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December 23, 2009 An El Paso couple beat their 18 month old baby to death. They were each charged with murder and injury to a child. The wife pleaded guilty to injury to a child and the murder charge was dropped and she was given a 5 year sentence out of a possible 5-99 years. She will probably get out in a couple of years. The husband went to trial for both charges. He first said the baby fell out of the crib. Then he said he found the baby on the floor unconscious. He put the baby in a tub of cold water to try to revive him then went to take care of an older child. When he came back the baby was lying on his side with half his face in the water. The autopsy showed 45 old and new bruises including a half-healed broken rib. There was no water in the lungs. Our medical examiner is in trouble because of lies on his resume – and he never got board certified. So he is not qualified to be a medical examiner but does that mean he is incapable of determining cause of death? The jury found the defendant not guilty of murder but guilty of injury to a child. He was given a 22 and a half year sentence out of a possible 5-99 years. He’ll probably be out in 5. My problem? 1. The penalty range (5-99 years) is too long. If the crime deserves a 99 year sentence (you might as well say life in prison) then how can you give a person a 5 year sentence? If the crime is trivial and only deserves a 5 year sentence, then a 99 year sentence would be cruel and unusual punishment which would violate the constitution. 2. With a penalty range that big the punishment for a crime is left up to the whim of a person or persons and defeats the purpose of ‘a nation of laws’. 3. The husband was punished for not confessing the crime. The wife was rewarded with a mild sentence for confessing. This has got to be a violation of the constitutional 5th amendment.
December 16, 2009 A man allegedly strangled his mother to death. She was found in the desert after being missing for nine days. His lawyer wants a change of venue because of the media coverage. The judge said he would wait three months and try to seat a jury before deciding. The lawyer told the judge he wanted to know if the prosecution obtained any statements written by the defendant "in text messages or postings on MySpace". The district attorney "acknowledged that police confiscated a computer from the defendants home. He said they may need a warrant to go through the computer's contents." "The lawyer said he was concerned that police officers created fraudulent MySpace accounts to obtain access to the defendants profile." My note: I would certainly be interested in learning the reason and authorization for the police to confiscate his computer. If they had a reason and authorization (warrant) for the confiscation why would they need a warrant now? I think we may have a tremendous problem with warrants in this country. The newspaper did not say if the computer belonged to the defendant. It was my understanding from a previous article that he was from Phoenix and visiting his family . December 7, 2009 A Tijeras, NM man has been charged with 50 counts of child molestation and sexual exploitation and the Feds have charged him with producing child pornography. A 911 “hang-up” call prompted the police to investigate. The door was unlocked so they went in and saw a camera, sex toys, and videos that looked like child pornography so they left and got a search warrant. In the evidence the police collected there were videos that show the man forcing a 7-year-old boy to engage in oral sex and intercourse as the child begs to be left alone and tries desperately to get away. The judge in the case has ruled that the search warrant was illegal but has let the evidence be admitted. The “lucky guy” will probably never see the inside of prison or have to register as a sex offender. With the judge ruling the search warrant illegal how can he admit the evidence? If he is found guilty, an appeals court is going to throw it out. More likely, the police will end up letting him plead guilty to a lesser charge. Did the judge see proof of a 911 call? In Texas the police would have been allowed to enter the home with a 911 call. After entering the home if any evidence of child pornography was visible the police could have seized it without a search warrant. Child pornography is classed as contraband and therefore subject to seizure without a search warrant. Las Cruces, NM. - A 50 year old man was arrested for possessing child pornography. He had thousands of child pornography pictures and videos on his computer, disks, portable drives, etc. He also had pictures of children he had taken at parks and other locations where children congregate and play. He admitted that he was addicted to child pornography. What makes this story interesting is that the last paragraph in the report in the paper is a request for any one with more information to call crime stoppers. (Is this another case of the prosecution not having enough evidence to convict and will have to plea bargain down?) El Paso, Texas - A couple beat their 2-year-old goddaughter to death. They were caring for her while her mother was deployed to Afghanistan. They were both charged with capital murder and injury to a child. The husband went on trial first and after 2 weeks of trial he realized he would be found guilty so he said his wife did it. He was found not guilty of capital murder but guilty of injury to a child. The jury deliberated for two weeks to decide punishment. They finally admitted they were hung. Eleven jurors wanted 50 years in prison and one wanted 20 years in prison. They will try again in April 2010 to sentence him. Meanwhile, the wife was re-indicted for capitol murder, murder, and injury to a child. I guess they realized how hard it was to prove capital murder so they added the lesser murder charge. She will go on trial in December 2009. Her attorney has requested that the charges be separated so the prosecutor will have to prove each charge separately. The assistant district attorney stated that the charges should be kept together because "The crimes were allegedly committed at the same time." (Yes, this is the kind of intelligence we need in our prosecutors office.)
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