Bill Cosby convicted on three counts of indecent assault.

Courtesy of CNN: 

The jury in Bill Cosby's retrial found the TV icon guilty of all three counts of aggravated indecent assault on Thursday for drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand in a Philadelphia suburb in 2004. 

The 80-year-old comedian faces up to 10 years in prison on each count, but would likely serve them concurrently. 

After the trial concluded, Constand left through a side door in the courtroom, walking into a hallway with her arms around two women and a huge smile on her face. 

Cosby shouted at the prosecutor in court when his bail was discussed, observers said. 

The case against Cosby centered on testimony from Constand, a former employee with Temple University women's basketball team. She testified that Cosby, a powerful trustee at Temple, drugged her and sexually assaulted her when she visited his home to ask for career advice. 

Cosby's defense team argued that their interaction was consensual. Constand is a con artist, they argued, who wanted a piece of Cosby's fortune. 

The case is the first celebrity sexual assault trial since the #MeToo movement began last fall, and as such, represents a test of how the cultural movement will translate into a courtroom arena. In closing arguments, defense attorney Kathleen Bliss positioned Cosby's legal team as standing up against "witch hunts, lynchings (and) McCarthyism."

"Witch hunt" where have we heard THAT before? 

It can be argued that the Cosby allegations were actually the impetus for the #MeToo movement, and that this conviction is proof that powerful men who thought that their money and prestige would protect them from justice have another think coming.

Gee, I wonder who could be next to learn that lesson?

San Fransisco to expunge marijuana convictions going back as far as 1975.

Courtesy of the LA Times:  

San Francisco will retroactively apply California's new marijuana legalization laws to prior convictions, expunging or reducing misdemeanors and felonies dating to 1975, the district attorney's office announced Wednesday. 

Nearly 5,000 felony marijuana convictions will be reviewed, recalled and resentenced, and more than 3,000 misdemeanors that were sentenced prior to Proposition 64's passage will be dismissed and sealed, Dist. Atty. George Gascón said. The move will clear people's records of crimes that can be barriers to employment and housing. 

San Francisco's move could be the beginning of a larger movement to address old pot convictions, though it's still far from clear how many other counties will follow the famously liberal city's lead. 

Proposition 64 legalizes, among other things, the possession and purchase of up to an ounce of marijuana and allows individuals to grow up to six plants for personal use. The measure also allows people convicted of marijuana possession crimes eliminated by Proposition 64 to petition the courts to have those convictions expunged from their records as long as the person does not pose a risk to public safety. 

They also can petition to have some crimes reduced from a felony to a misdemeanor, including possession of more than an ounce of marijuana by a person who is 18 or older.

You know what they say, where California goes the country is sure to follow.

But that certainly will not happen with Jeff Sessions leading the Justice Department.

I believe his response to marijuana use is some version of "shoot on sight." 

Sovereign citizen convicted of plotting to overthrow the West Virginia state government.

Thomas David Deegan

Courtesy of Metro News:  

A Wood County jury quickly convicted the man Friday who had threatened last fall to seize control of the state capitol and the state government of West Virginia. 

The prosecution’s case centered on a conference call recorded last September where Deegan talked about his plan. 

“The conversation was the actual crime itself,” Wood County Prosecutor Jason Wharton told MetroNews Friday morning. “The jury was able to hear the entirety of the conference call as well as some recordings from the regional jail and some other testimony.” 

“He made statements with regard to a plan to essentially bring many individuals to the state capitol in Charleston in an attempt to overtake the offices in that complex,” Wharton said. 

Deegan told those on the conference call they should shoot those who offered any resistance.

Oh he seems nice.

Here's more from the Southern Poverty Law Center:

Deegan is accused of laying out his overthrow plans in a series of conference calls -- one of them as recently as Sept. 14 -- where he called on like-minded armed extremists to grab their firearms and assist him in an attempt to overthrow state government, according to court documents. 

His intended plan was to remove several state government leaders from their offices, charge them with treason and replace them with sovereign citizens. After apparently setting up a sovereign citizen-style court system, those found guilty of treason would be put to death.

Gee who could have guessed that this might be the result of constant anti-government rhetoric pouring out of  right wing radio and conservative news outlets 24 hours a day?

Florida man faces 120 year sentence for firing two shots in the air while threatening neighbors. Sounds about right to me. Update!

