One of the side effects of my most recent past life is the unplanned exposure to our legal system. From the day the police first raided my home to about three minutes ago when I was reviewing on of the many sites I visit on a regular basis, my life seems consumed by the flaws in our legal system.
People often ask if I am angry at my husband and I will admit to moments but I am more angry with the current state of our legal system. I am not saying that he should not be punished for what choices he made, but I am questioning the way the system works and what the ultimate goal of the system is. My husband was prosecuted through the federal system although we were told that he could have been handed over to face state charges. He was sentenced to five years in Federal Prison, but he might have only sentenced to probation in the state system or minimally one year.
Who decides where an offender's case is handled? Well I recently talked to a Federal Public Defender, and was told that there is no formula or reason why any one case is handled on a Federal level and others are handled in the state system. There are certain criteria that make it eligible to be handled in a Federal court but once those criteria are met, it is still a human judgement call as to where the case is handled. Just the other day I was reading a news article about a man who was just arrested and the decision was still being made as to whether he would be tried in the Federal system or the state. The paper quoted that he would probably be tried in the Federal system because he would be face a much stiffer sentence. Why is it that two people can be charged with the same charge, but end up serving two extremely different sentences just based on the charging court?
There is something inherently wrong with our legal system when how much you serve for a convicted crime is simply decided by a flip of a coin. The Federal prosecutor gets to decide if this is a case he wants to tackle or one he wants to pass on and let the state system deal with it. It could be tied to the popularity of the arrest, the notoriety of the defendant, or the ability to put a feather in the prosecutors cap. Should our system be so arbitrary? I do not think so. If it is arbitrary then how can you argue that it is fair?
This leads to the next question about what is the ultimate goal of our criminal justice system. I can not help but wonder if the true goal of the system has been lost. On the national news the other morning there was a story about a new federal prison that could not be opened for operations due to budget cuts. The community was upset about all the jobs that are hanging in the wind without the prison opening. Everyone was taking about how horrible the community was feeling with the delay of the opening. I, however, felt nothing but sorrow. I was thinking of all the families whose loved ones would be facing incarceration at a this new prison. I was thinking of all the people who are facing harsh sentences based on the whim of one individual and Federal mandatory minimums.
Our politicians do not want to appear soft on crime and then offer the public the business of corrections. Prisons become booms to communities suffering from high unemployment. We can not afford to educate our children but we can afford to build prison and continue to fill them with first time offenders. For every job we create working in a prison we then remove one person from a family and remove the potential for that person to be a contributing member of society. Corrections has become BIG BUSINESS. Politicians fight to get prisons in their district because it means more dollars to their economy and a boom in job growth. It makes them look good to their constituents. Guards, support staff, customers, suppliers, construction workers are gain when a prison moves in. But is this the way that we should be stimulation our economies. Lets take some of that money and hire counsellors, probation officers, and case workers help those first time offenders stay in their communities, stay with their families, pay taxes, keep working and be rehabilitated without serving time in prison.
Do I think my husbands sentence was too harsh? Yes I do, based on how he would have been sentenced in a state court. There are many people out there who may disagree, but then fix the system. If you think his sentence was appropriate then make the same crime in the state system punishable by the same sentence as the Federal system. Had I ever thought about any of this before it became a everyday part of my life, no. But it is only when things touch us personally that we suddenly take a closer look at the world around us.
Let's get some equality in the system in both the punishment fitting the crime and consistency in punishment across the Federal and state system. I hope that you will never have a personal experience with the system but please don't wait to get informed and learn what is really going on in the world.
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Forget the difference between major jurisdictions like state/federal...even when people are prosecuted under the same laws they aren't applied the same depending on the jurisdiction. We were told by my husband's defense attorney that if his DUI accident happened in the county where we live (instead of the next county over) he probably would have gotten probation or extremely minimal jail time. Instead, he's serving 40 months. Because of a county line, and who the elected judges are in each jurisdiction!
ReplyDeleteIt seems like a good lawyer could have got your husband's case moved to the state system.
ReplyDeleteUsually if there are two legal systems operating parallel to each other, and one is significantly more lenient than the other, it means that the more lenient system is mainly available to the people who can afford it. To me, this is one of the worst parts of the current system.
If your husband had bought a super expensive attorney, it's possible that he would have preferential treatment in the eyes of the law, and been dealt with under the stat system.
Why should rich criminals receive less punishment than regular people who find themselves in legal trouble?
Great post. Keep up the good work, and hang in there.
Unfortunately we did spend money on an attorney (I would not classify him as good though), but what I have since learned is that we would have been better off using the Federal Public Defender. Our private attorney did not do as much as the public defender would have, except he took all our retirement money. The Federal Public Defender is not at all like the local public defenders and has a tremendous amount of resources at their disposal.
ReplyDeleteNow we certainly did not have enough money for some "Super" attorney, but after being involved in so many other cases, I am well aware that money could buy you out of some pretty tough situations.
I too am very puzzled about our justice system, how it works and how money effects the outcome.