Judge Revokes Bail For White Collar Crimes/​Jamaican Judges Release Murderers On Bail Daily

---

Judge revokes bail for white collar crimes/​Jamaican judges release murderers on bail daily.

With our inor­di­nate­ly high Jamaican crime rate, it seems to me it would be a good idea to use what­ev­er leg­isla­tive, judi­cial and oth­er tools we have avail­able to help the front line work­ers and by exten­sion pro­vide a much-need­ed respite from the bloodletting.

I say this to say that the leg­isla­tive part of our Government has a duty to pro­pose, debate, and pass mean­ing­ful leg­is­la­tion which is com­men­su­rate with the com­plex capa­bil­i­ties of today’s criminals.
At the same time, I under­stand the pull of pop­ulism in pol­i­tics and the need to dis­agree with and oppose every­thing the oth­er par­ty does. By doing so leg­is­la­tors have con­demned our cit­i­zens to con­tin­ue to be sub­ject­ed to an inor­di­nate crime rate by dumb­ing them down to accept­ing a blink­ered zero-sum black or white per­spec­tive to problem-solving.

Simply put Legislators can come togeth­er with a com­mon­al­i­ty of pur­pose and pass tough laws that actu­al­ly serve as a deter­rent to crime. The Government (oppo­si­tion includ­ed) can come togeth­er to ensure that law enforce­ment is giv­en the tools to do the job right while hold­ing them respon­si­ble and accountable.

These are not black and white issues the solu­tions to com­plex issues are gen­er­al­ly found in the grey. Additionally, Judges can begin to hon­or their oaths of office by demon­strat­ing fideli­ty and good stew­ard­ship to the pub­lic’s trust.
The con­tin­u­a­tion of the shock­ing and dis­grace­ful prac­tice by judges who con­vert the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem into a revolv­ing door can­not be overemphasized.

How are we to have faith in the sys­tem when a motorist who delib­er­ate­ly mow down and kill a police offi­cer who law­ful­ly sig­naled him to stop is giv­en a (16) six­teen-month prison sen­tence? What could be the jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for such abu­sive use of judi­cial pow­er and how is it even pos­si­ble that this is allowed to stand?
The answer to some of these ques­tions lies in the mis­guid­ed per­cep­tion which exists with­in the frame­work of judi­cial independence.

The Independence the judi­cia­ry is giv­en comes from the peo­ple. Those are cod­i­fied into laws defined and passed by the peo­ple. It fol­lows there­fore that the peo­ple have a right and a respon­si­bil­i­ty to alter, or change those laws when they are no longer serv­ing the pur­pose for which they were intended.,
If the judi­cia­ry is allowed to oper­ate out­side of over­sight and con­trol of the peo­ple, then giv­en enough time, it is itself in dan­ger of becom­ing a behe­moth which is anti­thet­i­cal to the inter­est of the people.
We may already be at that point.

It is impor­tant to remem­ber that Paul Manafort is only accused of com­mit­ting white col­lar non-vio­lent crimes. If a judge right here in the west­ern hemi­sphere is suf­fi­cient­ly aware that she under­stands the need to pro­tect the peo­ple from a non-vio­lent alleged white-col­lar crim­i­nal, why is it that Jamaican Judges are act­ing out­side statu­to­ry laws and com­mon-sense by releas­ing vio­lent mur­der­ers back onto the streets as soon as the police man­age to arrest them? As a con­se­quence they go back to mur­der­ing wit­ness­es and those to whom they are opposed, How then do we expect to low­er our mur­der num­bers and make Jamaica a place in which investors and busi­ness peo­ple want to live, raise their fam­i­lies and do business?

When the judi­cia­ry is allowed to release dan­ger­ous killers back onto the streets after they are arrest­ed after killing and being arrest­ed on six sep­a­rate mur­ders we are at that point.
When the judi­cia­ry is allowed to con­tin­ue to make the straw­man argu­ment that bail is not sup­posed to be pun­ish­ment we are already at that point because the law speaks specif­i­cal­ly to when bail may be denied pre-trial.

After being grant­ed bail with strict con­di­tions for alleged non-vio­lent white col­lar crimes Trump’s for­mer cam­paign man­ag­er Paul Manafort was remand­ed to Federal cus­tody by US District Judge Amy Berman Jackson last Friday.
The Feds allege that Manafort made attempts to tam­per with wit­ness­es who are slat­ed to tes­ti­fy in the Government’s case against him.
Understanding her role in the dis­pen­sa­tion of Justice Judge Berman-Jackson exem­pli­fied judi­cial responsibility.

“The harm, in this case, is harm to the admin­is­tra­tion of jus­tice and harm to the integri­ty of the court’s sys­tem,” Berman Jackson told Manafort in court.
“This is not mid­dle school. I can’t take his cell­phone,” she said of Manafort. “I thought about this long and hard, Mr. Manafort. I have no appetite for this.”
Manafort’s tri­al is set to begin in September, mean­ing Manafort may spend the remain­der of time locked away pend­ing his tri­al and if con­vict­ed he may be look­ing at a very long prison sen­tence. At age 69 it is not a stretch to imag­ine that Paul Manafort may nev­er be a free man ever again.
His friends were “shell­shocked” in the wake of the judge’s deci­sion to revoke his bail in light of the new indictments.

Whether Judge Berman Jackson meant that she had no appetite to restrain Manafort’s free­dom beyond those already imposed or that she has no appetite, for his behav­ior she nev­er­the­less ful­ly under­stood the bur­den of her respon­si­bil­i­ty to ensure that the peo­ple’s case against the accused is respected.
And so she had pre­cious lit­tle choice in send­ing him to jail, even though her hands were not tied by a manda­to­ry clause in the Bail Act forc­ing her to do so.
That is how judges are sup­posed to act, not act­ing in their own inter­est based on their nar­row world-view.