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Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

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Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#21

Post by eurleif »

rdl wrote: post #16
danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

Maybe we should be replacing prosecutors who remain technologically ignorant years after these issues come up. If her job responsibilities include prosecuting computer crime, she needs to understand the applicability of computers to crime, otherwise she's not doing her job. Being old and an appointed official is no excuse anymore. It's not as if she's a holdover from the Reagan years. She was an early appointment by…

I'm not disagreeing here, simple asking for information: how has she demonstrated an ignorance of technology?

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#22

Post by john_b »

danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

I agree especially with your last sentence. The torches-and-pitchforks crowd is missing the main point here.

However, whether or not she is "evil" is irrelevant. She clearly went after Swartz with a self-righteous zeal that was far divorced from the seriousness of the alleged crime. I don't know if someone in the US Justice Department had beef with Swartz they wanted to settle, or if they just wanted to make an example of someone, but one thing is certain and that's that until these prosecutors face actual backlash to their jobs and reputation when they go so far overboard, nothing whatsoever will change. They simply have no disincentive for this kind of irresponsible and unprofessional behavior at the moment.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#23

Post by danso »

eurleif wrote: post #21
rdl wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we should be replacing prosecutors who remain technologically ignorant years after these issues come up. If her job responsibilities include prosecuting computer crime, she needs to understand the applicability of computers to crime, otherwise she's not doing her job. Being old and an appointed official is no excuse anymore. It's not as if she's a holdover from the Reagan years. She was an early appointment by…

I'm not disagreeing here, simple asking for information: how has she demonstrated an ignorance of technology?

I know you're responding directly to the parent comment but for my part, I'll say that that's not my own accusation, just a possible speculation. Sometimes the reasons for terrible machinery to move ahead are rather banal.

I'll say for sure that a lot of the initial backing by legislators for SOPA/PIPA was just status quo informed by vague technical understanding of the issue, and not because everyone was in the pockets of the movie industry.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#24

Post by objclxt »

danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

I wholeheartedly agree. It's understandable that after a tragic, upsetting event like this people look for someone to blame. If you are looking for someone to blame, blame the law. Prosecutors take cases they think they can win. No prosecutor wants to lose a case. The decision to take a case is made based on the law and precedent.

Getting a DA fired solves nothing. What happens once you have achieved it? What have you accomplished? The law remains the same, and these type of cases continue to be brought.

Change is difficult. But I hope that if people really cared about this they would put as much effort as they can into changing the law, rather than trying to place the blame on a single individual - because the latter can easily result in even more misunderstandings.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#25

Post by danso »

john_b wrote: post #22
danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

I agree especially with your last sentence. The torches-and-pitchforks crowd is missing the main point here. However, whether or not she is "evil" is irrelevant. She clearly went after Swartz with a self-righteous zeal that was far divorced from the seriousness of the alleged crime. I don't know if someone in the US Justice Department had beef with Swartz they wanted to settle, or if they just wanted to make an examp…

Yes, it is possible she will have to be the proxy/figurehead towards which protest is directed...but if actual reform is the goal, then it's not a bad thing to examine fully what went wrong, if possible. Her office clearly has better things to do; who was the prime mover, if not her, in directing resources to this?

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#26

Post by lmkg »

While Cameron Ortiz' actions towards Aaron Swartz were unjust, I think that she is receiving an unduly large share of the ire, and as a result, several other agents and factors in this scenario are receiving an unduly small share. While I don't particularly want to defend her, I believe that a) justice is never served well by a lynch mob b) other actors are more deserving of blame, and by focusing on Ortiz we give them a get-out-of-jail-free card that involves throwing her under the bus.

Ortiz was prosecuting Aaron for actions that are, in fact, crimes, as defined by US law. That's her job, that's her responsibility, and 95+% of the time she is serving the public interest by performing that task. Creating just laws is not her responsibility, it is someone else's. Specifically, it is Congress' responsibility, and they fucked up big-time. They deserve dragging over the coals as much as she does, as do the interests interests who benefit from restricted access to knowledge who lobbied for the creation of these laws. If our reaction to these events is to remove Ortiz, but leave in place the laws themselves and those responsible for their creation, I would call that a failure on our part to hold responsible those who are responsible.

