Judgment Day

Like 99.9 percent of the rest of the working world—at least those that work the standard Monday through Friday—I love Fridays. Two work-free days (usually)—no phone calls, no business email, no work people…and no law.

Since I started this blog a short time ago, I constantly find myself looking for interesting criminal law content to post. Sometimes I completely miss other, more important news stories simply because I’m scanning so fast. This morning in particular it hit home, and I was reminded of a post by a public defender, titled Asides:

Since this is still my personal blog, and there are stories of interest out there that are not law-related, I’ve created a category called asides, wherein I will post links to stuff that interests me.

I’m following Gideon’s lead on this one. On Fridays, I'll be posting non-law related things of interest to me, and hopefully you, in celebration of the upcoming two days of all things not law.

Disclaimer: If there’s a legal story of particular interest on a Friday it may make its way in too.

An exonerated prisoner is national news, and the media cannot wait to tell the story of the innocent prisoner who has spent X amount of years behind bars. But what happens after these prisoners are released?

CNN recently interviewed 15 of the 17 men wrongfully convicted in Dallas County Texas. You can read how they’ve fared.

The detailed story of one recently exonerated prisoner, Wiley Fountain, is here.

Wiley was one of the lucky few to receive financial compensation from the state, but the $190,000 or so that made it into his pocket is long gone.

Time-out: $190,000 for 15 years? Just under $12,700 for each year of his life lost to a wrongful conviction? That sucks, plain and simple. I’m not sure you can even put a dollar amount on “time,” but I know a measly $12k doesn’t cut it. How often are exonerated prisoners compensated, and how does it work? Does the state simply shell out the money and say “good luck?” I’d hope there is some kind of reintegration program, but I’m pretty sure it’s average at best. Maybe Grits or Jamie Spencer can provide some information on this?

In Fountain’s case, he was homeless in five years, rearrested, and now he’s gone off the map. Most of the others released report they cannot find steady work.

According to Jeff Blackburn, one of the lead attorneys with the Innocence Project of Texas:

These wrongly convicted men get "a double-whammy screw job." There's little help from the government to transition back into society and they're still viewed as criminals once they're out of prison. They don't have any services available to them, not even $100 and a cheap suit.

Updated:   A special thanks to Grits for Breakfast for providing the following commentary:

It's even worse than "average" services. Because they're not on parole, they can't even get service received by people who actually committed crimes.

Our relatively new wrongful conviction compensation law authorizes a lump sum payment of $50K per year incarcerated, taxable.

Until recently, nobody gave a second thought to what happened to these folks when they're out. Now that there are so many of them, it's becoming extremely clear that the injustice done to them did not end at the prison gates, and can never be fully compensated with money alone.

In a prior post here I talked about New York considering microstamping ammunition to help aid law enforcement in gun crimes. According to this article in today’s Times Union, it looks like the plan is fading. The bill passed the House in April, but has been stuck in the Senate ever since.

Advocates like Assemblywoman Michelle Schimel, D-Great Neck, suspect the microstamping issue may have roused the National Rifle Association to push the Senate's Republican majority for a delay. The NRA has historically been active in upstate Senate races.

Or, the NRA has historically been active anytime, anywhere, any gun-related legislation is on the rise.  Yeah, it "may have" roused them.  It gets better:

In an unusual breach of unwritten legislative protocol, opponents, including one of Schimel's colleagues and representatives of gun groups, showed up unexpectedly at a live fire event. The opponents were thrown out before the actual demonstration, but later returned.

WOW, breaching the unwritten legislative protocol? Those guys are crazy! This is why I hate politics. Below is live footage from the event:

People v. Carter  (May 8, 2007)

Carter pled guilty to third degree burglary. The county court promised to sentence him to 2-4 years in prison, conditioned upon his return to court on the date of sentencing. The court further advised Carter that if he failed to appear, the court would not be bound by the plea bargain. Carter did not return for sentencing. His attorney advised the court that Carter’s parents said he was “eight states over” and the court imposed a sentence, in absentia, of 3 ½ to 7 years.

The Third Department vacated Carter’s sentence and remanded the case.

CPL 380.40 provides that a defendant must be personally present at the time sentence is pronounced. While this right may be waived where a defendant fails to appear at sentencing, he or she may be deemed to have waived the right to be present only if the defendant was previously advised of the consequences of failing to appear at sentencing.

Didn’t the county court advise Carter of the consequences of failing to appear at sentencing when it informed Carter if he failed to appear the court would not be bound by the sentence?

Not according to the Third, which held:

Although the County Court informed defendant that he could be subject to an enhanced sentence if he failed to appear for sentencing, the court did not specifically articulate that sentencing could proceed in his absence.

I find this holding interesting because of the degree of specificity the court required. Because the lower court merely informed Carter that it would not be bound by the plea deal, but did not inform him sentencing would proceed in his absence, Carter never waived his right to be present at sentencing. In some of its recent decisions in plea cases, however, the Third has taken the opposite approach when a defendant challenges the specificity of the plea colloquy. In those cases, the court has held the judge’s questioning was essentially “good enough.”

The Third continued:

Moreover, even where a defendant is found to have waived the right to be present at sentencing, proceeding with sentencing in absentia is not automatically authorized; rather the trial court must exercise its sound discretion upon consideration of all appropriate factors, including the possibility that defendant could be located within a reasonable period of time. Here, just one hour after the time set for defendant's appearance, the County Court sentenced him without first taking any reasonable measures to secure his attendance.

I wonder what the Third considers “reasonable measures” when the only information concerning defendant’s whereabouts was that he was “eight states over.” It’s not like he was sitting at home on the couch and the court could have given him a call.

The Chicago Sun Times has this story:

The Illinois prison population had been steadily increasing, mostly because of the high recidivism rates of drug offenders.

In 2003, Govenor Blagojevich made crime one of his top priorities by implementing a drug treatment program at the Sheridan Correctional Center and increasing the number of parole officers statewide.

The number of new convictions among parolees has decreased by more than 18 percent from fiscal years 2004 to 2007, with arrests of parolees declining by 23 percent during the same period.

Because of the reduction in repeat crimes, taxpayers have saved an estimated $64 million in prison costs since 2004, officials said.

"It's very uncommon for states to be able to reduce their overall recidivism rates," said Deanne Benos, assistant director of the Department of Corrections.

Benos, is correct, it is very uncommon—most states in the country are struggling with overcrowded prisons and no money to support them. But it really shouldn’t be. For years criminologists have touted the benefits of treatment over prison for drug offenders, particularly non-violent offenders that suffer from immense addiction.