Defense Blamed For Prosecutorial Overkill

post from TalkLeft on 10 August 2008 02:24:00 AM. © TalkLeft

Prosecutorial overkill is a factor in the high cost of death penalty trials, a point made by retired Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller, commenting upon the upcoming death penalty trial of Brian Nichols, the defendant in the Atlanta courthouse killings.

Prosecutors presented a 54-count indictment, including four murders, for crimes that took place at 13 separate crime scenes, and they identified 487 witnesses, Fuller said.

As Fuller pointed out, prosecutors could prove their case with ten witnesses. So whose fault is it that defense attorneys needed to interview 474 unnecessary witnesses to defend their client? Fuller suspended the trial when defense funds were cut off, and was later removed from the case. Unsurprisingly, the State of Georgia learned exactly the wrong lesson from the $1.8 million bill submitted by the defense:

State lawmakers approved new measures this year to ban senior judges such as Fuller — who do not face re-election — from hearing death penalty cases. They also tightened the public defender system's budget.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TalkleftThePoliticsOfCrime/~3/360859300/8831

Digg this

Sunday Talk - Gold Medal Edition

post from Daily Kos on 10 August 2008 02:21:07 AM. © Daily Kos

My friends, there's a full lineup and other fireworks below...

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/360858965/4962

Digg this

Late Night Work Break: The Walkmen

post from Moue Magazine on 10 August 2008 02:02:06 AM. © Moue Magazine

I’m glad I was poking around on Amazon tonight because otherwise I would have remained in the dark about the new The Walkmen album, You & Me, dropping on August 19th. Their album Bows + Arrows (2004) was one of the last cds I bought before[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://mouemagazine.wordpress.com/2008/08/10/late-night-work-break-the-walkmen/

Digg this

Sunday with the Senators - Olympics I Edition

post from DemConWatch on 10 August 2008 02:01:00 AM. © DemConWatch

You might have assumed that the big Senate news in the national media this week would have been the indictment of Ted Stevens. It?s not every day that a US Senator gets indicted. The last time was in 1994, when Kay Bailey Hutchison was indicted for actions occurring before she was elected to the Senate. But since his indictment on 29 July, except for an occasional piece, the whole situation seems to have fallen off the radar. Sure, Rasmussen polled just after, showing Mark Begich (D) up 13 points, but that?s about it.

Down in Mississippi, Roger Wicker is having his problems. It appears that he approves ads, but doesn?t actually watch them, nor know the content. I think he and John McCain are attending the same ?Um?.pause?.huh? school of response.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.demconwatchblog.com/2008/08/sunday-with-senators-olympics-i-edition.ht
ml

Digg this

Debunking More McCranky Lies Anout Barack Obama's
Tax Proposals

post from DownWithTyranny! on 10 August 2008 02:00:00 AM. © DownWithTyranny!

Meet Brian Deese, the Deputy Director of Economic Policy for Barack Obama's campaign. He seems like a nice young man, smart one too. Here's a video of him analyzing all the distortions and lies in McCain's new Smear and Fear attack ad. I like how he ends it: "In summary, this ad is a lie."

The bottom line about McCain's lies is this: Obama's tax plan gives 95% of American families a $1,000 tax cut, eliminates income taxes for seniors making less than $50,000, cuts capital gains taxes for small businesses to zero percent-- and ensures that no one making less than $250,000 pays a dime more in taxes.

Multimillionaires-- and the oil companies and other corporations they control-- and who have financed, and continue to finance, John McCain's political career are among the 5% who will be asked to pay their fair share. They're furious and... well there's a reason the Oil & Gas industry has poured over a million dollars into the McCain campaign and there's a reason why they've given him more money than anyone else in Congress. Did you see what we were talking about earlier in terms of the unsafe deterioration of the air travel system? You want to guess who gets the biggest contributions from the Air Transport Industry? Over a wide array of industries and corporations McCain is the One. The Telecoms paid him enough to sell out the Constitution on warrantless wiretaps and retroactive immunity for their law-breaking executives. In fact AT&T is his fifth biggest donor this year ($179,930), far beating out crooked, bankrupt home mortgage manipulators Bear Stearns ($94,200). Favorable tax policies have made him the #1 recipient of any politician in the country from the alcoholic beverages industry. John McCain always has been and still is-- is more than ever-- for sale. He has a long, long record of taking money from special interests and then voting for their agenda, regardless of what effect it has on his constituents. You think the gas crisis is bad now. It would be even worse under McCain! For all his years and years in Congress, he has no record of accomplishment to run on and he stands for nothing (other than war, war and more war)-- not even what he said the day before. All he can do is attack Obama with lies and lies and more lies.

video details and more

Read The Full Article:
http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2008/08/debunking-more-mccranky-lies-anout.ht
ml

Digg this

A Case Study In FBI Investigations

post from TalkLeft on 10 August 2008 02:00:00 AM. © TalkLeft

These are the costs of being labeled a suspect, or, almost as bad, a person of interest by the FBI:

When Perry Mikesell, a microbiologist in Ohio, came under suspicion as the anthrax attacker, he began drinking heavily, family members say, and soon died. After a doctor in New York drew the interest of the F.B.I., his marriage fell apart and his practice suffered, his lawyer says. And after two Pakistani brothers in Pennsylvania were briefly under scrutiny, they eventually had to leave the country to find work.