----

Intentionally separating this part.

While I do think that Ortiz is in the wrong for using bullying tactics, I do not place much blame on her for prosecuting according to an unjust law. For better or worse, that (fucking terrible) law was enacted by a democratically-elected government. I expect her to prosecute based on the laws enacted by a fair democratic process, and not based on her personal views. To do otherwise, I would consider an abuse of power.

She had faith that the laws given to her to uphold were just. In this respect, she was let down by those she depended on. While I wish she had not chosen to prosecute, I do not consider it a failing of hers that she did so. I pile far more blame on Congress than anyone, because it was their responsibility to make sure that the laws are just and fair. While several parties acted in a fashion I disagree with, they are the ones who had the greatest expectation to do otherwise.

Again, that is entirely separate from the bullying tactics she used in prosecution. Those actions are not defensible.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#27

Post by bcoates »

objclxt wrote: post #24
danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

I wholeheartedly agree. It's understandable that after a tragic, upsetting event like this people look for someone to blame. If you are looking for someone to blame, blame the law. Prosecutors take cases they think they can win. No prosecutor wants to lose a case. The decision to take a case is made based on the law and precedent. Getting a DA fired solves nothing. What happens once you have achieved it? What have yo…

Unfortunately this conflicts with the reality of Federal law in the US, where prosecutorial discretion is essentially the beginning and end of the criminal law system.

At any given time, any person and any company could be easily convicted of enough serious crimes to put them in prison for life or out of business. Prosecutors don't pick cases; they pick defendants, based on what are hopefully well-intended criteria. They then go through the extensive but essentially mechanical process of the justice system, which hopefully at least serves to shine enough daylight on the matter that prosecutor misbehavior is hard to hide.

Saying we should not pressure them to pick in a way we would prefer is to abandon the only actual influence over the system we have.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#28

Post by olefoo »

danso wrote: post #20
geoka9 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, she's a hero. Does it entitle her (or the people under her) to fuck up people's lives?

That's not the argument here. The argument is that there may be some other specific point to apply activism towards. She is the head of her office but this is clearly not the most important case at the top of her caseload. It could've been a subordinate who made the calls and had the delegated authority. Technically, President Obama has the power to install and remove U.S. attorneys at his discretion. Should we start…

I'm the author of the petition, so allow me to explain my thinking; and why I don't expect Ms. Ortiz to lose her job over this.

1. Obama appointed her, and by many metrics she is doing a good job.

2. The DOJ under Holder is anything but Liberal in it's outlook, a DOJ that's onboard with killing civilians who are American citizens without requiring even a closed hearing from a judge does not care what you think about prosecutorial overreach.

3. Using outsize threats and the power of indictment to coerce defendants into pleading out is policy, and goes well beyond an individual D.A.'s practices in a given case.

That said; the purpose of this petition is to raise embarrassing questions in a way that demands an answer.

Justice in this country should aspire to be more than "the shadow cast by the powerful upon the weak".

note: I'm aware that I should have had someone else proofread the text and that my misedit of the first paragraph is now unfixable.

Re: Petition the Whitehouse to remove Carmen Ortiz from office

#29

Post by Bjorkbat »

danso wrote: post #10

Some more context about the prosecutor: She was named "Bostonian of the Year" for her successful cases against mob bosses and drug companies: http://www.mainjustice.com/2012/01/03/massachusetts-u-s-atto... Out of the 94 U.S. DA offices, her office alone collected ~67% of the total criminal and civil fines in 2012, mostly owing to the successful prosecution of drug companies. Her success led to speculation that she wo…

Doing the right thing so many times you've lost count doesn't excuse doing the wrong thing.

And the way this was handled, it feels more wrong than right, and she certainly had some considerable say in the way it played out.

Maybe she's had plenty of opportunities to reflect on the consequences of her actions, maybe not (if it was all mob bosses and drug companies, probably not). In light of what's happened, at the least, she needs to reflect and grow from this experience.

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