Florida’s Single-Juror-Veto Law Defeats Justice in Parkland Case

by · Oct 13, 2022 2:45 pm

For the sentencing phase of capital cases, some states have true unanimous verdict laws. The jury must deliberate until it is unanimous one way or the other, just as they do in the guilt phase. If they are truly hung, the penalty trial is done over before another jury. California and Arizona have true unanimity laws.

Unfortunately, when Florida rewrote its sentencing law in the wake of a Supreme Court decision throwing out the old one, the Legislature unwisely chose a single-juror-veto law. In this system, if the jury votes 11-1 for the death penalty, the view of the one prevails over the view of the eleven, and the defendant gets a life sentence. That system introduces needless arbitrariness into sentencing, as the luck of getting one juror who has hard-core anti-death-penalty views (and possibly lied on voir dire) or who is willing to accept claimed mitigation that most people reject will result in a life sentence for one defendant under circumstances where others will be sentenced to death. Continue reading . . .

The Marijuana Scam

by · Oct 12, 2022 3:41 pm

This week California Attorney Rob Bonta announced a multi-agency crackdown on illegal marijuana grows and marketing in the state.  Last week President Biden told reporters that he will pardon all people convicted under federal law of possession of marijuana.  While these announcements are unrelated, they may draw much needed attention to lies told to the public about marijuana.  The first lie is that marijuana is relatively safe.  In an August 4, piece in Deseret News Daryl Austin discusses research from major universities and journals that detail the harmful effects of regular use.

“Negative outcomes include research that suggests a connection between smoking marijuana and respiratory symptoms like chronic bronchitis. The drug also tends to impact school performance. `Since marijuana use impairs critical cognitive functions … many students could be functioning at a cognitive level that is below their natural capability for considerable periods of time,’ one review from the New England Journal of Medicine notes.”

Continue reading . . .

Court: DA Cannot Prosecute BLM Protesters

by · Oct 11, 2022 10:34 am

In a unanimous ruling on September 28,  California’s Second District Court of Appeal announced that the San Luis Obispo District Attorney’s Office cannot prosecute seven Black Lives Matter (BLM) protesters because the District Attorney’s “well publicized association with critics of the Black Lives Matter Movement.”  According to the North Coast Times, in July of 2020 Tianna Arata allegedly lead roughly 300 BLM demonstrators onto Highway 101, blocking all lanes for an hour.  Some of the demonstrators attacked cars, smashing the window of one car with a skateboard, shattering glass on a four-year-old child in the back seat.  Arata was charged with a felony and several misdemeanors.  Six other BLM protesters were also charged.   But, later that year, Superior Court Judge Matthew Guerreo disqualified Dow and every prosecutor in his office, citing a campaign email from Dow and his wife which stated that the District Attorney was leading the fight against the “wacky defund the police movement and anarchist groups that are trying to undermine the rule of law and public safety in our community.”

Continue reading . . .

No New SCOTUS Cases

by · Oct 11, 2022 9:04 am

Today is a virtual Monday at the U.S. Supreme Court, after the Columbus Day federal holiday. The Court released an orders list from last week’s conference, but it did not take up any new cases for full briefing and argument. Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson dissented from denial of certiorari in Thomas v. Lumpkin, No. 21-444, a capital case with a claim of ineffective assistance of counsel in jury selection.

There are no criminal cases on this month’s docket, but today the Court hears argument in the crime-related civil case of Reed v. Goertz, No. 21-442, regarding DNA testing. Continue reading . . .

The Consequences of No Consequences

by · Oct 10, 2022 2:00 pm

It is a basic principle of human behavior that incentives matter. If people have an incentive to do X and we reduce the adverse consequences of doing X, then more people will do X. People who think that crime is somehow exempt from this principle, and that we can therefore reduce or eliminate consequences with no increase in crime, are living in fantasy land.

The latest example comes to us from the nation’s capital, noted in this editorial in the WSJ. People have an obvious incentive to ride buses without paying. If you shrink the consequences of doing that to almost nothing, will more people do it, draining revenue from an already under-funded system? Continue reading . . .

Crime Near Top of Public Concerns

by · Oct 6, 2022 2:57 pm

In a representative democracy, the way a representative votes on an issue is determined not only by what position the voters favor but also by how important they think the issue is. The issues foremost in the public mind are those where a representative is least likely to go against the majority view of the voters. Further down the list, voters’ disagreement with a representative’s vote is less likely to change how they vote in the election. Representatives may feel more free to vote differently based on other factors, including the views of major contributors, impact on favorability of media coverage, or their own (possibly misguided) views of good policy.

