Janklow resigns

[JULIE]

Dec. 10, 2003 New York Times......................Mr. Janklow, 64, has said he will resign from the House on Jan. 20, the day he is to be sentenced here for second-degree manslaughter, reckless driving, failure to obey a stop sign and speeding in the Aug. 16 crash that left a motorcyclist dead.

[lorazepam]

I hope he gets his insulin in the slammer. I wouldn't want him running into bubba in the cafeteria.

[kbasa]

:clap

[crvalley]

There are plenty more Janklow's out there, so keep you're eyes open...

[JULIE]

Janklow was sentanced to only 100 days in jail. It is yet to be seen if he will actually serve any of this time.

[jgr451]

Originally posted by SlashFiveTourer
Originally posted by crvalley : "There are plenty more Janklow's out there, so keep your eyes open..."


When will motorcyclists, and their surviving family members, get justice from North American courts? After the infamous JANKLOW (http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/08/29/janklow.charged/)affair in 2003, we now get this in 2004:

February 20, 2004 - Vancouver (BC) Sun newspaper: Charges against a man involved in a fatal crash on July 14, 2003 have now been dropped because of a technicality. Last month, the driver of a passenger vehicle was charged under the Motor Vehicle Act with driving without due care and attention and making an illegal left turn after a collision that killed a young woman. Police said a man driving south on No. 2 Road made a prohibited left turn into a local shopping centre parking lot. The young lady, riding a motorcycle north on No. 2 Road, struck the side of the turning passenger vehicle. She died the next day in hospital. Charges against the car driver were dropped after it was revealed he immediately paid a $450 ticket the local police gave him on the night of the crash. A Canadian Crown lawyer said charging the man under the Motor Vehicle Act is the equivalent of double jeopardy because paying the ticket means he has already pleaded guilty and been punished for the offence.

I wonder what the family of the young female motorcyclist thinks after hearing that bit of judicial gobbledegook from a Crown prosecutor. RIGHT! A traffic ticket for an "illegal left turn"...one deceased motorcyclist...OK, $450 please! ...Thank you! ...Account closed... NEXT! :banghead

Let me try to explain.I am a former prosecutor for the Crown.The damage was actually done by the policeman who laid on the MVA ticket.Did he not realize he was dealing with a fatality in which after due consideration a more serious or appropriate charge might be laid?Perhaps not.

I dealt with a very similar case many years ago in which a truck loaded with drywall turned left across the path of an oncoming vehicle,the driver of which was killed in the collision.The truck driver's mistake was in not realizing it would take longer to slow and accelerate his vehicle with the load(he was not a professional driver);and misjudging the speed of the oncoming car.The studied result was an MVA charge of driving without due care and attention.

Usually,it is the act that constitutes the foundation of the offence,not the consequences of the offence.The mental state is an issue also,but is much more difficult to assess objectively than the act.

The concept of double jeopardy is pretty fundamental and is not to be overridden out of convenience.

Here it seems clear that there was no intent to maim or injure or kill,so murder/manslaugter charges were not considered appropriate.The act and the likely mental state were carelessness and disobedience to traffic laws.Sometimes that is just the way it is.A charge of criminal negligence causing death might have been laid,but if the traffic ticket was already disposed of,that avenue was closed to the Crown.

That is my best guess,not having been involved in the actual decision making processes,or knowing precisely what the facts were.

[jgr451]

Oh and we all need to be able to separate what one might call "Judicial gobbledegook", which some folk would say can only come from judges;from the administrative decisions taken by prosecutors.

Prosecutors exercise discretions judiciously-that is their job-but they are not capable of uttering "judicial gobbledegook".

Nor do most judges...

Now, in a country where many prosecutors and judges are elected and must win a popularity contest every so often,the possibilty is higher.

[jgr451]

Ah yes.I had forgotten you are a policeman,BK.I did not meant to say that the policeman in the Vancouver story was wrong,but that he made a decision that coloured the course of the investigation and the prosecution of the cager in question.

Double jeopardy applies where one tries to charge someone with 2 different charges for the same set of facts,namely,the driving.If the driver was drunk,that is another set of facts in addition to the improper left turn.If his turn signal didn't work...if he had stolen property in the trunk...if his licence had expired or was the wrong class...those are different facts that would support another charge arising out of the same incident.But where all that he did wrong in violation of a law was to make an improper left turn,he gets the same result whether he kills someone or hits nothing.

It is sometimes hard to make calls like that when there is a strong emotional content in the matter at hand,which is why we ask and expect our policemen, Crown lawyers and judges , to be as objective as they can be.With the power these individuals have to affect people's lives, goes the awesome responsibility to be fair and treat everyone the same,whether they "feel like it" or not.

As Tina Turner said,What's Love Got to Do With It?

