Mississippi judge: "people charged with crimes, they are criminals"

[marmar]

A Mississippi judge displayed a startling lack of concern with constitutional rights during a one-on-one interview.

Circuit Court Judge Marcus D. Gordon agrees that suspects have a right under state law to an attorney as soon as an arrest warrant is issued, but he freely admits that he saves money by waiting to assign public defenders until suspects are formally indicted, reported Al Jazeera.

However, defendants routinely wait in jail for months without speaking to an attorney because Mississippi doesn’t set a time limit for prosecutors to seek an indictment.

Gordon, who is facing an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit for excessive pretrial detention and denial of counsel, told a reporter that he understands the system is flawed, but he said most criminal defendants were “con people” who probably deserved jail time.

“Lady, people charged with crimes, they are criminals, and they say what meets their purpose,” Gordon said. “Now they told you they had requested an attorney. They had not requested an attorney in 98 percent of the cases. You never hear of that, I never hear of that.” .................(more)

http://www.rawstory.com/2015/10/mississippi-judge-shrugs-off-innocent-until-proven-guilty-people-charged-with-crimes-are-criminals/

[ScreamingMeemie]

1. "Lady" is where I stopped reading.

Can these people age out already?

[dembotoz]

2. the juries i have been on would agree with him

my expectation of a fair trial in the land is minimal at best

[enough]

5. Agreed. Many people actually seem to think it would be impossible to be charged with a crime

unless you are guilty. I was on a jury a few years ago where everyone on the jury agreed the person was not guilty of the crimes he was accused of, but several jurists kept trying to think of something he WAS guilty of because he must be guilty of something or he wouldn't be on trial.

[Hortensis]

8. Same here, except it was pure kangaroo court and the jurists didn't care.

Their job in their minds seemed to be to uphold the social structure, and they completely ignored their role as triers of fact. The woman was charged, therefore guilty. To arrive at that they had to ignore proven perjury by a technical expert, a suspiciously missing police video, officer stories that contradicted and raised questions instead of answering them, and choose between believing the testimony of the defendant or the single witness. I was the alternate, so I didn't have to turn that pathetic case into some kind of 13 angry men mess.

I never saw this in California. It's not perfect there, for sure, but I personally had no problems with the handling of the 3 cases I served as juror on over the years. Some of the jurors, yes, but to the best of my knowledge the juries did our job. The last case involved a third strike under the federal law, but we had nothing to do with sentencing.

[hifiguy]

10. I clerked for two state district court judges.

for a total of three years. I tend to agree with you. Both judges were scrupulously fair and models of judicial integrity for whom I had great professional and personal respect and admiration. But I never saw a jury fail to convict a defendant in a criminal case. Now in a couple of those biggest and most serious cases - both involving murder charges - there was precious little doubt about the guilt of the accused, but I would always opt to personally be tried by a judge rather than a jury, even here in Minneapolis.

[niyad]

3. how in the hell does someone this stupid end up as a judge?

[brewens]

4. I know an old woman who otherwise has a heart of gold that will pretty much tell you the

same thing. She tells a story about being dismissed from jury duty for saying as much. Something like, they wouldn't be here if they weren't guilty. I suppose that's a lot better than her telling them what they want to hear and getting on a jury.

I had a local business owner tell me about his jury service. Some local kid accused of breaking into cars. He said, "they never really proved anything, but we knew they did it. Just typical downtown Clarkston punks." They convicted him too. Only one of the two was on trial there. If I'm on a jury, and I've been on a couple, an someone said something like that, I'd insist the foreman report that or I'd go to the judge myself. You're supposed to be fair and do your job. Judges especially.

[Cheese Sandwich]

6. This guy is the face of the system.

This is really sick

[marmar]

7. Yup