Time for Renn's two bits:
I have noticed a couple of other websites/blogs opining that a judge's recent decision to allow Allen Steed's rape trial to proceed is a victory for the State of Utah, and that a conviction is likely. One site says, "Who wants to bet?"
I will bet my wives that no trial of Allen Steed will happen. Why? Because the star witness, Elissa Wall, will never again dare to get on the witness stand. Oh, yes, she has been pretty glib on TV news interviews, but those interviewers didn't ask the tough questions.
Elissa Wall's entire case was choreographed by some not-so-clandestine figures behind the scenes. Sadly, there is also so much dirt behind those scenes that their house of cards is at risk of tumbling. A conviction of Allen Steed was never what they wanted. It would be a thin victory even now; a victory whose potential cost to them would be catastrophic.
As I suggested in my last post, this circus has been almost entirely about politics. People in powerful positions are posturing for political gain. Having Elissa Wall crack under moderately probing questioning would be about as beneficial to those political exploits as having Reszinda Swinetown get on the stand and admit that her YFZ Ranch phone call was scripted and orchestrated by the same band of dark characters.
So, when Rozslutta gets on the stand to admit the hoax, I'll believe that Elissa will get up on the stand and stand up for the truth, too.
Showing posts with label Allen Steed. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Allen Steed. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Hand In Cookie Jar
I am adding a follow-up comment to the previous Jeffs conviction reversal blogpost.
A closer read of the Utah Supreme Court opinion reveals that the Court adamantly disagreed with the prosecution's theory arguing that Jeffs was guilty of being an accomplice to rape.
From the start of this case, it was evident that Shurtleff, DuPaix, Fischer, Hoole and company were NOT sincerely interested in nailing Allen Steed. They were so driven to target Warren Jeffs, that nothing else mattered. If anyone seriously believed that Allen Steed was a "rapist" for marrying his young cousin, then no one really followed through. To this day, nothing has happened in the Steed rape case (and it probably won't). This was all about twisting, bending, tweaking, torquing, contorting, plying, manipulating and contriving the accomplice liability standard, in order to ensnare Warren Jeffs.
Problem is - they messed up! The Court articulately reprimands the State for contriving a theory of guilt which misinterprets the Utah statute. The State complains that Jeffs held a position of "special" trust in Wall's life. True - no one disagrees. The problem with this reasoning is that, if Steed was the real rapist - the real "actor", then we must ask if Steed was the one who held a position of special trust (and he didn't). The other problem is that, in order for accomplice liability to be met, Jeffs would have had to satisfy ALL of the following three elements:
1. He would have had to have a (mens rea) desire that a "rape" occur.
2. He would have had to exercise that "desire" by acting, coaxing, fomenting, assisting the rape to occur.
3. The actual crime of rape has to have been shown to have been committed (which it wasn't).
The Court observed that the State failed to show that element #1, INTENT, truly occurred. The Court also points out that the State completely BUNGLED its identification of the DEFENDANT (Jeffs) and the [alleged] ACTOR (Steed). The State was so blinded by its thirst to target Jeffs, that it forgot to cleanly distinguish between the two parties - Actor and Defendant, oftentimes treating Jeffs as the Actor, when he plainly was not the Actor (rapist), thus conflating the two.
This is the simplest explanation I can give of some of the legal logic behind the reversal. What is also fascinating is that Shurtleff announced today that he likely will not seek a re-trial, partly because, if the previous contortion of the jury instructions was ineffective (unconstitutional!), then no amount of legal acrobatics will get those jury instructions to work at a new trial. Furthermore, if this witch hunt had not been disingenuous in the first place, wouldn't Shurtleff be racing to the U.S. Supreme Court to get it to overrule this Utah decision which so "disappointed" him?
What I find truly pathetic is Shurtleff's remark that he will perhaps go "back to the legislature" and try to get some legislation that will more successfully focus on this type of crime. Maybe he wants to get the Utah legislature to modify the Constitution so that it can better attack Warren Jeffs. Wasn't Shurtleff satisfied when he rammed through his pet (hugely unConstitutional and NEVER-USED) "Child Bigamy" statute? Wasn't he satisfied when he wooed Texas's legislature into adjusting its laws to directly attack the FLDS? The Court made it perfectly clear that you cannot be classed as an accomplice to crime merely because you did a certain thing - just as a homeowner cannot be charged as an accomplice to burglary simply for forgetting to lock his doors. DUUUUUUHHHHH !!!!!!
