My full story on this is at Salon today. But, here’s the skinny.
It looks like Indiana’s now-former Republican Sec. of State, Charlie White, who was found guilty of three voter fraud felonies and three other felonies early this month, has now been sentenced.
And it also looks like the old adage — It’s Okay If You’re a Republican (IOKIYAR) — continues to ring true in the Hoosier State. Despite being the top election official in the very first state in the union to institute disenfranchising polling place Photo ID restrictions, Charlie White has gotten off with a slap on the wrist, essentially, for three intentional voter fraud felonies, and the three others he was found guilty of as well.
His sentencing hearing was held last week. He pretended to be contrite before the judge (unlike when he appeared days earlier on Fox “News”), so it turns out he’ll serve just one year in home detention for all of his crimes. The sentencing, naturally, has left him “elated.”
The fates of other, less Republican, less high-ranking folks however, such as those who were prosecuted with the full force of the federal government during the George W. Bush Administration’s unprecedented, if failed attempt to ferret out “voter fraud” crimes, were not quite as lucky. Unfortunately, they were used as fodder to help Republicans push for those polling place Photo ID laws (which would have failed to deter either them or White from committing voter fraud) by Bush’s wholly politicized Dept. of Justice.
For folks like Wisconsin’s Kimberly Prude and Florida’s Usman Ali, to name just two examples of those who were caught in that buzz-saw, and who each committed far less egregious — far far far less egregious — crimes than those intentionally committed by White, the legal system was not nearly as kind.
Prude, who tried to rescind her own absentee vote before the 2004 election, immediately after learning from her probation officer that she was not allowed to vote — despite never having served time in jail and being on felony probation for having passed a bad check four years earlier — was forced to serve more than a year in prison. Ali, who never even voted at all, had it even worse. He was deported to Pakistan where he hadn’t live in more than 10 years, destroying his life in this country for not just himself, but for his American wife and daughter as well.
I tell the whole story — of White’s virtually scot-free sentencing, as compared to Prude’s and Ali’s — in my story today at Salon. Please give it a read.
As you might expect, the moral, once again, is: IOKIYAR.
“The play was a great success, but the audience was a disaster.” – Oscar Wilde
Yep, disgusting. Another proud moment for Hoosiers, NOT.
A couple of minor points.
First, the Judge who gave a single year’s home detention for six felonies, Steven R. Nation, is a Republican.
Second, to his credit, Judge Nation rejected a defense motion to reduce the six felony convictions to six misdemeanors. Had he done so, White could have continued to serve as the Hoosier state’s chief elections officer.
Canada is following in the US’s footsteps in voter suppression techniques:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/tory-robo-call-scandal-widens-as-complaints-flood-from-nearly-30-ridings/article2350944/?utm_medium=Feeds%3A%20RSS%2FAtom&utm_source=Politics&utm_content=2350944
Adam8 (slandered by RawStory staff, autocratically banned by RawStory’s dictator Roxanne Cooper)
If home detention really means being detained at one’s home, I think a year of home detention is an appropriate (and stiff) penalty.
Prison conditions in many parts of the U.S. basically constitute cruel and inhuman punishment. A civilized society should not be comfortable with “jokes” whose theme is the likelihood of being raped while in prison.
Under these circumstances, home detention is appropriate for non-violent criminals. I wish it was the standard for non-violent drug-related offenses.
Now if you could just be as critical of all the election hijackers in government, despite partisan politics, you would be offering us gold, Brad. I tell you! You are —>this close
this close
this close…to reporting the truth. Neither Democrats nor Republicans care about free and fair elections. They all just want to win. No matter the cost. Until you admit it – I mean REALLY admit it to yourself – you will never be able to put it all together, sir.
Oh, my. I just read your full story at Salon, which includes this:
If that story is true, it does paint a year of home detention in a different light.
Mitch –
Glad you got the full story. Yeah, I saw your comment earlier, but didn’t have time to respond. Was gonna say largely what you have now said in your second comment. And that was the point. If she had received a year of home detention, I wouldn’t be complaining (as loud, anyway, since he was found guilty of SIX felonies, and took no responsibility for any of them, claiming he’d been screwed.) That’s a big contrast from what Prude did in her case.
Same is also true of Usman Ali’s case.
Ononymous – You’re not even “this close”. Again, you seem to miss the entire point of the story. But, again, using the lazy “they all do it”, seems much much cleverer than paying attention to the context of the story.
As to your claim that I don’t believe Democrats are interested in winning. Well, you’re just making stuff up. So, yeah, you weren’t even that close.
Really, you don’t have to try so hard to make your point here at The BRAD BLOG. When you do, you end up missing your targets by a mile.
Home detention, with NO cable, no internet – wired or wireless, and NO smartphone. Strip him naked, delouse him, cavity search him, scour the house for electronic devices, then hand him a rotary phone.
Three felonies and not a day in jail?
Impeach the judge for public corruption.
erdfc