Prosecutor Incredibly Unhappy He's Being Forced To Respect That Whole 'Speedy Trial' Thing
from the accused-criminals-apparently-have-no-rights dept
There's general prosecutorial dissatisfaction with the founders' decision to implement due process rights for accused criminals. Flowing from the "limits" of the Fourth Amendment into the Fifth and Sixth, it seems the system is set up for prosecutorial failure. At least, that's the impression you get when you hear prosecutors actively arguing against enshrined rights.
Albuquerque, New Mexico is in the middle of a two-year experiment in case management. Far too often, accused were allowed to languish behind bars until the state decided to begin prosecuting their cases. The right to a speedy trial doesn't seem to be so much a right as an easily-ignored guideline. People lose parts of their lives and, often, their employment for having done nothing more than be accused of committing a crime.
The order [PDF] says prosecutors have 10 days to work from arrest to arraignment and the rest of the schedule is sped up for both prosecutors and defendants. Most productions of evidence (from either side) must be handled in five days and preparing for trial (including providing lists of witnesses expected to testify) is limited to 25 days.
There have been few complaints from public defenders as defendants are being cut loose more frequently thanks to the state's inability to meet this order's definition of a speedy trial. All the complaints are coming from the prosecution's side, which is the side with a greater amount of resources at its disposal.
Maddening, absurd and unjust.
Those are just some of the words Bernalillo County District Attorney Raul Torrez is using to describe a special set of court rules said to have created a backlog of 8,000 unindicted felony cases in the Albuquerque-area.
The critique is aimed at Bernalillo County District Court’s two-year experiment, known as the “Case Management Order.” The CMO was designed and implemented as a way to clear out the county’s notoriously jammed up district court calendar that caused overcrowding at the jail and left defendants waiting years for a resolution to their case.
"Maddening, absurd and unjust" could just as easily describe the system before the fixes were implemented. Defendants waiting years for their cases to be resolved is both absurd and unjust -- which is exactly what state Supreme Court Justice Charles Daniel pointed out when instituting the order.
“When the CMO was issued, the Second Judicial District had a backlog of approximately 6,000 untried cases,” wrote Daniels. “Cases often took two to three years to resolve, creating serious speedy trial problems.”
The order simply pushes prosecutors to hew closer to the Constitutional ideal. There is a right to a speedy trial. There is no right to prosecute. And there's nothing in the Constitution that even suggests rights should be suspended simply because the government has a backlog to work through.
DA Torrez claims the order has directly resulted in increased crime in the Albuquerque area. He also claims prosecutors don't have enough resources to tackle cases in the limited timeframe the order demands. At this point, you might think Torrez would develop some empathy with the public defense side, which is chronically underfunded pretty much everywhere in the US because most voters and taxpayers have problems with paying to represent "guilty" people.
Torrez is one of those people. At no point does he recognize the order also cuts loose those falsely-accused or those who the state wouldn't be able to successfully convict. Instead, he portrays this attempt to adhere to the "speedy trial" right as a revolving door for criminals.
Torrez says judges are throwing out cases based on the CMO’s strict rules, giving accused criminals a free pass until their case gets refiled, if ever.
“We’re dismissing cases and throwing cases out on technical grounds,” said Torrez. “We’re not making the criminal justice system function the way it should.”
Uh, you weren't "making the criminal justice system function the way it should" before. That's why you got hit with a judicial order forcing you to speed up your prosecutorial process.
And Torrez is definitely overstating the problem. CMO dismissals are the exception, not the rule, making his claim of a link between the CMO and crime rate spikes highly suspect.
On Thursday, Bernalillo district court officials came up with statistics on the number of case dismissals that have happened so far this year. Out of the 900 dismissed cases, only 13 percent were related to the CMO, according to the statistics.
There are few things uglier than an arm of the state complaining about the Constitution, even indirectly. It sounds like the DA's office simply needs to learn to prioritize, starting with the rights of the citizens it puts behind bars.
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Filed Under: albuquerue, due process, guilty, innocent, raul torrez, speedy trial
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So technical grounds?
You mean like you shouldn't have brought the case in the first place & cut them loose?
I wonder what higher office this DA was gonna be seeking with their awesome win record... you can't tell me that even an innocent person whos been behind bars for years isn't gonna take any deal to get the hell out and try to rebuild their shattered life.
All that matters is it gets marked in the win column so their rate is nice and high. Doesn't matter if they inflated the numbers & screwed innocents... being tough on crime lets you move upwards.
