Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench • Hacker News Board

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#201

Post by tomohawk » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 11:37 AM UTC

smt88 wrote: post #184

tomohawk wrote: post #160

All judicial positions should have a set term, after which a new judge is appointed to the position, even at the Supreme Court level. For example, at the Supreme Court level, if each position was an 18 year term, each offset by 2 years, then a new justice would be nominated every other year to serve no more than 18 years. If a judge left early, the position would be filled until the end of the term. This would preven…

> All judicial positions should have a set term, after which a new judge is appointed to the position, even at the Supreme Court level. The problem with this is exactly the problem with all term limits: you can "sell" your decisions at the end of your term. Example: Kentucky's former governor pardoned some incredibly repulsive people because they were donors (or connected to donors)[1] and he had already lost his ele…

You can't fix stupid. There is no perfect system. But, we can do better. Requiring judges to go through a periodic review to continue seems like a good thing to try.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#202

Post by pjc50 » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 11:38 AM UTC

logicchop wrote: post #122

FpUser wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. Just prohibit jailing people for being too poor to paying tickets and similar "crimes". This definitely does not require mandatory sentences which is an evil on its own.

Your "Just prohibit.. " line sounds like a mandatory sentence to me; just in this case a mandatory sentence of "none." What would be left to the judge's discretion exactly?

Most jurisdictions do indeed have maximum sentence tarriffs for crimes, yes. UK example: https://www.sentencingcouncil.org.uk/offences/magistrates-co...

i.e. someone who has been banned from driving due to previous offences but who is caught driving may be sentenced to a maximum of 6 months in prison.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#203

Post by SkyBelow » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 12:34 PM UTC

elbigbad wrote: post #141

SkyBelow wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you effectively are creating a maximum punishment that could easily be ignored by some of the population. Take speeding tickets. What if a person just decides not to pay and keep speeding? Not that they can't, but they don't. Eventually you lose your licenses. You continue to speed, getting more tickets, and now also getting tickets for driving without a license. You continue to refuse to pay the fines and conti…

> Then you effectively are creating a maximum punishment that could easily be ignored by some of the population. No, just moving what the maximum punishment is from jail time to a boot on their tire. Conversely, who says jail time is enough? Why not make the maximum even worse than jail? At some point you have to have a max, just advocating that the max is reduced. > Take speeding tickets. What if a person just decid…

>Conversely, who says jail time is enough? Why not make the maximum even worse than jail? At some point you have to have a max, just advocating that the max is reduced.

Well the maximum penalty is a combination of death or solitary confinement, depending upon if the lethal force subdues a person enough to put them in solitary or if it kills them.

Please remember, I'm not talking about the penalty prescribed for a given specific crime but instead the penalty that follows a series of escalations where the escalations would be deemed common, and often lawful behavior, if not for the fact it is against someone acting on behalf of the court/law enforcement system.

Take being taken to jail. Outside of the legal system, someone trying to forcefully locate you into a caged environment ran like a jail would be kidnapping (and possibly enslavement) and lethal force to resist them would be a natural response. So someone being arrested can either submit to the law, in that they realize the person arresting them has the right to do so and thus allows the punishment to follow, or they can resist. In the latter case increasing force will be used to subdue them, potentially resulting in their being killed.

This is part of the philosophy that all laws are enforced by the barrel of a gun. That is speaking as a last resort in the worst case, not in the common case.

>How about a boot on their car? Seizure of their car for failure to have a license? Mandatory community service?

If they submit to these then that is that. But we are talking about the maximum penalty for someone who resists. What happens when they continue to resist? Not show up for community service? Not show up for court? Do you send police to arrest them?

>Assaulting someone is evil in itself

Not when done in defense of property (even if you don't believe in self defense, do you support police having the right to arrest a thief and use physical force if they resist). If the person respects the law's claim to their car then the escalation stops, but I'm talking worst case where they do not respect the legal structure enforcing the law.

>Most crimes have a maximum punishment.

Only if you submit to the punishment. Not submitting is accompanied by a harsher penalty.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#204

Post by SkyBelow » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 12:45 PM UTC

deleuze wrote: post #183

SkyBelow wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you effectively are creating a maximum punishment that could easily be ignored by some of the population. Take speeding tickets. What if a person just decides not to pay and keep speeding? Not that they can't, but they don't. Eventually you lose your licenses. You continue to speed, getting more tickets, and now also getting tickets for driving without a license. You continue to refuse to pay the fines and conti…

Yeah that would be a great argument if it wasn't for the fact that anyone who can afford a lawyer is never going to go to jail for unpaid tickets.

