system calls them rats, snitches, chivatos, stool pigeons, informants and sapos, just to name a few of the terms. The federal criminal justice system is built on these witnesses. So long as they tell “the truth,” they receive enormous reductions in their sentences. In some cases, sentences for defendants convicted after trial are 500 percent longer than sentences received by those who plead and cooperate with the government. 
So it’s no surprise that trials have dropped from almost 20 percent of all cases in the 1980s to less than 3 percent today (with most all the rest of the cases resolving in a plea). Like the days of Salem witches, even the innocent are racing to plead guilty and to tell the prosecutors what they want to hear in the hopes of avoiding monstrous sentences.
Who was the author of this learned opinion piece? None other than Miami's own DOM. DOM argues that because prosecutors decide if a defendant has been truthful in a debriefing, defendants naturally tell prosecutors what they think they want to hear, as opposed to the truth. 
DOM doesn't propose an alternative. He just decries the current system. 
So what is the alternative? Judges do not sit in on debriefings. If they are asked to decide if a defendant was truthful then a record would have to be kept of every debriefing and no prosecutor worth their salt that we know would want that. 

Perhaps the system of cooperation should be ended. But then that would put a majority of our brethren who do not know how to do anything other than fold like a cheap suit at the first appearance of the feds out of business. And most of these "fee and plea" lawyers  do not know how to write wills or draft a closing. 

So what is the alternative? 
Have at it. 

2 comments:

  1. — Carlos Muñiz, former chief of staff to Attorney General Pam Bondi, is on the list of 11 finalists for three openings on the Florida Supreme Court.
    — John Daniel Couriel, a former federal prosecutor and now lawyer with the Kobre & Kim law firm in Miami. He also ran unsuccessfully for House District 114 in 2016 as a Republican.
    — Jonathan D. Gerber, chief judge of the 4th District Court of Appeal in West Palm Beach. He was first appointed by then-Republican Gov. Charlie Crist in 2009.
    — Jamie Rutland Grosshans, a judge on the 5th District Court of Appeal in Daytona Beach. She was appointed by Gov. Scott earlier this year.
    — Jeffrey T. Kuntz, a judge on the 4th District Court of Appeal. Scott appointed him in 2016.
    — Bruce Kyle, a circuit judge in the 20th Judicial Circuit in Fort Myers. He also served as a Republican in the Florida House from 1998 to 2006.
    — Barbara Lagoa, a judge on the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Miami. She was first appointed by Gov. JebBush in 2006.
    — Robert J. Luck, also a judge on the 3rd District Court of Appeal in Miami. Scott appointed him to the court in 2013.
    — Timothy D. Osterhaus, a judge on the 1st District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee. The former state Solicitor General was appointed to the court by Scott in 2013.
    — Samuel J. Salario Jr., a judge on the 2nd District Court of Appeal in Lakeland. He was appointed by Scott in 2014.
    — Anuraag Singhal, a circuit judge in the 17th Judicial Circuit in Fort Lauderdale. He was first appointed by Scott in 2011.
    Couriel, Lagoa and Luck will be considered separately for one seat that has to be filled by a resident of the state’s Third Appellate District in South Florida; the other two seats are at-large

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  2. Does not look very good for PI attorneys.

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