Courtesy of the Orlando Sentinel: 

A Jacksonville man is facing a 120-year sentence for firing two shots that caused no injuries, The Florida Times-Union reported on Sunday. 

The trial of Army Veteran Randal Ratledge, 58, is scheduled to start with jury selection on Monday. Defense attorneys have asked the judge to waive the mandatory guidelines, but court officials said Judge Jack Schemer is bound by the state law. 

Ratledge, 58, was charged with six counts of aggravated assault after a 2012 incident involving his neighbors. Authorities said Rutledge fired shots in the air and screamed profanities at the six neighbors. He was charged with one count of aggravated assault on each of the neighbors.

Florida has a 10-20-Life when it comes to convictions for firing a gun and apparently the judge thought this guy deserves life. Though at 58 even a 20 year sentence would probably keep him in prison for the rest of his life.

I have to say that I think stricter penalties like this one might just make all of these open carry assholes think twice about pulling out their shiny metal penises whenever they feel their manhood is threatened, or maybe simply leave them at home altogether in order to avoid the temptation, and ultimately that would make ALL of us a hell of a lot safer.

Update: Okay so after a few people left comments and sent me e-mails I reread the article more closely, and  it appears that the headline in the Orlando Sentinel is incorrect and should read "Florida man faces 20-year sentence for firing 2 shots." Not 120 year sentence.

I have no idea how the story managed to get published with such a glaring error, or why it has not yet been corrected. After all THEY have editors.

Sorry for the misleading information. 

James Holmes, the Colorado theater shooter, found guilty on all 165 charges against him.

Courtesy of Newsweek:  

A jury on Thursday afternoon found James Holmes guilty of all 165 charges against him related to a July 2012 attack at an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater. Holmes, 27, was found guilty of first degree murder, including with "extreme indifference," attempted murder and explosives offenses. 

The jury began deliberating Wednesday morning and the decision was reached in just 13 hours, a short deliberation for a case that had 10 weeks of testimony. 

Holmes killed 12 people and injured 70 others after entering a showing of The Dark Knight Rises and shooting into the crowd. He was arrested outside of the theater. It took the judge an hour to read the 165 guilty verdicts, much longer than the minutes it took for Holmes, armed with three guns, to spray the theater with bullets.

Can't say as this surprised me much.  Holmes may have been schizophrenic but that is not enough to explain systematically killing twelve people and wounding seventy others.

Of course it does not exactly escape me that on the very day that this dark chapter in gun violence in America comes to a close a brand new chapter opens up in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

Just imagine how nice it would be to go an entire year without reading about a mass shooting in our country.

Perhaps somebody in Britain, or Australia, or Sweden, or just about anywhere else in the civilized world could tell us what that's like.

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the only Boston bombing suspect left alive, has been found guilty on all 30 counts.

Tsarnaev during his arrest.

Courtesy of the Boston Herald:  

Confessed murderer Dzhokhar Tsarnaev will now be the one pleading for his life after a federal jury took just 11 hours to find him guilty of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings and aftermath that left four dead and 260 maimed and injured. 

In a silent courtroom, a clerk read aloud the verdict finding Tsarnaev, 21, guilty of all 30 counts including conspiracy, use of a weapon of mass destruction and the murders of restaurant manager Krystle Marie Campbell, 29, Boston University graduate student Lingzi Lu, 23, and Martin Richard, 8 at the marathon finish line, as well as MIT Police Officer Sean Collier three days later. 

Tsarnaev swayed slightly on his feet, his head down, as the verdict was read and as the forewoman of the jury stared directly at him. He showed no reaction. 

The jury’s work is far from done. As early as next week, the same 12 deliberating jurors will reconvene for the start of Tsarnaev’s sentencing trial, where they will decide if he is to serve out his days behind bars or be ordered put to death.

This is the biggest story of the day, so it seems appropriate that we discuss it here.

I don't think there was ever any doubt that Tsarnaev would be convicted, the defense case that he was under the spell of his older brother simply never seemed viable to me. 

The next question of course is what is the proper punishment for his crimes?

Life in prison?

Or death?

Your thoughts?

Florida man who shot and killed unarmed teenager over loud music sentenced to life in prison.

Courtesy of CNN:  

A Florida judge Friday sentenced Michael Dunn to life in prison without parole for the 2012 shooting death of 17-year-old Jordan Davis. 