The threat of escalation by the legal system is why they seek a lawyer to engage the legal system instead of ignoring the legal system like you see in places where the legal system does not have power to escalate.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#205

Post by ascotan » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 1:18 PM UTC

rayiner wrote: post #64

There is some horrible conduct detailed on here, but also not so horrible conduct: > They included a California judge who had sex in his courthouse chambers, once with his former law intern and separately with an attorney; a New York judge who berated domestic violence victims; and a Maryland judge who, after his arrest for driving drunk, was allowed to return to the bench provided he took a Breathalyzer test before…

I like the way the ancient greeks did it. Every year we write a name of the person that we want removed from public office. The person with the most votes gets banished for 10 years.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#206

Post by tomerv » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 1:59 PM UTC

candiodari wrote: post #196

kortilla wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this particular example of the mother being in prison, where would the children live without these services?

The best answer for that question is in 99% of cases (light offenders) also in prison (not locked up. With the mother still taking them to school, ideally the same school). There's research that this is both the best for the child and a very effective way to reduce recidivism. And let's not forget that there really aren't that many effective ways to reduce recidivism, so this ought to be worth a lot to society. Gener…

I think we all agree that in this case the mother - who is a light offender - should not have gotten such a harsh sentence. Your vision of the mother being with the child effectively means that the mother gets a lighter sentence. But sadly that's not the case here... so you're either saying we should abolish hard sentences to light offenders (or maybe just those with children?), or you're not really answering the question.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#207

Post by tomerv » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 2:06 PM UTC

SquishyPanda23 wrote: post #185

throwaway0a5e wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>how does it do any good to put her behind bars at all The good it does is deterrence to the rest of the population. Or that's how authoritarians like to see these sorts of dis-proportionate punishments.

Nobody gives a sentence like that as a deterrent. You give a sentence like that out of cruelty toward people you don't like who you want to stick it to.

Many people have some misguided belief in the power of deterrence. My point of view is that if you want to scare people from doing something bad, you need to catch it early (the "it's going on your permanent record" approach to scaring middle-schoolers into behaving). Once someone is a repeat offender, it's probably too late to change them.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#208

Post by briffle » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 2:13 PM UTC

analyte123 wrote: post #134

candiodari wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The whole thing there can be reduced to the observation: why does society let foster care and youth protective services exist? You might say "well to protect kids". Except, there's a massive body of research proving that they make things worse, certainly on average: https://sci-hub.se/10.1257/aer.97.5.1583 Massive negative effects, from reading scores, to later earnings, to subjective happiness (yes, really, kids rep…

Child protection is like a loaded gun sitting on a table waiting for someone to pick it up. Anyone who doesn't like you or the way you raise your kids can phone in a trumped-up complaint and send investigators in your home to see if your child needs to be taken away and put into a lowest-bidder archipelago of foster homes and group facilities. Disgusting all around to me.

I have actually been a foster parent, and have had kids come to my house at 11pm, that you can smell from 7 feet away, covered in lice, with a single backpack with all their possesions. One kid called 911 because mom and dad wouldn't wake up (heroin). Some suffering from Sex Abuse, some literally starving, etc. Yes, Foster Care has its problems (and part of why I don't do it anymore) but there ARE legitimate needs in the communities. I would love to know what you think it should be replaced with?

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#209

Post by sneak » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 2:21 PM UTC

Reedx wrote: post #19

chidog12 wrote: post #3

> Judge Les Hayes once sentenced a single mother to 496 days behind bars for failing to pay traffic tickets. The sentence was so stiff it exceeded the jail time Alabama allows for negligent homicide. > Johnson’s three children were cast into foster care while she was incarcerated. One daughter was molested, state records show. Another was physically abused. Speechless... Makes my blood boil

Seriously, even if she failed to pay 10,000 traffic tickets, how does it do any good to put her behind bars at all? They really couldn't think of a better way to deal with non-violent offense??

Let’s not pretend:

It’s because she’s black.

White authorities in the American South (this was in Alabama) have been jailing, fining, beating, harassing, blackballing, and even lynching black people for hundreds of years.

It continues to date.

Re: Thousands of U.S. judges who broke laws, oaths remained on the bench

#210

Post by curryst » Wed, Jul 01, 2020, 2:49 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #85

godelski wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also that many judges are appointed. > In the last election, I tried to find out about the local judges on my ballot and could find virtually nothing. In my last election I had the voting booklet. There were two judges running for a position. One had a website and the other (the incumbent) didn't. Honestly, a lot of candidates I found didn't have websites. If you aren't going to take the time to make a simple website…

I don't understand why a judge would have a website. That's so crazy to me. They're not supposed to be appealing to anyone. They're supposed to interpret the law as it's written. They're technocrats. What would you like to see on a judge's website? Their opinions on things? They shouldn't have any personal opinions!

They absolutely have opinions, often about how to interpret the law. This is why Supreme Court decisions always have the "dissenting opinion" document listing out why they think the majority decision was incorrect.

Many laws are not so black and white that the decision is explicit. You have to handle weird chain of custody questions, whether evidence was seized lawfully, etc, etc.