watchpaul: WTF? First-degree murder off table

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

WTF? First-degree murder off table

When jurors in the Thomas Arthur Applegate case finished deliberating for the day Tuesday, they were still hopelessly deadlocked — 11 to one — with regard to what degree of murder and attempted murder Applegate should be found guilty of.

However, when they resume deliberation this morning, they will not have to ponder on the first-degree option.

Humboldt County Superior Court Judge John T. Feeney announced in open court at about 12:15 p.m. Tuesday that the first-degree charges had been dismissed and that jurors are to no longer deliberate on that degree with regard to the murder and attempted murder counts.

After announcing the Humboldt County District Attorney’s Office decision to drop the first-degree option, Feeney dismissed the jurors for the day but ordered them back today at 8:30 a.m. to resume their deliberation.

As the jurors walked out of the courtroom Tuesday afternoon, one had tears streaming down her face...

...When asked why he decided to drop the first-degree option on the murder and attempted murder charges, Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos said, “It was a calculated decision based upon the information we have.” Read the rest

6 comments:

Anonymous6/13/2007 7:31 AM
“Whether it’s the right one or not, only time will tell,” Gallegos said.

How much incompetence will the people of Humboldt put up with?
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Anonymous6/13/2007 7:56 AM
No matter how badly he did it, Gallegos got the facts in. If a juror can't see first degree in this case,
that's the kind of thing that just happens to any prosecutor. However, what he did was blink on the first degree case to avoid a hung jury and a retrial. That's moral cowardice. As always, he's looking for something, just not the right thing, out of the case
to keep up his "win" column.
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Anonymous6/13/2007 7:59 AM
He sucks.
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Anonymous6/13/2007 6:43 PM
It's a tossup. The moron DA versus the 12 droolers that make up a typical Humboldt County jury. Feeney is the one that will be pleading insanity by the time this one is done. Realizing that it is irresponsible to offer up an opinion based on news accounts, I will do it anyway. How the hell could this NOT be first degree murder?
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Anonymous6/14/2007 3:02 PM
Same way it could be not
assault with the gun he used to commit the murder and the attempted murder.

Humboldt has arrived at the perfect storm of
jurors, judges and DA's.
Enjoy the ride, you voted for it.
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Rose6/15/2007 2:06 PM
Don't count the judges and juries on this one.

The system is out of whack and it can all be laid at the feet of one person. The DA.
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Paul Gallegos

The Humboldt County Grand Jury found that "Weak leadership and poor managerial practices" have undermined the office... Implicit in all evidence gathered by the Grand Jury - including interviews with the D.A. (Paul Gallegos) - is the unfortunate truth that the D.A. (Paul Gallegos) exhibits a limited understanding of how things are done in the department" Gallegos "lacks the global perspective needed to keep the department operating efficiently," and quotes an unnamed staff member as saying, "The D.A. (Paul Gallegos) does not fully understand the functionality of many of the things we do here" - Years later, in his own words: "I’m not an administrator, they didn’t elect me to be an administrator, they elected me to make sure this office runs..."

Douglas & Zanotti

CASE TOSSED The district attorney misrepresented the law and failed to provide evidence of former Eureka Police Chief David Douglas' and Lt. Tony Zanotti's innocence during a criminal grand jury inquiry into the 2006 shooting death of Cheri Lyn Moore, defense attorneys argued in court documents filed Thursday... ”Our judicial system stands as a real and necessary check on the grand jury indictment process,” one of the documents states. “This court has the authority and the means by which to halt this prosecution, which is justified neither by the undisputed facts, nor by the law.”

Gallegos has taken what was "arguably the state's best small DA's office, with a cutting edge CAST program that "trained the trainers"... into a bunch of time serving bureaucratic wannabee brown nosers, lightly sprinkled with a couple of earnest learners who are sure to split as soon as possible.