The sentence, imposed nearly two years after Dunn shot and killed Davis during an argument over loud music, also carries an additional 90 years for three convictions of attempted murder and firing a weapon into a vehicle. 

"This case demonstrates that our justice system does work," Duval County Judge Russell Healey said moments before sentencing Dunn.

I think this verdict is very good news, especially for those of us who worried that this guy would get  the "Zimmerman treatment" and be allowed to simply walk free after killing this kid in cold blood.

I think the judge really summed things up well with these words: 

"Mr. Dunn, your life is effectively over," Healey said. "What is sad... is that this case exemplifies that our society seems to have lost its way."

"We should remember there is nothing wrong with retreating and deescalating the situation," the judge said.

And good riddance to bad garbage in my opinion. Just check out the non-apology apology that Dunn offered the family right before his sentencing:

"I want the Davis family to know I truly regret what happened," he said. "I'm sorry for their loss. If I could roll back time and do things differently, I would." 

He feared for his life, he said. 

"I did what I thought I had to do," Dunn said. "Still, I am mortified I took a life, whether it was justified or not."

So even in the end this POS is trying to make the case that he felt he was in danger and was only trying to protect himself.

That is such bullshit. This asshole lost his temper and used a gun to take out his anger on a car full of unarmed teenagers, killing one.

If he had not had a gun this would have just been a frustrating altercation that he could have bitched about later on Facebook. But because he lives in America, and every asshole who can afford one is allowed to purchase a gun, this 17 year old is now dead.

The judge is right, society has lost its way.

Convicted conservative filmmaker avoids prison. Gee how surprising.

Contestants in worst fake a smile competition.

Courtesy of HuffPo:  

Conservative author and filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza was sentenced on Tuesday to spend eight months in a community confinement center during five years of probation after pleading guilty to a campaign finance law violation. 

The defendant, a frequent critic of President Barack Obama, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Richard Berman in Manhattan. He was also given a $30,000 fine and ordered to do one day of community service a week during his probation. 

D'Souza, 53, admitted in May to illegally reimbursing two 'straw donors' who donated $10,000 each to the unsuccessful 2012 U.S. Senate campaign in New York of Wendy Long, a Republican he had known since attending Dartmouth College in the early 1980s. 

"It was a crazy idea, it was a bad idea," D'Souza told Berman before being sentenced. "I regret breaking the law."

Yes he regretted breaking the law so much that he tried to blame his conviction on the fact that he was "targeted" by the Obama Justice Department.

POS.

Too bad really, I was kind of looking forward to hearing how D'Souza fared in the general population of a federal prison while surrounded by inmates who may not have taken kindly to the fact that he makes his money attacking the first black President of these United States.

Hey remember that guy in Florida who was only convicted of attempted second degree murder after killing an unarmed teenager for playing his music too loud? Yeah he's going back to court.

Courtesy of the Tallahassee Democrat:  

Jury selection is set for today in the second trial of man accused of first-degree murder in the death of a teenager during a 2012 dispute over loud music. 

Jordan Davis, 17, died after Michael Dunn, 47, fired into the SUV in which Davis was a passenger. 

Dunn was previously convicted of three counts of attempted second-degree murder and firing into an occupied vehicle, but jurors deadlocked on the charge of first-degree murder. 

He has yet to be sentenced on the charges he was convicted of during the first trial, but faces up to 60 to 150 years in prison.

Apparently the state was unhappy with the first conviction so they are attempting a do-over. 

The attorney for the family stated that they hope that this time the jury comes back with a first degree murder conviction.

Now don't get me wrong I think this guy deserves to go away for a long, long time, which he will already do anyhow with just the attempted second degree murder conviction, but isn't trying him twice against the law? I do believe that is called Double Jeopardy.

I am no legal eagle but I did see that Ashley Judd movie like four times. 

Oscar Pistorius found guilty of South Africa's version of manslaughter.

Courtesy of USA Today:  

South African judge on Friday convicted athlete Oscar Pistorius of "culpable homicide" in the death of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp. 

A conviction of culpable homicide, the term for manslaughter in South Africa, carries a maximum 15-year prison sentence. 

Pistorius had already been cleared of murdering Steenkamp. Pistorius has been granted bail and will return to court on Oct.13 to find out whether he will be imprisoned and, if so, for how long. 