[JULIE]

Janklow had many prior traffic violations and had been ticketed before for running the same stop sign. This is a clear case of political mis-usde of power.

[TheSlashFiveTourer]

Originally posted by jgr451
Prosecutors exercise discretions judiciously-that is their job-but they are not capable of uttering "judicial gobbledegook".

Hmm..isn't that something like saying Don Cherry is not capable of uttering "hockey gobbledegook" every Saturday night on CBC?
:D
Originally posted by BlueKnight....we don't have all the facts here, merely a titalating news article from the Vancouver Sun, which in itself is suspicious. If the Vancouver Sun is like the Toronto Sun, i.e. using pictures of scantily clad women to sell their copies, then I rest my case.

Sorry, Mike, old buddy...you're a bit off base with regard to the VANCOUVER SUN (http://www.vancouversun.com) being in the same minor league with the Toronto Sun and the Calgary Sun tabloids. I realize living there in the wilds of northern Ontario as you do, you may not be aware that the Vancouver Sun is a well-respected BROADSHEET newspaper published on a daily basis in Vancouver, British Columbia. Usually six or seven sections every day, news coverage, editorials, financials, sports coverage (GO CANUCKS!!), classifieds, obits and the maddening display of page after page after page of advertisements pleading with us to spend our money on fast cars, goofy fashions and discounted furniture sales. Not the best newspaper I read on a daily basis but for a fee of one dollar per day, plus 0.07 cents for the cursed GST, it'll do until I can afford a subscription to the New York Times and the Washington Post. The Globe and Mail as "Canada's National Newspaper" don't cut it.

Come to think of it, I haven't seen a "scantily clad woman" in the Vancouver Sun now for many moons! I can't recollect ever seeing a "scantily clad woman" in the Vancouver Sun! The Vancouver Sun??

By the way, Mike...what's wrong with "scantily clad women" anyway?? When you get to your 70's, I think you'll appreciate them all the more. And cannot a magazine or newspaper with two or three grainy photos of "scantily clad women" be capable of providing coverage of news events for its readers?

As for "a titalating news article from the Vancouver Sun..." I checked on the Oxford Dictionary definition of "titillate" and find that it translates to "tickle, agreeably excite." After reading the original small article about the accident in the "Law and Order" section of the Vancouver Sun on the 20th of February past, I was neither "tickled" nor "agreeably excited" about the death of the young woman in Vancouver several months earlier at the hands of a traffic violator. That could have been any one of US on that motorcycle...and probably will be for some of us this summer.

Is it any wonder that Lady Justice wears a blindfold so that she cannot see what goes on in her name?

[jgr451]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by SlashFiveTourer
Hmm..isn't that something like saying Don Cherry is not capable of uttering "hockey gobbledegook" every Saturday night on CBC?
:D

MMmmmmmmmm :dunno I think Don can utter all the gobbledegook he wants without fear of being castigated for claiming an inappropriate podium pounding place.

We do need to make distinctions among police,prosecutors and probators(sorry!!!) and their spheres of decision making. Without sounding like pedantic pissants , period.

[ian408]

Originally posted by SlashFiveTourer
Hmm..isn't that something like saying Don Cherry is not capable of uttering "hockey gobbledegook" every Saturday night on CBC?
:D


He's one import I'm glad we don't get too often. Though I do
get a quite a kick out of his commentary. Don Cherry is to
Hockey what John Madden is to NFL Football :D

[TheSlashFiveTourer]

Originally posted by ian408
He's one import I'm glad we don't get too often. Though I do
get a quite a kick out of his commentary. Don Cherry is to Hockey what John Madden is to NFL Football :D

Ian: I'm not sure who would be more pleased with your lucid comparison, Donald S. Cherry or John Madden! :D

The NHL playoffs start in three weeks and it looks like the San Jose Sharks will take a good run at the Stanley Cup. If you get TV coverage of the games there in Sunnyvale, get ready for Don Cherry, his comments and his natty suits on a nightly basis for a couple of weeks!
:clap

[ian408]

Originally posted by SlashFiveTourer
If you get TV coverage of the games there in Sunnyvale, get ready for Don Cherry, his comments and his natty suits on a nightly basis for a couple of weeks!
:clap

Oh, we won't see him here. Maybe some of the early rounds
on Center Ice (Pay TV games from the "home" market). We'll
get Randy Hahn (for Shark's games) and one of the Golf guys
from ESPN later :)

Even with Don, CBC broadcasts are far better than any
network here in the states.

Ian

[TheSlashFiveTourer]

Originally posted by ian408
....CBC broadcasts are far better than any network here in the states. Ian LUV YA!! :beer

[ian408]

Originally posted by SlashFiveTourer
LUV YA!! :beer

Ah, shucks....:bliss