Thread: Judges ignore no-bail law may as well give you the finger

Judges who ignore no-bail law may as well give you the finger
Laurie Roberts
Republic columnist
Mar. 21, 2007 12:00 AM

It's now been 17 days since Jocabed Dominguez-Torres was arrested and accused of getting drunk, running a red light and killing a 20-year-old Peoria man. Seventeen days since the courts were notified that she's in this country illegally and thus can't be released from jail under a new law approved by voters.

So what, you might ask, have our judges and commissioners done to comply with the overwhelming will of the people?

They set bail. Then they reconsidered. And lowered her bail. advertisement




In judicial speak, I think they just gave Arizona voters the finger.

It's been just over two weeks since Scott and Patty Miller lost their only son, Chris, and were ushered into the court system. Their reaction thus far?

"Complete dismay and total loss of confidence," Scott told me Tuesday. "For us to have gone through the last two weeks trying to deal with the grieving process all the while having to fight the legal system just to do what the voters said was the right thing to do to me is just unconscionable."

Chris Miller was killed just after 2 a.m. on March 4 when Peoria police say Dominguez-Torres, 22, ran a red light and crashed into the car in which he was riding. Her blood-alcohol level was 0.20 percent, 2 1/2 times the legal limit.

Peoria police notified court officials that she's here illegally and that she admitted to buying forged resident and Social Security cards on the streets of Phoenix.

Yet Commissioner Kathleen Mead set her bond at $150,000. This, despite Proposition 100.

You remember Prop. 100. It's a new law that denies bond in cases such as this to people here illegally.

It passed last November in every county of the state. It passed by the widest margin of any proposition on the ballot. It passed because 78 percent of this state's voters decreed that it shall be the law of the land.

Just not, apparently, in Maricopa County Superior Court.

After Mead set Dominguez-Torres' bond, a court spokeswoman explained to me that commissioners can't deny bond on the say-so of the police or even the suspect. They must get word from an official source, she said, which is tough given that bail must be set within 24 hours of an arrest and the people in Immigration and Customs Enforcement who could give the high sign don't work weekends.

Mead had to set Dominguez-Torres' bond on a Sunday.

The next day, March 5, the courts got that official word from ICE when they put an immigration hold on Dominguez-Torres.

"I don't know how much more official we can get," ICE spokeswoman Lauren Mack told me.

Yet five days later, Commissioner Michael Barth lowered the bond to $50,000.

On Monday, a Maricopa County prosecutor asked the court's presiding criminal judge, James Keppel, to change Domiguez-Torres' status to non-bondable, pointing out that our state Constitution now requires it. Keppel's response: "I'm not the Court of Appeals."

He's holding a hearing Thursday morning to decide whether he has the authority to overturn Barth's bond.

No word on whether anyone in the court system is worried about whether they have the authority to overturn voters.

Neither Keppel nor the court's presiding judge, Barbara Mundell, returned calls to explain how the arbiters of law can just ignore it.

However, courts spokeswoman J.W. Brown e-mailed me to let me know that judges are sworn to follow the law.

"Several times each week, they order individuals charged with serious felonies be held without bond," she wrote, "when information presented to the court shows the proof is evident or the presumption is great that the person committed the alleged offense and is in the U.S. illegally."

And yet Dominguez-Torres remains in jail on that $50,000 bond. If her family puts up $5,000, she'll be taken by ICE to a detention center, and if she doesn't fight deportation, she could be back in Mexico by April Fools' Day.

Fitting, don't you think?



Reach Roberts at laurie.roberts@arizonarepublic.com or (602) 444-8635. Read her blog at robertsblog.azcentral.com.

http://www.azcentral.com/news/columns/a ... 0321.html#

Does anyone have the phone numbers for Kathleen Mead and Michael Barth? I think they deserve a call, don't you?

Originally Posted by jecg_97030

Does anyone have the phone numbers for Kathleen Mead and Michael Barth? I think they deserve a call, don't you?