A day earlier, Judge Thokozile Masipa said state prosecutors had failed to prove Pistorius, 27, was guilty of premeditated or second-degree murder. 

However, Masipa found the actions by Pistorius — an Olympic and Paralympic athlete known as the Blade Runner for his use of specially designed prosthetic legs — to be "negligent."

Negligent? I'm sorry how do you say WTF in South African?

This asshole fired a gun through the door of his bathroom, when the only two people in the apartment were he and his girlfriend. 

I do not buy for an instant that he thought there had been a break in and was frightened into firing those shots.

A witness says she heard arguing, so how in the hell does this negligent thing come into play?

He had a fight with his girlfriend, she locked herself in the bathroom to get away from him, and he shot her in cold blood through the door.  End of story.

THAT is at the least second degree murder.

This asshole just got away with murder. 

The best coverage of Bob McDonnell's conviction comes from MSNBC's Rachel Maddow. I know, I know, big surprise.

Click image to play video

Courtesy of MSNBC: 

Rachel Maddow reports on the guilty verdicts in the corruption trial of former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell and his wife, and traces the declining arc of McDonnell’s pious “family values” political persona to his legal defense of scapegoating his wife.

Rachel did an incredible job of revealing the almost overwhelming hypocrisy of this scumbag and does it with her usual in depth research and gift for story telling.

This is why Rachel remains my go to source when i really want to get the facts conserning a breaking story or understand some complicated political intrigue.

Former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell and his wife found guilty of multiple charges. Another GOP star bites the dust.

Courtesy of CBS News: 

Former Gov. Bob McDonnell, R-Va., and his wife, Maureen, have been found guilty on multiple counts of conspiracy, corruption and bribery. 

Bob McDonnell was found guilty on 11 different counts relating to the conspiracy charges. Maureen McDonnell was found guilty on eight of the 11 conspiracy charges as well as one charge of obstruction of official proceeding that occurred during the grand jury investigation. 

The jury reached the verdict after three days of deliberations. There was loud sobbing in the courtroom as the counts were read. 

Sentencing has been set for Jan. 6, according to news reports. The couple could face years of jail time.

Yeah I bet there was sobbing. 

I thought McDonnell staged one of the most cowardly defenses I have ever seen, where he essentially blamed everything on his wife and made sure they were never seen arriving or leaving the courthouse together.

I am not saying that his wife was without fault, but as the Governor HE is the one that was supposed to maintain the ethical standards.

Not only that but McDonnell was offered a plea deal that would have seen him convicted of only one of the charges against, him, and not the corruption one either, and allowed his wife to avoid any jail time at all, and he refused to take it. 

You may remember that McDonnell, also known as Governor Ultrasound, was once touted as a possible Republican presidential candidate in 2016.

Instead it looks like he might be spending some time behind bars where his prison husband can treat him just as shabbily as he treated his own wife.

Now let's see if we get a similar happy ending from the Rick Perry indictments. 

Convicted felon, and sovereign citizen, claims that he does not have to obey the law because his rights come from "the creator."

Courtesy of Monroe News: 

An Erie man charged with multiple felonies challenged constitutional laws in a Monroe court and claimed his rights were violated when police searched his home and confiscated several weapons. Philip R. Za­pata, 36, of 6705 Preston St. said in First District Court Tuesday afternoon that he was not bound by Michigan laws, a belief typically shared by those known as sovereign-nation citizens. 

“Your laws are violating my rights,” Mr. Zapata told First Dis­trict Judge Jack Vitale. “My rights don’t come from the Constitution. My rights come from the creator.” 

Acting in his own defense, Mr. Zapata challenged virtually every facet of the case, including the police identifying his residence on Preston, which he called his “family storage unit.” He also challenged the use of his name because it was printed on legal documents in capital letters. He referred to his name as a “dead entity.” 

The case against Mr. Zapata involves his alleged possession of weapons that Erie Township police removed from his home on Feb. 6. Chief Dean Ansel and Officer Jon LaSotta both testified that they had a legal search war­rant when they entered Mr. Za­pata’s house. Mr. Zapata, a convicted felon, is not allowed to legally own weapons. Inside the house that day, the police officers testified to finding and seizing a rifle in a bathroom, a 9mm handgun be­hind a trap door in a wall and a shotgun behind a freezer. 

You see this is the result of people being told that this is a Christian nation and that God wrote the Constitution.

