What's Up in the 8th
Everybody loves a second chance. Darrick Jones is going to get a third one,
Reggie Lee ran out of them, Virgil Hill isn't going to get one, and Baltek
Randhawa is going to get one, even though maybe he shouldn't.
The Judicial College teaches judges a number of things, but
there's no foreign language requirement, and that presents a problem in City
of Bedford v. Randhawa. Randhawa
was charged with aggravated menacing for a speech he made about Baltek Randhawa
in the Sikh Temple the two attended.
Well, it started out as
aggravated menacing; by the time trial day rolled around, it had been reduced
to disorderly conduct, a minor misdemeanor, a reduction impelled, it's my
guess, by the fact that the prosecutor would have rather have been beaten in
the face with a ballpeen hammer than
spend two days in a jury trial on this.
Especially because the supposed threats had been made in Punjabi. There was an audiotape of the speech, and Randhawa
had it transcribed, and also offered the testimony of an interpreter. The court refused both, distrusting the
interpreter (who'd also made the transcription) because of her 18-year friendship
with Randhawa.
Normally, whether a trial court erred in refusing an
interpreter would be reviewed for abuse of discretion, but this isn't the
normal situation; as the court notes, "the issue is not whether either appellant
Randhawa or the interpreter were proficient in the English language but,
rather, if the trier of fact was proficient in Punjabi." We can pretty much guess the answer to that
one, and the court, expressing its difficulty in understanding "how the court
could reach a fair and just verdict without hearing the actual statements that
were made," reverses and remands for a new trial.
Randhawa had also assigned a speedy trial violation as
error, but the panel decides that it need not address that, since the
assignment regarding the interpreter is "dispositive." Really?
If the court had sustained the speedy trial claim, there would've been
no need for a retrial. The smart money
is that there won't be one anyway; the prosecutor has probably heard as much
Punjabi as he intends to in his lifetime.
See reference to ballpeen hammer, supra.
There's not much question that Darrick Jones is a bad
guy: in a little over two months, he
broke into three homes and terrorized the inhabitants, then shot another man on
the street for good measure, prompting one of the most liberal judges on the
bench here to give him a 32-year sentence.
That got reversed in February because the judge didn't make the
necessary findings for imposing consecutive sentences, and after further reflection
on the remand, the judge decided that a 21-year sentence was more
appropriate. Jones appeals again, and
in State
v. Jones, the court reverses again, for much the same reason: the judge didn't make the finding that
consecutive sentences weren't disproportionate.
The case mainly serves to
demonstrate that the 8th District is the most stringent in the application of
the 2929.14(C)(4) requirements. In some districts, not only would the
appeals court have upheld the sentence, they would have tacked the 11 years
back on.
A simple lesson is provided by State
v. Lee. Ten years ago, in State v. Brooks, the Supreme Court held that
a judge couldn't impose a prison sentence for a probation violation if he
hadn't notified the defendant at the time of sentencing of what sentence would
be imposed upon violation. When Lee
pleads guilty to a fifth degree felony, the judge puts him on probation, but
warns him that a violation would result in a 12-month sentence. Three violation hearings later, the judge
finally runs out of patience and sends Lee off for 11 months. Lee complains that the judge didn't tell him
about the sentence at his first two violation hearings, but he doesn't have to,
as long as he does it at the initial sentencing hearing.
Virgil Hill had a number of problems: an eighth-grade education which didn't allow
him to read or write, medications for anxiety and depression, and psychiatric
reports which concluded he wasn't psychotic, despite that fact that he reported
sometimes "hearing voices." His more
immediate problem was the seven-count indictment against him, charging him with
kidnapping, aggravated robbery, felonious assault, and two counts of rape, all
arising from his relationship with his "on-again/off-again girlfriend." That latter problem appeared to be
ameliorated, if not solved, by his plea to one count of assault and one of
sexual battery. But then he tried to
withdraw his plea. Well, you know how
those things work out, and in State
v. Hill, that's how they did work out:
the court goes through the litany of how a simple change of heart isn't
sufficient - it's sufficient to back out of a deal to put siding on your house,
but not to get out of a guilty plea - and that's that.
But then we come to the concurring opinion. The court's opinion quotes little of the plea
or motion transcript, other than Hill's acknowledgment that he was "not saying
I'm innocent," but the concurrence notes that at the plea hearing, Hill
admitted "putting hands on" the victim, but denied being guilty of the rape.
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