Life Experience.

[pnwgirl]

Jul 1, 2018 4:00:05 GMT f1guyus said:

You may have noticed the I’m  little cynical about the law enforcement establishment. Here’s one reason why.
Once upon a time a person I trust completely to tell the truth was a juror in a 1st degree murder trial in San Joaquin County. The basics of the case were, there was a disagreement in a bar in Lodi, the perp left the bar, went home, got a pistol, drove around until he found the victim in another bar. Called him out and shot him dead. One shot, thru the heart. From 25 feet. Then he drove to the Lodi police chiefs office and turned himself in. The motive for the killing was the favors of the wife of another very prominent Lodian. Nether his name or hers could de disclosed. So in court an alternate theory of an unpaid gambling debt became operative. The woman came to court accompanied by her attorney, spoke with the judge in private, no written record of her testimony (if it was testimony) was kept. The local papers kept her identity secret. Now, why did this make a difference? Gambling debt? skanky cheating wife? What’s the difference? When the jury got in the jury room one of the jurors decided that not paying a gambling debt made it OK to shoot the victim. And a slam dunk 1st degree murder became voluntary manslaughter. So my guess is right now the prosecutor and the defense attorney are figuring out how they can keep Sac LE in the clear and put Mookie DeAngelo in the bucket without him ever giving interviews. Everything else is secondary. And they have to get SoCal to agree. That’s going to be the hard part. That and getting the press to go along the way the locals did back in the day. 

I take it you believe Sacramento law enforcement has some dark secret that would be disclosed if law enforcement was required to testify. What exactly is it that you think they have to hide?

[pnwgirl]

Jul 2, 2018 2:25:38 GMT @thedog said:

Jul 1, 2018 22:46:39 GMT themeasurer said:

How is this unusual? First, there was a hearing involving publicity.

The DA's held a press conference and said they needed to agree on a strategy. That's not an overnight deal.

Why? Because actual humans, with only a 40 hour work week (in theory) have to be consulted and decisions made. Each DA has to meet with his/her team and then communicate (carefully) with the other DA's.

It's only been two months. There's no reason to hurry and any sane DA office would put cases where there's a hurry ahead of this one. 

It's not about Sac control. It's about what makes sense for the system, as a whole. When they do announce where he's going next (I predict Ventura, where, btw, Totten has his own, methodical way of doing things), they will have already discussed the how of transferring him (and more important, who is going to pay).

Transferring JJD somewhere else will be expensive. No one wants to spend the money until everyone agrees. All kinds of variables (how much is already on the docket, how many people available in the new DA's office to prosecute, transfer of evidence).

Given the amount of digitized evidence along, all those DA's and their staff are currently going over it. They have other things to do, as well. He is safely put away and his attorney has not tried to claim that he's not getting a speedy process (I bet it's the opposite, I bet she wants more time too).

He has not even entered a plea to any jurisdiction's charges. That will hopefully happen on July 12. Then, the next hearing (whenever there's time for it on the judge's docket) may be about jurisdictional change.

I'm not sure why anyone things that in a state of nearly 40 million people, with about 50 counties and 12 involved jurisdictions (similar to 12 separate states in some ways), this would go any quicker. Law is slow.

Yeah, there's nothing "unusual" about the case staying in Sac for the time being. Motions to Consolidate and Change Venue will come after his arraignments. If you were to do it now, you'd be putting the cart before the horse. It'd be a whole lot of wasted time and effort to do it before the arraignment only to have the defendant plead guilty.

Each county is a separate jurisdiction and must prosecute its charges separately. There is no potential to “combine prosecutions” of charges from different counties within the same state. You are confusing media reports that county prosecutors were coordinating their efforts, which has nothing to do with “combining” anything.

EDIT: California Penal Code, Part 2 Sec. 790 permits the prosecutor to bring a motion to consolidate prosecution of murders “connected together in their commission” but in different jurisdictions. A quick google search turns up some interesting cases where the Court denied motions to consolidate.

The “connected together in their commission” standard is far different than the judicial economy standard used in civil proceedings.

[pnwgirl]

Jul 1, 2018 18:14:24 GMT @thedog said:

Jul 1, 2018 4:00:05 GMT f1guyus said:

You may have noticed the I’m  little cynical about the law enforcement establishment. Here’s one reason why.
Once upon a time a person I trust completely to tell the truth was a juror in a 1st degree murder trial in San Joaquin County. The basics of the case were, there was a disagreement in a bar in Lodi, the perp left the bar, went home, got a pistol, drove around until he found the victim in another bar. Called him out and shot him dead. One shot, thru the heart. From 25 feet. Then he drove to the Lodi police chiefs office and turned himself in. The motive for the killing was the favors of the wife of another very prominent Lodian. Nether his name or hers could de disclosed. So in court an alternate theory of an unpaid gambling debt became operative. The woman came to court accompanied by her attorney, spoke with the judge in private, no written record of her testimony (if it was testimony) was kept. The local papers kept her identity secret. Now, why did this make a difference? Gambling debt? skanky cheating wife? What’s the difference? When the jury got in the jury room one of the jurors decided that not paying a gambling debt made it OK to shoot the victim. And a slam dunk 1st degree murder became voluntary manslaughter. So my guess is right now the prosecutor and the defense attorney are figuring out how they can keep Sac LE in the clear and put Mookie DeAngelo in the bucket without him ever giving interviews. Everything else is secondary. And they have to get SoCal to agree. That’s going to be the hard part. That and getting the press to go along the way the locals did back in the day. 

What the juror described to you is the California Code of Evidence in action. There are laws in place that vet the type of evidence that can be submitted to jurors for their consideration, and the judge is the person reasonable for making those determinations.