These people are simple, barely functioning morons, who somehow believe despite their ignorance and criminal behaviors they are entitled to own guns.

I wonder if while in prison he will convince his cellmate not to touch him in his naughty bits because those body parts come from his creator?

Michigan GOP candidate would like everybody to kindly ignore his arrest record for masturbating in cars and elect him to office.

Jordan D. Haskins, candidate for the state legislator, and public masturbator.

Courtesy of Raw Story:

A candidate running to represent Michigan’s 95th House district in the state legislature wants you to know that once you look past his bizarre sexual fetish and multiple felony convictions, he is a rock-ribbed conservative Republican, whose “stool of conservatism” is held up by “faith, family and freedom.” 

Michigan Live reported Friday that Saginaw’s Jordan D. Haskins dismisses the arrests and prison time as the results of youthful indiscretion and said that he is ready to “move on from that and do what I can” to serve his state as a Republican state Representative. 

“I have dreams,” Haskins said to Michigan Live, “and I want to make a difference.” 

Haskins, 24, has served prison time in two states and is currently on parole, but there are no rules preventing him from running for the state House. 

On four occasions between April of 2010 and January of 2011, Haskins broke into vehicles on public and private property, disconnected the ignition wires, then started the engine. As the wires snapped and spit sparks, Haskins would masturbate to climax in a sexualized ritual he calls “cranking.” 

Haskins has lived in Michigan and North Carolina and has lengthy criminal records in both states, dating back to the age of 15. Early offenses had mostly to do with breaking into cars and going on joyrides. 

“I was just a lonely, angry kid at the time,” he said. “If anything, I could be put on ‘World’s Dumbest Criminals.’”

Valid point, after all who hasn't broken into cars, hot wired them, and then polished the bishop while listening to the vehicle's engine turning over?

Well me for one. 

And here I thought I was fairly well versed in deviant behaviors, and yet I have never even HEARD of this one.

And look I don't like to judge other people's sexual proclivities, but he guy DID get convicted for his, and this did not happen when he was an adolescent, but instead only three or four years ago.

Yeah if I were a voter in Michigan's 95th district I am pretty sure this would be more than enough to dissuade me from casting my vote for this guy.

Sarah Palin accuses President Obama of "Palling around with a cop killer advocate." As you might imagine that is completely misleading.

Courtesy of Arizona's own race baiting bomb thrower's Facebook page:  

Obama’s Palling Around with Cop-Killer Advocate… 

You know evil reigns when America’s “leader” gives full-throated support for a cop-killer advocate. Obama wants this guy to help run the Department of Justice. 

(Law enforcement union leaders: are you still proud of your support for liberals?) And here I thought I’d seen it all with the way the administration coddled the racist DHS employee who advocated murder and violent hate speech on his website. 

Friends, what we’re witnessing is a lost cause on the domestic and international fronts. So, what we do is hold on, pray hard, and oust the Obama administration’s agenda at the ballot box. Work hard, America, as you look forward to the end of the Obama era. It will be the end of an error. 

- Sarah Palin

The thing that has Palin's white pointy hat all bent out of shape is the fact that President Obama's nominee to head the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, Debo P. Adegbile (Voted down by the Senate just today), was once employed by the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund.

The Defense Fund has a history of representing African Americans who have been convicted of various crimes, when there was a question as to whether they received a fair trial or not.

One such individual, Mumia Abu-Jamal, was convicted and sentenced to death. The NAACP took on his case, in which he had been convicted of killing a police officer, and got his death sentence tossed, well BEFORE Debo P. Adegbile began working there.

Here is what the Washington Post has said about his time there: 

Adegbile, 47, spent more than a decade working for the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund, where he served as the group’s in-house voting rights expert. The legal defense fund began its work on Abu-Jamal's behalf well before Adegbile began working for it, however he did contribute to the filing of a 2009 court brief that argued that Abu-Jamal faced a discriminatory jury -- an appeal later found to have merit by a judge.

In other words he did his job and helped to represent a client that an appeals court agreed did not receive justice during his initial trial. This happens time and time again in the US legal system and nobody usually holds the lawyers accountable for the supposed crimes of their clients.

However this is an African American nominee, who once represented an African American organization (That provided legal counsel for an African American convict), and who was chosen by an African American President.

I am trying my best to see this response by Sarah Palin and the Right Wing as anything but racist.

However I am failing to do so.