[Seattle-editorial] Feature Proposal

[BFGalbraith]

FP:
http://seattle.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=35804&group=webcast

3 important local issues addressed here (by someone
who I've been assuming is a local author):

1)Ridgeway/GRK
2)justice system
3)Plea Bargaining

I believe it has it's own headline:
Life for Confessions? The Ridgway Plea Bargain 

And the first half of the first paragraph is a good
intro:
_______________________________________________________
I am no legal analyst. I am just a person examining
the local news. But I have a problem with the American
criminal justice system's tactics. As I watched the
television coverage of the courtroom which held Gary
L. Ridgway during his confession and plea bargain this
week, I had troubles with the implications of some of
the court's questioning of Ridgway. To accept a plea
bargain, the court does a little song and dance where
it has the defendant say out loud that s/he agrees to
waive all rights to an appeal or any revisiting of the
issue, that the defendant enters into the plea bargain
of free will, and that the defendant understands what
s/he just agreed to. I call it a song and dance
because many people who fall victim to an underfunded
public defender system, and are bullied by threats of
inflated criminal charges from the prosecutor, plead
guilty to crimes, crimes they never committed,
strictly out of fear of getting lost in the justice
system, not out of truth and justice. 
_______________________________________________________



=====
-Benjamin 

"BFGalbraith"- bfgalbraith at users.sourceforge.net 
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