51–60 of 89 posts
This sounds to me like nothing more than an abuse of power by a DA. Those are much more common than people realize. As an example, in a recent case that I'm familiar with in Oregon, a man that I personally know was unjustly charged with 4 criminal charges that the DA knew were unjustified. He fought. He won. He now has, in addition to a crushing legal bill, a bill for the time he spent locked up in prison on trumped…
This is happening more than it should. Lots of hands are reaching into the private prisons industry's resources (cheap labor). Some towns are investing HEAVILY in private prisons. The prisoners that are "good" get to work making products that can easily undercut any competitor.
When a whole county is dependent on a private prison, well, the whole system in the county has a vested interest in throwing as many people in jail as possible. Corruption all the way up AND down.
"Terroristic Threats" are one way that free speech is under attack. Another is harassment laws. Law student Anya Bargh was arrested for sending an email saying "Let’s celebrate diversity by having the next dean NOT be Jewish." If that isn't protected speech I don't know what is. http://www.volokh.com/2013/05/03/law-student-arrested-chiefl...
In reading the above link, it's obvious that her arrest stems from more than just that one email, but rather a series of email messages and online comments that some had claimed were harassment. That being said, it most likely is still protected free speech, as odious as those messages and postings were. I think the case will be dismissed, but her future in law school is probably over.
However, without having seen the arrest report or other documents, it seems from the news articles that the quote in my post is considered by the police to be in itself harassment.
Also, to be arrested for protected speech is bad enough, even if the charges are dismissed. Imagine if every time you held up a banner you could get arrested for harassement, it took a court case to acquit you.
This sounds to me like nothing more than an abuse of power by a DA. Those are much more common than people realize. As an example, in a recent case that I'm familiar with in Oregon, a man that I personally know was unjustly charged with 4 criminal charges that the DA knew were unjustified. He fought. He won. He now has, in addition to a crushing legal bill, a bill for the time he spent locked up in prison on trumped…
>But in my opinion the biggest single factor is that the DA in question is an investor in the private jail to which he sends people. This is happening more than it should. Lots of hands are reaching into the private prisons industry's resources (cheap labor). Some towns are investing HEAVILY in private prisons. The prisoners that are "good" get to work making products that can easily undercut any competitor. When a w…
As an example, Arizona's immigration policies were written by lobbyists for the private prison system, and said lobbyists that they hired have pushed for similar bills in every state that they can get to listen.
Another travesty is that the people impacted by this become felons and in many places lose their right to vote. (In many states - Florida being a star example - this is because Republican politicians did the math and see it as an easy way to get rid of Democratic voters. Voter suppression is supposedly illegal, but it has been happening forever and nobody seems to care as long as it happens to dislikable people.) Thus the people who are most painfully aware of the extent of the abuse are removed from the democratic process - and those close to the victims wind up with an entirely rational fear that if they speak up too loudly about it, they will get targeted as well.
And as Aaron Swartz famously discovered, even if you have reasonable financial resources, you probably don't have enough to even try to defend yourself against this machine. Just think of how much worse that is for people who start out poor!
"Terroristic Threats" are one way that free speech is under attack. Another is harassment laws. Law student Anya Bargh was arrested for sending an email saying "Let’s celebrate diversity by having the next dean NOT be Jewish." If that isn't protected speech I don't know what is. http://www.volokh.com/2013/05/03/law-student-arrested-chiefl...
This sounds to me like nothing more than an abuse of power by a DA. Those are much more common than people realize. As an example, in a recent case that I'm familiar with in Oregon, a man that I personally know was unjustly charged with 4 criminal charges that the DA knew were unjustified. He fought. He won. He now has, in addition to a crushing legal bill, a bill for the time he spent locked up in prison on trumped…
Where is the ethics committee on this one?
> "(Expletive) a boston bominb wait till u see the (expletive) I do, I’ma be famous" > The actual line is: > "(Expletive) a boston bominb wait till u see the (expletive) I do, I’ma be famous rapping " http://bostonherald.com/news_opinion/local_coverage/2013/05/... > An accused teenage rapper pleaded not guilty today to making a bomb threat on Facebook he warned would eclipse the horror of the Boston Marathon tragedy…
It shouldn't matter one bit what he said. Neither interpretation of his lyric should be grounds for any kind of criminal punishment.
there was a similar story with an ex-marine last year. http://www.nbc12.com/story/19396255/marine-brandon-raub-spea... Its certainly shocking to see people being arrested over facebook posts. No sure what to do. Maybe start a campaign to encourage people to post 'terrorist' messages in protest? What can they do with 10 million terrorist messages?
This sounds to me like nothing more than an abuse of power by a DA. Those are much more common than people realize. As an example, in a recent case that I'm familiar with in Oregon, a man that I personally know was unjustly charged with 4 criminal charges that the DA knew were unjustified. He fought. He won. He now has, in addition to a crushing legal bill, a bill for the time he spent locked up in prison on trumped…
If this is true, it's a serious breach of legal ethics. It might be worth someone's while to get some reputable lawyers in Portland interested in the issue with an eye towards filing a complaint with the Oregon bar.
I'm not going to say that shady things don't happen in prosecutor's offices, but the ones I've seen tend to be political (trying hard to nail someone for a high-profile case because it would look bad to come up empty handed). State bars don't like to second guess discretionary authority in situations like that. Clear-cut conflicts of interests like this one, on the other hand, are the kind of thing state bars like to make examples out of, because they are easy to verify.
This sounds to me like nothing more than an abuse of power by a DA. Those are much more common than people realize. As an example, in a recent case that I'm familiar with in Oregon, a man that I personally know was unjustly charged with 4 criminal charges that the DA knew were unjustified. He fought. He won. He now has, in addition to a crushing legal bill, a bill for the time he spent locked up in prison on trumped…
> But in my opinion the biggest single factor is that the DA in question is an investor in the private jail to which he sends people. If this is true, it's a serious breach of legal ethics. It might be worth someone's while to get some reputable lawyers in Portland interested in the issue with an eye towards filing a complaint with the Oregon bar. I'm not going to say that shady things don't happen in prosecutor's of…
My past experiences say that a lot of crazy stuff happens in rural areas, and nobody hears about it.