Plus, Texas is itching to get its hands on Jeffs. Utah has to hurry up and decide if it wants to waste years and $$$millions on a pointless re-trial, or let Jeffs go home a free man. If justice doesn't always work, karma and poetic irony sure do help out sometimes.
In a further irony, a Texas man was recently convicted of molesting a 13-year-old girl whom he also impregnated (when she was 15). The man got a sentence of two years of probation! I have to ask myself if he should not have been subject to Hildy Harferbrain's (79-year) sentencing enhancement by virtue of the fact that the pair were "legally not able to marry".
Perhaps Texas will soon have the "Yellow Egg Of Texas" all over its face, just as Utah got its little red hands caught in the proverbial cookie jar.
Go Christine !!!!! Go Wally !!!!!
A closer read of the Utah Supreme Court opinion reveals that the Court adamantly disagreed with the prosecution's theory arguing that Jeffs was guilty of being an accomplice to rape.
From the start of this case, it was evident that Shurtleff, DuPaix, Fischer, Hoole and company were NOT sincerely interested in nailing Allen Steed. They were so driven to target Warren Jeffs, that nothing else mattered. If anyone seriously believed that Allen Steed was a "rapist" for marrying his young cousin, then no one really followed through. To this day, nothing has happened in the Steed rape case (and it probably won't). This was all about twisting, bending, tweaking, torquing, contorting, plying, manipulating and contriving the accomplice liability standard, in order to ensnare Warren Jeffs.
Problem is - they messed up! The Court articulately reprimands the State for contriving a theory of guilt which misinterprets the Utah statute. The State complains that Jeffs held a position of "special" trust in Wall's life. True - no one disagrees. The problem with this reasoning is that, if Steed was the real rapist - the real "actor", then we must ask if Steed was the one who held a position of special trust (and he didn't). The other problem is that, in order for accomplice liability to be met, Jeffs would have had to satisfy ALL of the following three elements:
1. He would have had to have a (mens rea) desire that a "rape" occur.
2. He would have had to exercise that "desire" by acting, coaxing, fomenting, assisting the rape to occur.
3. The actual crime of rape has to have been shown to have been committed (which it wasn't).
The Court observed that the State failed to show that element #1, INTENT, truly occurred. The Court also points out that the State completely BUNGLED its identification of the DEFENDANT (Jeffs) and the [alleged] ACTOR (Steed). The State was so blinded by its thirst to target Jeffs, that it forgot to cleanly distinguish between the two parties - Actor and Defendant, oftentimes treating Jeffs as the Actor, when he plainly was not the Actor (rapist), thus conflating the two.
This is the simplest explanation I can give of some of the legal logic behind the reversal. What is also fascinating is that Shurtleff announced today that he likely will not seek a re-trial, partly because, if the previous contortion of the jury instructions was ineffective (unconstitutional!), then no amount of legal acrobatics will get those jury instructions to work at a new trial. Furthermore, if this witch hunt had not been disingenuous in the first place, wouldn't Shurtleff be racing to the U.S. Supreme Court to get it to overrule this Utah decision which so "disappointed" him?
What I find truly pathetic is Shurtleff's remark that he will perhaps go "back to the legislature" and try to get some legislation that will more successfully focus on this type of crime. Maybe he wants to get the Utah legislature to modify the Constitution so that it can better attack Warren Jeffs. Wasn't Shurtleff satisfied when he rammed through his pet (hugely unConstitutional and NEVER-USED) "Child Bigamy" statute? Wasn't he satisfied when he wooed Texas's legislature into adjusting its laws to directly attack the FLDS? The Court made it perfectly clear that you cannot be classed as an accomplice to crime merely because you did a certain thing - just as a homeowner cannot be charged as an accomplice to burglary simply for forgetting to lock his doors. DUUUUUUHHHHH !!!!!!
Plus, Texas is itching to get its hands on Jeffs. Utah has to hurry up and decide if it wants to waste years and $$$millions on a pointless re-trial, or let Jeffs go home a free man. If justice doesn't always work, karma and poetic irony sure do help out sometimes.
