Pray you never appear before this Judge in TX

[sixmile]

NY Times
Mixed Opinions for Top Texas Judge Accused of Misconduct
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/08/us/08judge.html?_r=1&ref=WRH
'In 1998, Judge Keller wrote the opinion rejecting a new trial for Roy Criner, a mentally retarded man convicted of rape and murder, even though DNA tests after his trial showed that it was not his semen in the victim.
"We can’t give new trials to everyone who establishes, after conviction, that they might be innocent,” she later told the television news program “Frontline.” “We would have no finality in the criminal justice system, and finality is important.” snip

Finality is paramount in the justice system, not justice?

[adamuu]

1. wow. that's so wrong. n/t

[mrbarber]

22. Wow, what a monster.

[Lyric]

2. Wow...just, wow.

She needs to be in prison. We can all make sure that she has plenty of finality to take with her.

[sixmile]

3. Don't you mean 'she'?

Judge Keller is of the fairer sex.

[Lyric]

5. Duly corrected.

:hi:

[hootinholler]

4. Well, they did give him a trial before they hanged him.

In the grand Texas Tradition. String him up! No wait we have to give him a trial before we hang him!

-Hoot

[LiberalFighter]

12. Why haven't they done that to Bush? Damn it!! Texans follow your traditions!!

Sorry to the sane Texans.

[asjr]

6. Somewhere in Texas folklore

there is a judge who was called "The hanging judge." His name has slipped my mind. Help me.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

7. Arkansas folklore

Judge Roy Bean out of Ft. Smith.

[asjr]

11. Bean--now I remember but I had no idea

he was an Arkansan. Thanks for the info.

[tanngrisnir3]

20. Newp. Born in Kentucky and adjudicated in west Texas.

[yourout]

8. Unbelivable.

[tangent90]

9. Wall, Fat Tony said much the same thing a while back.

:grr:

[yurbud]

10. after watching FRONTLINE's original "Case for Innocence,'' I decided it wasn't safe to VISIT Texas

even as a white guy like me (and Roy Criner).

There were a couple of judges in that episode that foreshadowed the know-nothing witch-hunt self-serving circular reasoning we saw during the Bush years.

Except those nitwits in robes (black robes by day) are mostly still in office.

[barbtries]

16. i decided to look up the episode

after reading your post. roy criner has been released.

[sixmile]

21. Good.

More room for corporate criminals.

[rainbow4321]

23. Go to TX on vacation

Leave TX on probation. I had a patient tell me that one time. I think it should me our new state motto at this rate. Look at how many wrongly convicted and jailed people were freed after cleared by DNA testing just in Dallas County.

[yurbud]

26. at least they are letting them go now. at time of that episode, they weren't

[yurbud]

27. the judges in that episode came perilously close to making Bush look like a rocket scientist

When one of them was asked what the evidence was against Criner, he said, ''The primary ebladence was the body, there was the dead girls body.''

But of course the body had no DNA, fiber, or fingerprint linked to Criner. The body was just evidence that SOMEONE killed her.

[L0oniX]

13. Yea ...the sick ass state that used to get you 20 years for a joint.

[struggle4progress]

17. I remember when possession in Texas could potentially earn a life sentence

http://books.google.com/books?id=WMOdI9pC-gEC&pg=PA62&lpg=PA62&dq=texas+marijuana+law+possession+life+sentence&source=bl&ots=hQTAYy1P59&sig=RfnpLVJwvNXOK4FMAD2-AHVH5C4&hl=en&ei=Pgi0SePVOKSQ-Qakj5CDAw&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=9&ct=result

[formercia]

19. I met a broken man back in '72

did 7 years on a chain gang in Florida, building roads in the Everglades. Two joints.

They broke his body and spirit.

[sammythecat]

28. That's awful

Few things worse than ignorant people with power.

[TreasonousBastard]

14. Sharon Keller has always been the antichrist of judges...

IIRC when she was a prosecutor she was one step ahead of the sheriff for borderline improprieties and as a judge has not only been far too pro-prosecution but has been far too pro-corporation and come up with some very weird opinions from the bench. I believe she was censured at least once for opinions that defied law or logic.

Been a while since I saw anything about her, but the Times article is a bit too properly fair&balanced for my tastes-- I'm guessing it was written by a reporter who doesn't know all the background and is bending over backwards to be fair to a monster. A New Yorker piece about Keller years ago ripped her into little pieces and flushed them away.

[LiberalFighter]

15. She just might get her just reward yet.

Now, Judge Keller is again defending her actions, this time in a judicial misconduct case that could end her career.

Seventeen months ago, lawyers for a man facing execution sought extra time to file a last-minute appeal. Judge Keller refused to delay the closing of her clerk’s office past 5 p.m., even though late filings are common on the day of a scheduled execution. The man, Michael Richard, was put to death by lethal injection a few hours later.

Based on that case, the State Commission on Judicial Conduct last month charged Judge Keller with incompetence, violating her duties and casting public discredit on the judiciary. Judge Keller, who was first elected chief judge of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in 2000, faces a public trial and could be forced off the bench.

The names of her defenders: Dan Hagood, Knox Fitzpatrick

[handmade34]

18. scary!

[readmoreoften]

24. She needs to be thrown away.

Perhaps imprisoned herself.

[Liberal_in_LA]

25. She's horrible.

[progressoid]

29. Maybe she would like an electric chair in her court room to just "finalize" all her decisions.

What an awful person.

[Skittles]

30. would she say that if it was a family member of hers?

fuck no