Monmouth University has this poll, finding that crime has risen to number two on the voters’ priority list. Continue reading . . .

Murderer Who Won SCOTUS Spiritual Advisor Ruling Faces Execution

by · Oct 5, 2022 2:00 pm

A Texas man convicted of the 2004 robbery and murder of a Corpus Christi store clerk is scheduled to be executed today.  John Ramirez won a U.S. Supreme Court ruling last March requiring states to accommodate condemned murderers’ requests to have their faith leaders pray and hold their hands in the execution chamber.  The Associated Press reports that the Texas Board of Pardons unanimously declined to commute Ramirez’s death sentence on Monday.  During a three-day drug binge, Ramirez and two female accomplices were looking for someone to rob in order to buy more drugs.  They spotted store clerk Pablo Castro emptying garbage in a convenience store parking lot and attacked him.  Ramirez stabbed Castro 29 times, then took $1.25 from the dead man’s pocket.  Nearby witnesses saw the entire incident.  Later, Ramirez held a knife to the throat of a young mother at a drive through and stole her purse and tried to rob anther woman at another drive through, who managed to escape.  CJLF filed argument in Ramirez v. Collier, urging the court to restrict civil lawsuits of this kind unless the plaintiff can show great and immediate, irreparable injury.  The Foundation’s brief is available here.  Update:  Ramirez was pronounced dead at 6:41 PM Wednesday night.

Krasner Lies While Philly Bleeds

by · Oct 4, 2022 11:50 am

Last week progressive Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner told a local news anchor that his approach to crime, which involves not prosecuting criminals is “working.”  The anchor noted that a thousand people had been killed over the past 20 months, with the city hitting the highest murder rate in its history.  “It is working,” replied Krasner.

In an article published in today’s Daily Mail, Manhattan Institute scholar Heather MacDonald observes, “Krasner apparently defines a policy as working when it contributes to the highest number of murders and the highest rate in the city’s history, a record number of carjackings, the routine looting of stores, and savage beatings of innocent pedestrians.  Krasner has a knack for denying the undeniable.”

Continue reading . . .

SCOTUS Begins Term, Takes Attorney-Client Privilege Case

by · Oct 3, 2022 7:45 am

The U.S. Supreme Court began its October 2022 Term today. The court released an orders list taking up nine cases for full briefing and argument. Among them is 21-1397, In re Grand Jury. The Question Presented is: “Whether a communication involving both legal and non-legal advice is protected by attorney-client privilege where obtaining or providing legal advice was one of the significant purposes behind the communication.”

The Court also took up a case involving the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act and the criminal prosecution of a corporation majority-owned by a foreign government, Turkiye Halk Bankasi A.S. v. United States, No. 21-1450. Continue reading . . .

Culture, Root Causes, and Discussion Taboos

by · Sep 30, 2022 9:53 am

In a basketball tournament for teenage girls last November, one player punched an opponent, knocking her to the floor and giving her a concussion. What did the offending girl’s mother think of this blatant assault and battery? She was the one who instructed her daughter to do it. Latria Shonty Hunt was charged with contributing to the delinquency of a minor but let off with an apology and restitution. See this story by Vikki Vargas and Heather Navarro for NBC LA.

People have long debated the “root causes” of crime, and the discussion usually focuses on income. Poverty is the root cause of crime. Government programs are the solution to poverty. So let’s just spend more on government anti-poverty programs and crime will go down. That was how the Great Society was sold to America in the 1960s, and it was a cataclysmic failure. But that does not stop people from urging us to repeat the history.

Victor Hugo notwithstanding, we have enough of a social safety net in place that no one is going to jail for stealing loaves of bread to feed starving children. We need to look elsewhere for root causes. A powerful but under-discussed root cause of crime is culture. Too many young people are subject to influences from those around them that cause them to choose the path of crime rather than the path of law-abidingness. In the case of Ms. Hunt’s daughter, the very person who should have been teaching her to obey the law, respect the rights of others, and generally be a good person was teaching her just the opposite. Even kids with good parents are subject to bad influences from peers and popular culture.

So why don’t we hear more about culture as a root cause of crime? Continue reading . . .