In a further irony, a Texas man was recently convicted of molesting a 13-year-old girl whom he also impregnated (when she was 15). The man got a sentence of two years of probation! I have to ask myself if he should not have been subject to Hildy Harferbrain's (79-year) sentencing enhancement by virtue of the fact that the pair were "legally not able to marry".
Perhaps Texas will soon have the "Yellow Egg Of Texas" all over its face, just as Utah got its little red hands caught in the proverbial cookie jar.
Go Christine !!!!! Go Wally !!!!!
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
Supreme Questions
A friend of mine attended the Utah Supreme Court appeal hearing yesterday regarding Warren Jeffs' rape-as-an-accomplice conviction. Apparently, Wally Bugden made some compelling arguments against the legitimacy of the charges and convictions. Before I elucidate, I want to make a comment about our sense of justice in America.
I don't really like Shaquille O'Neal. I don't know him at all, although I saw him in a bad movie once. Truth is - I dislike him because he never played for my favorite team. I think that a lot of Americans can build up a similar, simmering hatred for people on the opposing team, or for people who are different. I think that we Americans like to be polarized, and to see things as black-or-white. There is no gray. It is this social phenomenon that makes it easier for us to throw our consciences out of the window and let the end justify the means. We violate our own principles due to our desperate need for victory. It is the necessary drawback of the Jeffersonian polemic model.
Tom Green's unlawful-sex-with-a-minor trial was a media circus. His "wife", Linda (of 17 years), had borne him seven children, and is presumably happily still with him to this day. The complexity of Tom's case was that Linda was "married" to him and impregnated with her first child when she was 13 1/2 years old. Now, back then (circa 1986), marriage in several states was perfectly tolerated at 13, so the question of propriety depends on how you view things and on local history and traditions.
The prosecutors (David Leavitt and Monte Stewart) faced the challenge that so many years had passed since the time of the alleged offense that the statute of limitations had already run. In 1986, the statute was 'eight years from the date of the offense'. At the time of the trial the statute had already been changed to 'four years from the date the offense was reported to law enforcement'. Neither provision could catch Tom, but, since the prosecution was hell-bent on a conviction, it brought in a string of witnesses to testify that they "didn't report the crime" (so that Tom couldn't claim that the statute of limitations clock had already started to run in 1986). The judge cooperated, and, through an amazingly creative contortion of the statutes, Tom was convicted and incarcerated. Today, he his back with his family, even perhaps continuing to do some of the things that got him arrested in the first place. So why won't the prosecutors arrest him again? You already know the answer - POLITICS.
So Wally Bugden argued yesterday that Warren Jeffs was charged with the wrong crime. Instead of arresting him for solemnizing the (void) marriage of a minor to a young man, they arrested him for aiding and abetting a rapist and for abusing his special position of trust as a minister. Bugden made the interesting point that the prosecution had completely omitted at trial to introduce any evidence that Jeffs had coaxed Allen Steed to have non-consensual sex with Elissa Wall. He only encouraged the alleged "victim" to follow through consensually with her marital duties. Based on this, Jeffs cannot be charged either as the rape's actor or as the aider and abettor. Further, Bugden argued that, since no rape conviction was achieved for Steed, the presumed 'rapist', it is absurd to convict Jeffs for having been an accomplice to a rape that has not legally been shown to have occurred.
Now, if it is true that Elissa was coerced against her will at the tender age of fourteen into a monogamous (and non-legal) "marriage" with a young man she did not love, then that is sad. Whoever did the coercing should acknowledge his or her error and make amends. This is one of the many accusations leveled at Warren Jeffs. Bugden apparently also asked if Elissa's family was not eminently more implicated in choreographing the wedding - and why are they not in prison instead?
My point is this - Utah politicians have made great publicity out of demonizing Warren Jeffs and painting him as a perverse, megalomaniacal despot. This was enough to get him on the FBI's 10-most-wanted list. Mormon politicians = good; Polygamists = evil. I wonder if it is that simple. Even if Warren Jeffs is different or eccentric, or even an iron-fisted leader, why does that excuse society in locking him in the stocks and throwing rotten vegetables at him for days? Why is it okay to charge him with a laundry-list of crimes that do not fit his actions? Is he so vile that we must throw truth and justice to the wind and punish him by any means available to us?