When you post that, "The woman came to court accompanied by her attorney, spoke with the judge in private, no written record of her testimony (if it was testimony) was kept", what you're describing is what's called a Motion in Limine. Those are motions heard by the judge outside the presence of the jury to determine if certain matters can be brought up in front of them, or if the rules of evidence bar it. A record of those proceedings is kept, the jury just doesn't get to hear it. Those decisions to exclude evidence are appealable to higher courts.

There are two reasons I can think of off hand why the identity of the prominent wife and the Lodian could not be disclosed. One reason is California Evidence Code 352, which bars evidence is that is substantially more prejudicial than any relevant probative value it may have. This type of evidence will cause jurors to be moved by emotion, hatred, ect. as opposed to logic. This type of evidence is only not allowed when the potential prejudicial effect is substantially greater than any relevant use it might have. So, if this was a well known and hated person, and her identity wasn't really important for a relevant matter in the case, her identity could be excluded.

Another reason her identity might have been excluded was that it would lead to inpermissible character evidence. If this was a well known person who was associated with a group that did bad things, it would be improper for jurors to know the identity of the group, and then conclude that because she's part of a group that does bad things, on that occation she acted within conformity with the group's reputation and did something bad. This frequently comes up with gangs. Prosecutors and defense attorneys are generally barred from bringing up a person's (victim or defendant's) gang affiliations unless it's super material to something the jury absolutely needs to know in a case. There's too much of a risk that jurors will use the reasoning, "This person is in a gang, and gangs do bad things; so, it makes sense that on this particular occasion the defendant did something bad because he's in a gang."

While I'll be the first to admit that gangs are responsible for a lot of crime, the court systems want jurors to look at evidence isolated from whatever incident the person is being charged with. The court wants juror to convict people for specific crimes; they don't want jurors to blanket convict people as generally being bad people. That's why character evidence, and evidence of gang/criminal organizations a person is a part of generally is not allowed. 

When the jury got in the jury room one of the jurors decided that not paying a gambling debt made it OK to shoot the victim. And a slam dunk 1st degree murder became voluntary manslaughter.

If they did this, the jurors simply weren't following the jury instructions. The legal difference between first degree murder and voluntary manslaughter isn't how much you agree with the motive, or how much punishment the jury subjectively feels the defendant should get. The difference is premeditation and deliberation. If somebody goes home, grabs a gun, then drives around looking for somebody, that's definitely first degree murder because they've taken the time to think through and plan a murder. Voluntary manslaughter would be heat of the passion killing, like walking in and seeing your wife in bed with another man, quickly grabbing a weapon, and killing them. The second you have the slightest "cooling off period", it stops being voluntary manslaughter.

So, the jury in that case just didn't follow the jury instructions (which is common), so that's on them, not the legal system. This is actually all the more reason why courts and judges don't give too much power/evidence to juries, because they are essentially just random people dragged in off the street without legal training. To ensure fair trials, you have to tightly control the information that gets to them.

Legal Beagle:

Thank you for your succinct explanation. I am a civil attorney in another state, and appreciate you taking the time to explain the proceedings.

[pnwgirl]

Jul 5, 2018 18:22:44 GMT @thedog said:

Jul 5, 2018 0:13:31 GMT pnwgirl said:

Each county is a separate jurisdiction and must prosecute its charges separately. There is no potential to “combine prosecutions” of charges from different counties within the same state. You are confusing media reports that county prosecutors were coordinating their efforts, which has nothing to do with “combining” anything.

In California you can absolutely combine prosecutions from different counties for judicial efficiency. I might have been a little sloppy when said Motion to Consolidate, since technically that motion would be used to combine pending cases in one county only. "Coordination" is the correct legal term to combine cases in different venues, under California Code of Civil Procedure 404.

The Code of Civil Procedure applies to civil cases, not criminal.

[pnwgirl]

Jul 5, 2018 21:00:08 GMT pnwgirl said:

Jul 5, 2018 18:22:44 GMT @thedog said:

In California you can absolutely combine prosecutions from different counties for judicial efficiency. I might have been a little sloppy when said Motion to Consolidate, since technically that motion would be used to combine pending cases in one county only. "Coordination" is the correct legal term to combine cases in different venues, under California Code of Civil Procedure 404.

The Code of Civil Procedure applies to civil cases, not criminal.

You may be thinking of California Penal Code, Part II Section 790:
law.justia.com/codes/california/2016/code-pen/part-2/title-3/chapter-1/section-790/

The prosecutor can bring a motion to consolidate prosecution of murders in different jurisdictions that are “connected together in their commission.”

[rickraven]

This case is not easy. The hurry up and prosecute the guy is exactly what we don't want. Sending him to another county won't help. All in due time.

It must be remembered that these crimes were spread all over the place in Sac County. Interjuristiction rivalry between the SD and Local Badges was worse than it is now to the nth degree. There were many other serial rapists, serial murderers and huge drug trafficking rings going on in the SAC area at the same time. Looking at it in hindsight, for the resources and staffing levels at time was abysmal. It remained that way until the mid 90s and by then he was long gone in No.Cal and his So.Cal murder spree was done for a decade (as far as we know).

JJD covered his tracks well. He was a very successful serial rapist/murderer and s shittu shoplifter. How many cops connect non violent to uberviolet crimes? A hammer and dog repellent does not = rapist/murderer. Dog repellent was never an issue...the vics said he smelled bad and LE surmised it to be nervous sweating.

It's easy to say LE missed this and that in hindsight after this scumbags arrest and lay the known evidence at JJDs feet and say "Yeah..a cop shoplifting, they should have had him...see the hammer..see the spray?" I say so what. A one off stupid low level crime that go him fired. Now if it were a sexual assault...sure. Investigations in real time didnt happen like it does today. This one is the big one that got away and JJD is the one to blame...not LE.