I think they deserve phone calls, faxes, emails, THE WORKS!
This is outrageous.

Filthy sicko judges using the bench to make up their own rules!

My heart goes out to the Millers in their tragedy. So many American lives lost because of illegal aliens.

Court finally follows Prop. 100, pulls bond for suspect in fatality
Laurie Roberts
Republic columnist
Mar. 23, 2007 12:00 AM

Day 18 and the crackerjacks over at Maricopa County Superior Court finally figured out they're supposed to hang onto a suspected drunken driver accused of running a red light and killing a Peoria man.

Presiding Criminal Judge James Keppel on Thursday revoked the bond given to Jocabed Dominguez-Torres, saying "new information" shows she was drunk at the time of the crash and is in this country illegally.

This well over two weeks after Immigration and Customs Enforcement notified the courts that she's here illegally and thus ineligible for release under Proposition 100. advertisement




Apparently, it wasn't enough that she admitted on the day of her arrest that she'd bought phony ID on the streets. Or that Peoria police notified the courts that she's here illegally. Or that ICE clued them in.

It took no less than the Department of Homeland Security giving the high sign, 18 days after the March 4 crash, for the courts to follow the law, though I'm guessing it didn't hurt that four key legislators were holding a press conference Thursday "to discuss possible consequences for judges who fail to uphold their oath to adhere to the Constitution."

Sen. Linda Gray said she will investigate how often the courts are ignoring Prop. 100, which denies bail to undocumented immigrants accused of committing serious crimes.

"There's still time to pass legislation holding the judges accountable," she said. "I don't quite go with impeachment, but maybe next year, if we find out more information that they not upholding the Constitution as they have sworn to do, we can also go that avenue."

Meanwhile, Supreme Court Chief Justice Ruth McGregor sent Rep. Russell Pearce a letter Wednesday, assuring him that she will take additional steps to make sure judges are complying with Prop. 100 when they set bail at initial appearances. But she noted that the law requires not just proof of legal status but a high standard of proof that the person committed the crime.

"As you know, the initial appearance must occur within 24 hours of an arrest, and even the most efficient and experienced prosecutors may not be able, within that time period, either to ascertain a defendant's immigration status or to determine that the proof against a person charged with a crime meets the criteria of Proposition 100," she wrote.

Translation: Prop. 100 isn't worth the paper it's printed on. At least not in your basic, bread-and-butter DUI fatality cases because that's what this was. From Day 1, Peoria police reported to the courts that they had evidence that Dominguez-Torres ran the red light, killing 20-year-old Chris Miller, and that she was drunk - not to mention evidence of forgery stemming from phony permanent resident and Social Security cards found in her purse.

What more did the courts need?

Pearce isn't buying the excuses. "These are people that are absolutely playing 'lawyerspeak' about what is common sense for you and I and every other citizen in this state," he said.

Meanwhile, Maricopa County Superior Court issued a statement Thursday afternoon, saying commissioners are complying with Prop. 100 the best they can given the limited information they get and the fact that prosecutors are usually no-shows at these hearings.

"A snapshot review of individuals brought before Initial Appearance Court commissioners in a 15-day period this month shows that a total of 44 people were held non-bondable under Proposition 100," the statement said.

The question is: How many did they let go?

http://www.azcentral.com/news/columns/a ... 0323.html#

Please make your phone calls civil. I went to http://pview.findlaw.com/view/2385059_1 and http://www.superiorcourts.maricopa.gov/ ... sp?title=2 and found the folloiwng:

Michael Barth: 602-876-8200
Kathleen Mead: 602-876-8200
James Keppel: 602-506-4251

I found no email addresses, and I guess I can see why. I'll be calling on Monday and letting these folks know that I've jotted their names down and will find SOMEONE ELSE to vote for in all future elections besides these people. In my opinion, there wasn't sufficient passion exhibited on any of these folks' parts to uphold the will of the voters. These three deserve to know that I'll be actively voting AGAINST them at EVERY future election, and why.

Please use the info here responsibly.
Thank you!
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