I believe that the State's attorneys don't care. I believe that they hate the FLDS and Warren Jeffs so much, that they don't care about following the spirit of the Constitution and good laws. They just want to "get them" at all costs. Why else would they try to get Texas to change its laws just so that it could ensnare the residents of the YFZ Ranch? Why else would they side with the angry enemies of the FLDS and condone Wisan and Lindberg's shameless plundering of the UEP? Maybe we all sleep easily because a reportedly evil man was crucified or tarred and feathered. That is not justice - it is brutality.
Addam Swapp blew up an LDS chapel in 1987. 22 years later, he still sits in a prison with no hope of a parole date. Ironic, wouldn't you say, when the average murderer serves nine years? This all stems from Utah's intense animus against Fundamentalist Mormons and polygamists. Why does the legal system tolerate such barbarism? You already know the answer - POLITICS. I am reminded of the state-sponsored raids and massacres of the early Mormons.
In yesterday's hearing, Chief Justice Christine Durham asked deputy A.G. Laura DuPaix if a Baptist minister should be incarcerated for counseling a member of his congregation to stay with her husband after complaining that she doesn't love or desire him anymore. Bugden wondered if parents who take their 15-year-old daughter in for contraceptives should not also be prosecuted for aiding and abetting non-consensual sex for a minor who legally cannot consent to it.
I pray that the Utah Supremes will see the State's naked malice and bad faith inherent in the Jeffs prosecutions and overturn them. If he really did commit a crime, then charge him with the crimes he truly committed - not some craftily twisted contortion of a wildly inapplicable statute because you hate him. This nation is fixing to undergo a dramatic metamorphosis (see Isaiah's "marvelous work and a wonder"), and such heavy-handed abuses of power might just bite some of the rest of us if we don't look out.
I am sickened when I think back to the remarks of Justice Nehring when he concurred in the Rodney Holm decision. In one of the most pathetic, milque-toast utterances I have ever read, he wrote:
I also suspect that I have not been alone in speculating what the consequences might be, were the highest court in the State of Utah the first in the nation to proclaim that polygamy enjoys constitutional protection. . . . . .
It would be a violation of my oath of office to permit my apprehensions about the public reaction to any ruling of this court to participate in my decision-making effort or to influence in any way my vote on a case. Moreover, I do not intend to suggest that the majority opinion is in any way shaped by fears of a public backlash against sanctioning polygamy.
If this kind of waffling is indicative of how Nehring will rule in Jeffs' case, I fear the worst. I fear also that, if Warren is forced to take his case to the next higher Court, it won't be around by the time he gets there.
I don't really like Shaquille O'Neal. I don't know him at all, although I saw him in a bad movie once. Truth is - I dislike him because he never played for my favorite team. I think that a lot of Americans can build up a similar, simmering hatred for people on the opposing team, or for people who are different. I think that we Americans like to be polarized, and to see things as black-or-white. There is no gray. It is this social phenomenon that makes it easier for us to throw our consciences out of the window and let the end justify the means. We violate our own principles due to our desperate need for victory. It is the necessary drawback of the Jeffersonian polemic model.
Tom Green's unlawful-sex-with-a-minor trial was a media circus. His "wife", Linda (of 17 years), had borne him seven children, and is presumably happily still with him to this day. The complexity of Tom's case was that Linda was "married" to him and impregnated with her first child when she was 13 1/2 years old. Now, back then (circa 1986), marriage in several states was perfectly tolerated at 13, so the question of propriety depends on how you view things and on local history and traditions.
The prosecutors (David Leavitt and Monte Stewart) faced the challenge that so many years had passed since the time of the alleged offense that the statute of limitations had already run. In 1986, the statute was 'eight years from the date of the offense'. At the time of the trial the statute had already been changed to 'four years from the date the offense was reported to law enforcement'. Neither provision could catch Tom, but, since the prosecution was hell-bent on a conviction, it brought in a string of witnesses to testify that they "didn't report the crime" (so that Tom couldn't claim that the statute of limitations clock had already started to run in 1986). The judge cooperated, and, through an amazingly creative contortion of the statutes, Tom was convicted and incarcerated. Today, he his back with his family, even perhaps continuing to do some of the things that got him arrested in the first place. So why won't the prosecutors arrest him again? You already know the answer - POLITICS.
