SIGforum.com Main Page The Lounge Manslaughter for Stabbing Someone to Death, Was it a Violent Crime? Judges Disagree!
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Gerald Scott got parole after serving 11 years of a 22 year sentence because his crimes "weren't violent" (?????) Actually, the logic is a little more involved but 5 judges say he should be paroled. A snippet of the story below, link to full story follows. "NEW YORK (AP) — Once annually, sometimes less, the full federal appeals court in New York meets to confront a perplexing legal question. Most recently, it was to decide whether shooting somebody point-blank in the face and stabbing somebody to death are violent acts. The 14 judges of the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan who heard arguments in U.S. v. Gerald Scott were left to decide how to label the 1998 killings that they agreed were “undoubtedly brutal." Ultimately, the full court voted 9-to-5 this week to conclude that Scott’s crimes were indeed violent. But their votes came with a robust debate over a legal puzzle that has vexed multiple federal courts — even if, they agreed, the answer might seem like common sense. A lower-court judge had decided that Scott’s convictions — on manslaughter charges — meant he had not been convicted of a violent crime. He was freed after serving just over 11 years of a 22-year sentence. The decision did not shock judges who considered the appeal in November in a unique gathering known as an “en banc” meeting of the full 2nd Circuit. That’s because two laws at stake — the Armed Career Criminal Act and the Career Offender Sentencing Guideline — do not define a violent crime by what the defendant actually did. Instead, the crime is defined by the minimum acts someone might have committed and still been convicted of the offense. ..." Link_to_Story I always thought you were convicted for what you did, not for what you might have minimally done to accomplish something similar. Silly me. ... stirred anti-clockwise. | ||
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Unflappable Enginerd |
Sooo... The prosecutors likely pled this case down to manslaughter to put this bonehead animal away more expediently, and now the court turns him loose earlier because of it? Am I reading this correctly? __________________________________ NRA Benefactor I lost all my weapons in a boating, umm, accident. http://www.aufamily.com/forums/ | |||
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Member |
In a nutshell, things like this likely factor in to why lawyers consistently poll low in trust. | |||
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| Member |
He got 22 yrs., served half and is out. That’s usually what the cons are looking at isn’t it? Serve 1/2 your sentence, with good behavior, & your out. Someone sets these “rules”. Judges? | |||
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Fighting the good fight |
It's the difference between legal definitions, and common English definitions. In common English, a "violent crime" means "a crime that involves violence". Simple and straightforward, and broadly applied. The issue is that "violent crime" for purposes of sentencing enhancements or parole determinations is often specifically defined by statute. So a group of legislators (not judges) got together at some point and wrote and passed a section of law that may say something like "a violent crime for purposes of this section is defined as the offenses of murder, rape, arson, aggravated robbery, or battery in the 1st degree". (Or similar.) So it's not every crime that involves violence, just those specifically defined as a violent crime in the statute. So while we can all agree that manslaughter involving shooting someone in the face is a "violent crime" in common English, if manslaughter isn't one of the offenses listed in the legal definition of "violent crime" in the statute used for sentencing/parole, the judge cannot consider it a "violent crime" for those purposes. Legislators write the laws, and often define the terms used in the laws. Judges can interpret the language of the laws when there's room for interpretation, but the judges are bound by the language of the laws as originally written when things are strictly defined.
It's often much less. Many felons in Arkansas typically serve 1/4 to 1/6 of their prison sentence. | |||
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Member |
...and moronic stupidity ensued. Maybe someone should inquire of one of those 'legislators' how anyone is stabbed to death without violence being a component. Was the victim 'casually', or 'gently', or 'lovingly' stabbed to death? Again, this is just another glowing example of how retarded our society as a whole has become. Common sense has completely flown the coup. ----------------------------- Guns are awesome because they shoot solid lead freedom. Every man should have several guns. And several dogs, because a man with a cat is a woman. Kurt Schlichter | |||
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| Member |
True, and many legislators are lawyers by training and as such, are, or should be, acutely aware of the importance of language used in the laws they author. | |||
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| No good deed goes unpunished  |
A lot of statutory law is written by the Uniform Law Commission. For example, a state may want to enact or replace its laws regarding how trusts or financial powers of attorney are governed. The state will start with the uniform statutes drafted by the ULC. Most states will have a committee that makes recommendations for changes in the ULC language. The ULC tries to be middle of the road, but its language will be too progressive for some states and not progressive enough for others. | |||
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| drop and give me 20 pushups |
So the court is now saying that manslaughter is not murder eventhough the victim is still dead. As stated the perpertrator was plead out to the lessor charge so the prosucutor gets another win scalp to put on his belt. ........................ drill sgt. | |||
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| Fighting the good fight |
It's not just that court. Manslaughter is not murder, by law. Otherwise, there wouldn't be separate manslaughter and murder laws. It'd all just be murder. Manslaughter vs. Murder vs. Homicide, etc... These words might be used by some people interchangeably in casual conversation, but the reality is that they have different definitions. (Same with assault vs. battery, or robbery vs. burglary. Lots of folks like to use those interchangeably in casual conversation, but they have different definitions, and are not the same thing.) | |||
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| Big Stack |
You're convicted of the crime you're charged with, when you're found or plead guilty to it. The terms of the law control the punishment. I'm pretty sure that's what going on here. The act, washed through the lens of who the law is written, determines the terms under which parole is considered.
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Sigforum K9 handler |
Hint- for sentencing guidelines, very few violent crimes are considered violent. In most states, “violent” crimes require the offender to serve a greater amount of their lawful sentence. “Non violent” “crimes” require only pennies on the dollar service. So, if you do not want to pay to have to incarcerate people, you classify more offenders as non-violent. Did you know if you lure a police officer in Kentucky to a house under false pretenses, and then wage a failed attempt to murder him with a rifle, it is non-violent. | |||
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| Little ray of sunshine  |
All true, but sometimes legislation is very badly written and causes problems from the get-go. Other times there are subtle and unexpected problems hiding in the drafting. The fish is mute, expressionless. The fish doesn't think because the fish knows everything. | |||
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| Member |
Too bad it wasn't a "hate crime." | |||
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Member |
Unfortunately, some of those "unexpected problems hiding in the drafts", were (IMHO) provided intentionally as escape clauses by those who either wrote the legislation initially or provided input during negotiations on what the final bill would entail. "I'm not fluent in the language of violence, but I know enough to get around in places where it's spoken." | |||
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| Member |
Bingo. Virtually all legislation coming out of that cesspool in Washington is written to conform to someone's agenda. Remember, if a white guy and a black guy commit the same crime, the white guy likely goes to jail while the black guy gets probation because we have to many "black and brown" people in jail already. The law and the enforcement of it is a joke at this point, hence the reason we have so many problems in this country. And it's likely only going to get worse. ----------------------------- Guns are awesome because they shoot solid lead freedom. Every man should have several guns. And several dogs, because a man with a cat is a woman. Kurt Schlichter | |||
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SIGforum.com Main Page The Lounge Manslaughter for Stabbing Someone to Death, Was it a Violent Crime? Judges Disagree!
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