Not to mention Steven Hatfill. Maybe Bruce Ivins had something to do with the mailing of anthrax, although the lack of evidence that he was in Princeton when the letters were mailed is a glaring hole in the FBI's theory. [more ...]

[A]long the way, scores of others — terrorists, foreigners, academic researchers, biowarfare specialists and an elite group of Army scientists working behind high fences and barbed wire — drew the interest of the investigators. For some of them the cost was high: lost jobs, canceled visas, broken marriages, frayed friendships.

The director of the FBI's section on domestic terrorism says that investigations are "not always pretty."

"You try not to step on people’s toes, but sometimes it happens.”

It happens when you care more about solving the crime than about the lives you destroy in the process. Here's an example:

Early on, with more zeal than solid information, agents turned on three Pakistani-born city officials in Chester, Pa. One, Dr. Irshad Shaikh, was the health commissioner; his brother, Dr. Masood Shaikh, ran the lead-abatement program. The third, Asif Kazi, was then an accountant in the finance department.
Mr. Kazi was sitting in his City Hall office one day in November 2001 when F.B.I. agents burst in and began a barrage of questions. “It was really scary,” Mr. Kazi recalled in an interview last week. “It was: ‘What do you think of 9/11? What do know about anthrax?’"

Across town, an agent pointed a gun through an open window at Mr. Kazi’s home while others knocked down the front door as his wife was cooking in the kitchen. At the Shaikh brothers’ house, agents in bioprotection suits began hunting for germ-making equipment and carted away computers.

None of the three men had ever worked with anthrax. But for days, they were on national television as footage of the searches ran on a video loop and news announcers wondered aloud if they were the killers.

The result of the FBI's heavy-handed investigation:

The Shaikhs’ path to citizenship was disrupted, their visas ran out and both had to find work abroad, Mr. Kazi said. Mr. Kazi, already a citizen, was searched and interrogated for as long as two hours every time he traveled back from visiting his brother in Canada. Only about a year ago was his name removed from a watch list, allowing him to travel freely.

And then there's this:

Another casualty was Kenneth M. Berry, an emergency room physician with a strong interest in bioterrorism threats. In August 2004, agents raided his colonial-style home and his former apartment in Wellsville, a village in western New York, as well as his parents’ beach house on the Jersey Shore. ... “He was devastated,” Dr. Berry’s lawyer at the time, Clifford E. Lazzaro, said in an interview. “They destroyed his marriage and destroyed him professionally for a time.”

If Ivins' suicide is proof of his guilt, what should we make of Mikesell's reaction to being regarded as a suspect?

In 2002, Mr. Mikesell came under F.B.I. scrutiny, officials familiar with the case said. He began drinking heavily — a fifth of hard liquor a day toward the end, a family member said. “It was a shock that all of a sudden he’s a raging alcoholic,” recalled the relative, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of family sensitivities.

This is the FBI's response to the agency's heavy-handed tactics:

[T]hey reject criticism from lawmakers and others about the conduct of the investigation and express no regret about those who were caught up in it.

FBI director Robert Mueller said Friday:

“I do not apologize for any aspect of the investigation,” he told reporters. It is erroneous, he added, “to say there were mistakes.”

Of course not. Because the FBI cares about clearing the case, not about whether they got the right guy, or destroy innocent lives in the process.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/TalkleftThePoliticsOfCrime/~3/360846134/25766

Digg this

Edwards ex-mistress rules out paternity test -
Yahoo! News

post from uncomfortably numb on 10 August 2008 01:49:21 AM. © uncomfortably numb

The ex-mistress of former presidential candidate John Edwards said Saturday she will not participate in DNA testing to establish the paternity of her daughter.read more | digg story

[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/uncomfortablyNumb/~3/360865621/edwards-ex-mistress
-rules-out-paternity.html

Digg this

Russia bombs Georgian military airfield

Reuters - Loud explosions rocked Georgia's capital early on Sunday, and a senior official said Russia had bombed a military airfield near Tbilisi's international airport.read more | digg story

[[ This is a content summary only. Visit my website for full links, other content, and more! ]]

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/uncomfortablyNumb/~3/360865622/russia-bombs-georgi
an-military-airfield.html

Digg this

US Papers Sun: Sticking Points Remain on Accord

Georgia and Russia, as well as the Olympics, continue to dominate the news, but the Washington Post manages a couple of pieces on a slow Iraq Sunday.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/6187

Digg this

House Race Update--Women Candidates

Congress is where the real battles are being fought and where the Dems can make real gains as the[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/OpenLeft-FrontPage/~3/360854144/showDiary.do

Digg this