[sunnykerr]

Sheriff Joe Arpaio sued by justice department The US Department of Justice has sued an Arizona sheriff accused of racially profiling Latinos, among other alleged civil rights violations. The lawsuit alleges sloppy police work and a disregard for minority rights by Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio. US officials wanted the sheriff to agree to train his officers in how to perform duties such as traffic stops. But Sheriff Arpaio, who denies the allegations, said the department's demands would nullify his authority. The self-styled "toughest sherriff in the US", he shot to prominence by forcing prisoners to wear pink underwear. Assistant US Attorney General Thomas Perez told a news conference on Thursday: "We have invariably been able to work collaboratively with law enforcement agencies to build better departments and safer communities." He added that Sheriff Arpaio's Maricopa County office had been "a glaring exception". In one case cited in the lawsuit, a sheriff's officer stopped a Latino woman - a US citizen who was five months pregnant - as she pulled into her driveway and insisted she sit on the hood of her car. "When she refused, the officer grabbed her arms, pulled them behind her back, and slammed her, stomach first, into the vehicle three times," the suit said. The woman failed to show she had motor insurance, but the matter was resolved when she provided such proof to a court, the lawsuit said. In December, the justice department released a scathing report accusing his office of multiple offences, including punishing Hispanic jail inmates for speaking Spanish. He previously apologised for his office's botching of sex-crime investigations, including child abuse allegations. When cases were reopened, 19 arrests were made. Correspondents say Sheriff Arpaio appeared to be visibly angry at a news conference on Thursday. "I am not going to surrender my office to the federal government. I will fight this to the bitter end." On the eve of the lawsuit he said: "They're telling me how to run my organisation." Maricopa County has also been under investigation for criminal abuse-of-power allegations since at least December 2009, an inquiry which has focused on the sheriff's anti-public corruption squad.

Source

Traffic stops. They have to teach them how to perform traffic stops.

Botching cases of child sex abuses.

Manhandling pregnant women.

Punishing prisoners for speaking what one can at least suppose could have been their mother tongue.

And we're going to trial now?

This man's a menace to the public he's supposed to be serving. If he's not criminally negligent than he's outright abusive!!!

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That guy sounds like a real charmer, doesn't he?

[sunnykerr]

Tell me about it!

Seriously, though, how scared are the people of Arizona that it took the freaking Department of Justice to step in and stop the abuse?

[Cristofle]

William Balfour has been convicted of first degree murder in the killings of Jennifer Hudson's mother, brother, and nephew. He has been sentenced to life in prison:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/12/us...s.html?_r=1&hp

This was a terrible, terrible tragedy I prayed for that poor little boys the days he was missing, I remember.

[sunnykerr]

I'm not very familiar with that case, but I'm glad that he will now face the consequences of his actions.

[Cristofle]

I think it's a very haunting example of the real danger of domestic violence- this guy was continually abusive to his wife and repeatedly threatened her and her family, and no one really took him seriously because "that's just how they worked"- until the day he walked into her home after she'd left for work and murdered her mother and brother, then kidnapped her son and murdered him too.

Incidentally, this is what compelled me to get Amber Alerts sent to my phone- it's a great system, but you have to know the alert is there and see the evidence they have in order to actually know you're a witness to a crime (the little boy was alive for hours after his grandmother and uncle were murdered, someone might have seen him during that time and not known what they were looking at).

[Gray Ghost]

Isn't it sad how that Zimmerman will probably either walk or get a lighter sentence if convicted yet a woman in Florida just got 20 years for firing a warning shot at her abusive husband(the shot hit a wall, not her husband) that threatened to kill her? What a joke.

[sunnykerr]

Cristofle I hadn't realized there was domestic abuse involved, let alone all the details you mentioned. That makes me a little sick. Domestic abuse laws really need to be made more riigid.

Jacob Yes, Zimmerman getting off at all is a joke. Him getting off when a woman defending her life from an abuser gets a serious sentence is proof to me that the system is seriously sick.

[Cristofle]

I'm very troubled that Marissa Alexander got 20 years for firing a gun into the ceiling trying to protect herself from a man threatening to strangle her. The jury apparently convicted her in 12 minutes- I don't even know what to say to that. Sometimes I feel like no progress at all has been made regarding public views on domestic violence.

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Originally Posted by Cristofle (View Post) I'm very troubled that Marissa Alexander got 20 years for firing a gun into the ceiling trying to protect herself from a man threatening to strangle her. The jury apparently convicted her in 12 minutes- I don't even know what to say to that. Sometimes I feel like no progress at all has been made regarding public views on domestic violence.

I wonder if the punishment would have been the same had she been a white woman and he been a black man. And just the fact that I'm wondering this tells me there's something wrong with the legal system.

[Cristofle]

Honestly, she likely wouldn't have even gotten charged, and if she had she certainly wouldn't have been convicted. The statistical data on charging and convicting black people versus white people for essentially the same crimes is too overwhelming to ignore. There is just no justification for this sentence- she didn't assault anyone. She didn't set out to hurt anyone. Yes, the kids were upstairs, but she almost certainly wasn't in a state of mind to even remember that- she definitely wasn't aiming at them, and no one was hurt. She was trying to save her own life against a man who was threatening to kill her.

[sunnykerr]

Are we saying she got a stronger sentence because she's an African-American woman?

I found the story, in case anyone's interested in reading the actual details, such as CNN can provide them: Link.

It's the same prosecuting state's attorney as will be trying the Trayvon Martin case, so that's something to keep in mind.

It seems they're taking the fact that there were children (in another room) in the direction she aimed at very seriously.

Also, the current law carries an automatic sentence of 20 years without regards to mitigating factors. So, to me, that's highly problematic.

[Cristofle]

Not a stronger sentence, because the law mandates she must get at least that with the charge. I think the charge itself was an extreme over-reach, and doubt she would have been CONVICTED had she not been black.

I think it's unfair to charge her so harshly because the kids were upstairs- the man who has admitted he threatened to kill her is responsible for the situation spiraling out of control the way it did.

[sunnykerr]

No doubt, this is a bum conviction.

I was just trying to figure where the U.S. is at on this.

I think the charge was ridiculous myself, but, I'll be honest, the U.S. criminal system is a big mystery to me.

[Cristofle]

I'm wary of mandatory sentencing, because I think each case should get looked at on an individual basis. Even the judge seemed to know this was excessive, because he said this was the minimum possible sentencing he could give her based on the charge and he had no choice. So that's something to look at here- should there be mandatory minimum sentencing, or is that allowing cases like this to fall through the cracks, where this woman got a ridiculously harsh sentence?