So Wally Bugden argued yesterday that Warren Jeffs was charged with the wrong crime. Instead of arresting him for solemnizing the (void) marriage of a minor to a young man, they arrested him for aiding and abetting a rapist and for abusing his special position of trust as a minister. Bugden made the interesting point that the prosecution had completely omitted at trial to introduce any evidence that Jeffs had coaxed Allen Steed to have non-consensual sex with Elissa Wall. He only encouraged the alleged "victim" to follow through consensually with her marital duties. Based on this, Jeffs cannot be charged either as the rape's actor or as the aider and abettor. Further, Bugden argued that, since no rape conviction was achieved for Steed, the presumed 'rapist', it is absurd to convict Jeffs for having been an accomplice to a rape that has not legally been shown to have occurred.
Now, if it is true that Elissa was coerced against her will at the tender age of fourteen into a monogamous (and non-legal) "marriage" with a young man she did not love, then that is sad. Whoever did the coercing should acknowledge his or her error and make amends. This is one of the many accusations leveled at Warren Jeffs. Bugden apparently also asked if Elissa's family was not eminently more implicated in choreographing the wedding - and why are they not in prison instead?
My point is this - Utah politicians have made great publicity out of demonizing Warren Jeffs and painting him as a perverse, megalomaniacal despot. This was enough to get him on the FBI's 10-most-wanted list. Mormon politicians = good; Polygamists = evil. I wonder if it is that simple. Even if Warren Jeffs is different or eccentric, or even an iron-fisted leader, why does that excuse society in locking him in the stocks and throwing rotten vegetables at him for days? Why is it okay to charge him with a laundry-list of crimes that do not fit his actions? Is he so vile that we must throw truth and justice to the wind and punish him by any means available to us?
I believe that the State's attorneys don't care. I believe that they hate the FLDS and Warren Jeffs so much, that they don't care about following the spirit of the Constitution and good laws. They just want to "get them" at all costs. Why else would they try to get Texas to change its laws just so that it could ensnare the residents of the YFZ Ranch? Why else would they side with the angry enemies of the FLDS and condone Wisan and Lindberg's shameless plundering of the UEP? Maybe we all sleep easily because a reportedly evil man was crucified or tarred and feathered. That is not justice - it is brutality.Addam Swapp blew up an LDS chapel in 1987. 22 years later, he still sits in a prison with no hope of a parole date. Ironic, wouldn't you say, when the average murderer serves nine years? This all stems from Utah's intense animus against Fundamentalist Mormons and polygamists. Why does the legal system tolerate such barbarism? You already know the answer - POLITICS. I am reminded of the state-sponsored raids and massacres of the early Mormons.
In yesterday's hearing, Chief Justice Christine Durham asked deputy A.G. Laura DuPaix if a Baptist minister should be incarcerated for counseling a member of his congregation to stay with her husband after complaining that she doesn't love or desire him anymore. Bugden wondered if parents who take their 15-year-old daughter in for contraceptives should not also be prosecuted for aiding and abetting non-consensual sex for a minor who legally cannot consent to it.
I pray that the Utah Supremes will see the State's naked malice and bad faith inherent in the Jeffs prosecutions and overturn them. If he really did commit a crime, then charge him with the crimes he truly committed - not some craftily twisted contortion of a wildly inapplicable statute because you hate him. This nation is fixing to undergo a dramatic metamorphosis (see Isaiah's "marvelous work and a wonder"), and such heavy-handed abuses of power might just bite some of the rest of us if we don't look out.
I am sickened when I think back to the remarks of Justice Nehring when he concurred in the Rodney Holm decision. In one of the most pathetic, milque-toast utterances I have ever read, he wrote:
I also suspect that I have not been alone in speculating what the consequences might be, were the highest court in the State of Utah the first in the nation to proclaim that polygamy enjoys constitutional protection. . . . . .
It would be a violation of my oath of office to permit my apprehensions about the public reaction to any ruling of this court to participate in my decision-making effort or to influence in any way my vote on a case. Moreover, I do not intend to suggest that the majority opinion is in any way shaped by fears of a public backlash against sanctioning polygamy.
If this kind of waffling is indicative of how Nehring will rule in Jeffs' case, I fear the worst. I fear also that, if Warren is forced to take his case to the next higher Court, it won't be around by the time he gets there.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