We have more money, more resources, more staff and its REALLY unfair you expect us to do that speedy trial thing (especially when many of these cases are so thin we needed to hold them in jail for a couple years to soften them up).
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You cannot sue a prosecutor for breaking the law because the courts are so corrupt they don't even notice they are corrupt. You can't prosecute one for breaking the law because it is the prosecutors who file charges, not private citizens. It doesn't matter how blatant or egregious the crime is. Short of getting a gun and shooting a corrupt prosecutor, there is literally nothing a wronged private citizen can do to get any kind of justice -- and assassinating a government official has consequences of its own.
When a prosecutor violates your rights (a separate felony for each right violated, and another for each time each right is violated again), you have no recourse. All the power is in the hands of the court. It doesn't matter that there are laws that make certain actions by that court illegal, so long as the court refuses to police itself and no one else has the authority to do so.
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In reality, it's pretty much the same system as the one we're protesting, but we control it over them. So that makes it "right".
"You want to see true evil? Go home and look in the mirror, you'll find it there."
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/s
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If, after even 5 days, you have nothing to charge then with, then it goes to follow you also have nothing to justify holding them in prison for either, so you have nothing to complain about when the case gets dropped.
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The way cops, prosecutors and judges are treated when accused of wrongdoing is how the system is supposed to work for everybody. That's what 'innocent until proven guilty' looks like in operation.
It's only corrupt behavior because they reserve for themselves the treatment that the law says they must give to EVERYONE.
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We need more love and empathy in the world.
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"And I would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for you meddling judges!"
Torrez says judges are throwing out cases based on the CMO’s strict rules, giving accused criminals a free pass until their case gets refiled, if ever.
“We’re dismissing cases and throwing cases out on technical grounds,” said Torrez. “We’re not making the criminal justice system function the way it should.”
Yes indeed, damn those rules for getting in the way of locking an accused criminal away for years before they are tried.
I have to wonder exactly what function he believes the 'criminal justice system' is supposed to hold if releasing people because you never got around to holding a trial to demonstrate guilt before locking them up is apparently contrary to it.
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Re: "And I would have gotten away with it too if it weren't for you meddling judges!"
What other purpose could a criminal justice system possibly serve?
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It seems the system is set up for prosecutorial failure.
As well it should be. If you can't prove a case, you shouldn't get to keep it.
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Re: It seems the system is set up for prosecutorial failure.
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Re: Re: It seems the system is set up for prosecutorial failure.
the prosecution wins most criminal trials.
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Due to various reasons, mostly because the underfunded public defender's office convinces them to do so. The plea bargaining system in place does not promote justice, it promotes the private prison industry - as intended. Very few accept plea bargains because they are guilty. It is quite disgraceful.
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Other ways
Meanwhile, last time I wanted to argue a stp sign traffic ticket, I waited 16 months. When I showed up, they read off a long list of names and said "these cases have been dropped".
Maybe we do have too many lawyers here...
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https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/01/op-ed-how-i-turned-a-traffic-ticket-into-the-consti tutional-trial-of-the-century/
In short, he asked a cop:
“So, you signed an affidavit under the pains and penalties of perjury alleging probable cause to believe that Adam MacLeod committed a violation of traffic laws without any evidence that was so?”
Without hesitating he answered, “Yes.”
I recommend people read the entire thing.
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So it's both civil and criminal, except when it's neither, depending on which screws the accused over more at the time.
Neat trick that.
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Is this one of those for-profit private jails? It would be interesting to see if anyone in the court system owns part of any local private jails. Nice how they don't have funding to prosecute them but they have funding to keep them in jail.
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Instead, he portrays this attempt to adhere to the "speedy trial" right as a revolving door for criminals.
Another law enforcement person whining like a bitch about their work being hard?
Imagine that.
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More necessary to all levels of society, harder work for less pay, and it's about three times more dangerous than being a cop.
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Needs a Mob, Tar, and some Feathers...
Torrez says judges are throwing out cases based on the CMO’s strict rules, giving accused criminals a free pass until their case gets refiled, if ever.
“We’re dismissing cases and throwing cases out on technical grounds,” said Torrez. “We’re not making the criminal justice system function the way it should.”
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How can people like this keep their fucking jobs?
He is directly bitching about a system that was "intentionally" designed AGAINST fuck holes just exactly LIKE HIM, from ruining peoples lives.
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It's Albuquerque
/I wish it were sarcasm...
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Re: It's Albuquerque
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Need to look for justice
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Guess what...it was meant to be that way!
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