One weeps for Max Cardoza who won Angellel, and for Maggie Fleming who won so many impossible victories. Mired in Humboldt for personal reasons, they have to suffer the ignominy of working for Paul, with Yougo, yes, yougo who has freed more people as a prosecutor than he did as a defense attorney. As has Paul. Anonymous comment

Gallegos has answers for everything. I’ve never met anyone whose answers came so quickly, with such polish - except about his law school(s). He likely sounded the same way when promising to get prosecutors off their anachronistic “at will” status and onto civil service status. It never happened. Indeed, he told them, “Disloyalty will not be tolerated” – a real morale builder.

He sounds great. What progressive doesn’t want to believe in him? But it’s a myth. He’s an intellectual lightweight and self-aggrandizer who tries to please everybody with glib answers. Jim Fahey for The Arcata Eye

The Humboldt County DA's office is one of the most exciting prosecutorial
offices in California.

Its District Attorney, Paul Gallegos, is willing to charge anyone who commits
wrongdoing--no matter how wealthy, sacrosanct, or ruthless. He believes in total equality before the law. He also plans to be innovative in promoting programs of prevention and treatment. He wants to make it the best prosecutorial office of its size in the nation.... Gallegos' Help Wanted ad

Gallegos' OWN Quotes

★ ...District Attorney Paul Gallegos said he believes the statute of limitations clock, even on misdemeanors, doesn't start running until law enforcement knows or reasonably should have known of the offense. In this case, Gallegos said, that means the statute of limitations would not run out at least until Feb. 8, 2009, or one year after Gundersen's arrest and the discovery of the photographs in question...

★ "...some people actually molest out of different feelings, some times out of feelings of love....” DA Gallegos explaining why Child Abuse prosecutions were down

★ “I never said that the information was not available under the Freedom of Information Act. Quite the contrary, I informed you that our use of force policy is not a public record.” Paul Gallegos to the Times Standard 5/25/07

★ ...“One is that I do everything to make people happy which means I don’t stand for anything except for just something,” he said. “The other is I stand for something and I try to be a leader and take some people, a group of people, a community someplace and I say guess what folks, this is who I am. I stand for your beliefs. We share these beliefs or we don’t. You get the option to judge that. This is who I am and I am committed to leading us this place, wherever it is...." Eureka Reporter Gallegos defends record, looks ahead 7/3/2005

★ Note the difference between what he SAID, and what he DOES..."...So what are these issues? Top on Gallegos' list is the proliferation of "garbage cases," small-time crimes and overcharged cases that he said are clogging up the court system.

Garbage cases, said Gallegos, come in two forms: Cases that would lose if actually brought to trial and cases that are overcharged for the crimes committed. The idea behind filing both kinds of garbage, he said, is to get the defendant to plead guilty, netting a conviction without having to go into court.

Again, the IRONY is astounding! Look at what he SAYS, and then think about what he DOES! "Probably 95 percent of the cases that are filed plead guilty. In fact, there are a lot of cases that are filed on the assumption they will plead guilty, because of the time and expense involved in defending them. But these cases shouldn't even be filed in the first place, because if they were challenged, they would lose," Gallegos said. Better yet: If they weren't filed at all, it would save the county time and money...." North Coast Journal 2/21/02 Too bad he didn't take his own advice.

★ “Tim’s a stud,” he said. “He really is; anyone would be stoked to have him.” Gallegos on his second in command right hand man Assistant District Attorney Tim Stoen. (Former second in command right hand man to Jim Jones/People's Temple.)

NOTE:

"Helping Crush Progressivism" - ie: exposing the predatory litigious orgs and those who seek power for power's sake.... The original purpose of watchpaul is to post important documents relating to Humboldt County District Attorney Paul Gallegos and his handlers who seek to gain power through the acquisition of political offices. This includes, but is not limited to, the manipulations of "Humboldt Watershed Council," "EPIC," "Baykeeper," and other activist groups - the unregulated orgs. It also includes the master manipulators, such as Richard Salzman and Ken Miller.

Links to key stories and documents are also included in the sidebar, so that you do not have to try to scroll back through what has become a lengthy series of posts. I encourage you to use the Search and Labels features as well.

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Tuesday, June 12, 2007

WTF? First-degree murder off table

6 comments: