If you’ve not heard, over the weekend it was announced that the felony charges against James O’Keefe — who famously, never actually posed as a pimp in ACORN offices — and his three co-conspirators in the matter of attempting to illegally access the phone system of U.S. Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA) in New Orleans, have been reduced to misdemeanor charges.
It’s believed likely that the agreement was part of a plea deal. The reduced charges would carry a maximum prison sentence of 6 months and a fine of $5,000, versus the maximum sentence of 20 years for the felony charges.
MORAL 1: If you’re going to attempt to feloniously enter federal property under false pretenses in order to manipulate the phone system of a sitting U.S. Senator, make sure a) you’re an operative for the Republican, not Democratic, Party (remember: IOKIYAR!), b) you do not have an Arabic sounding name and, most importantly, c) you have as one of your co-conspirators the son of the acting U.S. Attorney in the same state where you are attempting to commit your crime.
MORAL 2: If you get caught and arrested while doing any of the above, even if, as your attorney says, you’re just “kid,” be sure to be a “kid” who has the ample funding and high-powered connections to employ, for your defense, a superstar GOP attorney such as one who was powerful enough to have represented the U.S. Senate Republicans during the Watergate Hearings nearly 40 years ago and during the witch-hunt investigation of the Clinton administration in the 90’s.
Here endeth the lesson.
Nobody reduced my three felony charges to a misdemeanor. But then again, I didn’t learn and follow the lessons to be learned in this blog post. Instead, I just exposed the crimes the FORs (Friends of Republicans) were doing, and so of course I had to be hammered for it.
This is absolutely ridiculous. The worst part is he will get away with his actions concerning the fraudulent reporting of ACORN
I guess James O’Keefe will retain his voting privileges.
No such luck for ACORN’s would-be beneficiaries.
Looks like being black is a greater offense than conspiring to attack the offices of a U.S. senator.
I’m pretty sure alot of people who needed ACORN are p.o’ed at this latest turn of events. I can’t wait to see how the GOP martyrs him now
anyone remember me going on about Caroline Critchfield Hunter a couple years back?…well,
http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/033...e-suppression/
I applaud the acting Chief on bringing in St Louis County to handle the investigation.Sounds as if charges are still being decided upon for the “few other” Overland cops currently suspended.
Sounds as if they know who erased the tapes and was perverting justice and we can only hope they receive the fullest punishment the law allows.
If we cant trust the Police to be honest even against one of their own, were all screwed.
Please delete the above 99, thanks xx
See how money fucking controls our law. GROSS ME OUT!
Hey there Shortbus, 99’s on a sebbatical… unless there’s a serious need. Sorry, dude.
Hey Flo, DAMN GREAT RULING…but always vigil here…media lack of focus seems to leave us on the short side of VICTORY. Go figure. 🙂
Steve @ #1,
I looked back at some of the old Brad Blog articles and I found one in which it said that your charge would be reduced to a misdemeanor for good behavior after a year, I think it was?
I’m guessing that didn’t happen.
I will always be grateful that you broke the law in order to expose actual criminal activity that had far-reaching effects on our entire election system.
What a contrast to these lawbreakers who had to make up criminal activity that never existed and sell it to the public to bring down an organization that helped so many people.
So, when’s O’Keefe’s next edited sting video against the Salvation Army coming out?
@Laura, No. 11. Thanks for your very kind words.
I plead guilty to and was convicted of one felony, and I was sentenced to three years of probation. Per the plea agreement, after staying out of trouble for one year my felony conviction was, in fact, reduced to a misdemeanor. I completed the last two years of probation without incident and my conviction was expunged. The expungement is per Cal. law for a first offender who completes all requirements of probation, as I did.
But I did get charged with three felonies, and convicted of one felony. These little pissants (O’Keefe, et. al.) will, it seems, only be charged with misdemeanors.
And the aforementioned pissants have deep-pocket donors from the right-wing to cover their legal bills. My wife and I had to double mortgage our house to pay my legal bills. Our defense fund did receive generous donations from progressive individuals from all over the country, and we are very grateful for that. But that double mortgage was still necessary, and that continues to weigh us down financially to a very significant degree.
Also, there were no right-wingers standing by to offer me gainful employment. I got fired when the news broke that I’d been charged with three felonies (in March of 2006), and four years later this ex-felon is still unemployed (but going to school full time to train for another career, and should be working again in the near future).
I have no complaints; I did what I did, and my wife and I had to pay the price. I do wish, however, that other parties who were involved in criminal wrongdoing in my case had been held to account. And I also believe that O’Keefe, et. al. are getting preferential treatment and being handled with the proverbial “kid gloves.” I had no such luck. But then again, IOKIFYAR.
@ Steve #13,
Thanks for the clarification, that you had been charged with 3 felonies and convicted of one; then later the conviction was reduced.
Yeah, quite a difference from our well-connected miscreants who had their charges reduced. We’ll just have to figure out some other way to MTPFHOP (make them pay for hurting other people).
There does seem to be something wrong with our jurisprudence system. Just yesterday one of the criminals guilty of the meltdown plea bargained down from a sentence that would have incarcerated him for 25 years to a meagre 6 months for hoodwinking millions from their nest eggs.
Not that I was particularly prescient, and I’m sure I wasn’t alone in my predictions, but right after the arrest of O’Keefe I commented on many blogs that he’d never spend a day in jail. He’ll be sentenced, but it will be suspended and he’ll be given probation. This was an easy one to see.