Friday, April 01, 2011

It Must Suck Being A Public Defender

A 22-year-old man raped a 92-year-old woman.

Well, the jury did its job and found him guilty, and even noticed aggravating factors that would keep this raping SOB in prison for 85 years. Hooray! Jury did the right thing!

But wait a minute, the rapist's public defender, doing her job, argues that it's too much:

“He’s 22,” public defender Carol Cline said of her client. “If there were no sentencing enhancements he’s probably going to be in his 60s when he gets out. The upward departure (in sentence) means he never gets out.”

Well, yes, that's the plan. But Cline wasn't done defending the rapist:

Cline argued before Johnson County Judge Stephen Tatum that the jury did not have sufficient cause to recommend the stiffer sentence. She said the state did not do a scientific risk assessment to determine if he posed a future danger to society.

She also challenged the contention that the enhanced sentence was justified by the victim’s age and infirmity.

“She was sharp as a tack,” Cline said of the woman, who managed to call 911 during the attack. “She did all the smart things she was able to do and she was not severely injured.”


And your point is?

Cline said the attack on the victim only lasted a couple of minutes and the rape Angilda committed “was not necessarily worse than the average” rape. She also noted that Angilda faces a longer sentence than he would have if he had murdered the woman.

So in other words, it was rape-lite. Not really "rape-rape."

Cue Whoopi:



How soul-destroying must it be to work for raping pukes like this?

6 comments:

wally said...

It must suck not to know how our jurisprudence system works.

Bob said...

@wally: are you calling me ignorant, Walt?

wally said...

Nah, I'm just an innocent bystander. Watching you do the petard-hoisting.

wally said...

Our societal systems, being imperfect, sometimes have byproducts we find unpleasant and hard to stomach. Our justice system demands that attorneys defend their clients to the limit of their abilities. To fault them for doing so is, let's say, disingenuous. Understandable certainly--we're only human--but disingenuous nonetheless.

TOTWTYTR said...

Soul destroying, but once she gets sufficient experience as a public defender and goes into private practice a very lucrative soul destroying experience.

Of course your client ending up with a sentence that will take him into his 80s isn't exactly a smashing victory.

And Wally, Bob wasn't speaking to the legal machinations, he was speaking to the soul destroying nature of being a defense attorney when your client is a slime ball. Which no doubt varies from lawyer to lawyer. People who can't deal with it go into other specialties within the legal business.

wally said...

I take your point, TOTWTYTR, and Bob's, that it must be a soul-destroying occupation for many, but I thought I detected more than a hint of disapproval of the attorney for defending her client so vigorously. If wrong, I apologize.