tvc184

The defense team says that they are going to claim self-defense.

No Blacks on the jury.

I write a response and look at it a couple of days later and sometimes think that it doesn’t make sense. You know what you’re thinking about but it doesn’t come out that way in writing.

Terrible. I was hoping by the news saying it was serious and not critical the person would survive.

An innocent bystander murdered a couple of days ago by teenagers having a shootout in a parking lot. Not to be outdone, three more people were shot today with one a serious condition. Beaumont seems to have exploded in violence. Is Beaumont becoming the new Memphis or Detroit?

The Supreme Court recently ruled that federal courts could not order states to gerrymander districts to create majority minority districts. In the case of Louisiana v. Callais the Supreme Court said that a state could not be ordered to gerrymander districts in order to create more minority representation districts. To do so would violate the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Some courts and people felt that discrimination was okay if it was against White voters. So in Callais, Louisiana was allowed to redraw their districts. Up pops Alabama. In a challenge to the Voting Rights Act, a special master was appointed to redraw the Alabama districts about 3 years ago which had been set by the state legislature. The federal special master disregarded the legislature and drew the state districts by gerrymandering in order to force more minority representation. After the decision by the Supreme Court in Callais to not have federal courts decide state districts, another challenge was made in Alabama to enforce the federal approved districts, again ignoring those enacted into law by the legislature and the decision in Callais. The federal court in the Northern District of Alabama stepped up and again interfered with the Alabama legislature map. It was like Callais never happened. So naturally, there was an appeal to United States Supreme Court. They ruled yesterday that the federal court in Alabama needs to get back its lane and butt out. Alabama’s district map will remain as the legislature drew it and not a federal court approved master.

I am not sure what you mean by the extenuating circumstances and being charged correctly unless you are referring to passion or mitigating circumstances. A crime of passion has never been forgivable. I am not sure where you are going with it but there is no premeditation in the Texas Penal Code. There is only the culpable mental state. I agree about the potential of justice not being served. I have sat on three juries (federal civil jury, state felony and state misdemeanor) and hearing what some jurors say or ask behind closed doors is sometimes crazy. A juror will grab onto some minuscule point taken completely out of context and then it likely doesn’t matter anyway.

By law you can’t, notwithstanding people who think it was justified. Texas used to have a law, as some other states do now, that calls killing a person under sudden passion as Manslaughter. The classic is coming home and finding your wife in bed with a guy and maybe understandably losing your temper. The point being that even being upset is not enough but suddenly coming upon something that sets you off where you otherwise probably wouldn’t have. How many people in the Golden Triangle area file for divorce every month after one or the other party was caught cheating? How many resulted in homicide? That is different than walking in and accidentally catching someone in the act. It doesn’t negate the crime, but people are left with the thought of something like, yeah, I understand that. It gives a jury a chance to say that it’s still wrong but with a lesser penalty. You are correct, it’s still Murder because he intentionally killed someone. In some cases, the person may not have had time to think it out rationally. Quite a while back, Texas removed that law from the books. If you intentionally kill someone, it’s Murder, period or as social media now says, full stop. To (in my opinion) appease people, the changed law said that intentionally killing someone is still Murder even if you were provoked into anger, however….. The law on the penalty for Murder is a First Degree Felony and 5-99 years. IF, after a jury convicts a person of intentionally killing someone, so Murder, but finds that it was under sudden passion, the jury can voluntarily reduce the penalty to a Second Degree Felony or 2-20 years in prison. Of course even for a regular Murder charge, a jury can give a person as little as 5 years. So why the option to reduce it in deliberations to a 20 year maximum as a mitigating factor when a jury can do that without a different law? I think it’s a feel good law although technically under sudden passion a person can receive a 2 year minimum as opposed to a 5 year minimum. I don’t see much of a chance of a jury convicting a person of Murder and then giving a 2 year sentence but sometimes juries are strange. So what does all of that have to do with this case? I can think of two tactics by the defense. I think it’s fairly certain that the kid accused did kill the other. That leaves either sudden passion as a lesser prison sentence or self-defense. Did the deceased initiate an act toward the accused that placed the accused in a reasonable belief that he was in danger of serious bodily injury or death? I haven’t looked at the case lately, but it seems like there was a claim that the now deceased student grab the other guy by the arm or shoved him. Does grabbing a person by the arm or shoving him place the other person in fear of death or serious bodily injury? If that is true then there can sure be a lot of lawful killing going on. Even if a person punches you in the nose, does that lead a reasonable person to believe that he is about to die or suffer a serious bodily injury? Imagine how many kids fought when we were in school. How many would justify deadly force in self defense? I can attempt to think that is how the defense is going to approach this, however. They’re going to say that there was an argument and one student shove the other, so the one that would’ve killed him in “self defense”. Although, in my opinion, it should not work, it will be setting the grounds for asking for a lesser sentence due to sudden passion and probation.

Clearly it should be a conviction but who knows with the politics of the day. I could see him being convicted of Manslaughter as a lesser included offense but it doesn’t really fit the crime although it would in other states. In some states sudden passion is considered Manslaughter or Voluntary Manslaughter (as it was when I started 42 years ago) but Texas has removed that law. There is part of the Murder law in Texas that allows a jury to consider sudden passion as a mitigating factor AFTER the person is convicted of Murder.

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I used to say that but apprenticeships and technical certifications or trade schools show that you can finish something. The military is the same. Do people really need English composition, humanities and intro to science classes for most jobs? I would venture to guess that in a majority of jobs, a person who has done 4 years in the military and was honorably discharged (and probably has a learned skill) should rank higher than a person who has English Lit and consumer math with a sheepskin. Looking at google out of curiosity, up to 41% of college grads are not employed in a job that deals with their degree and 52% at least initially take jobs that do not require a degree. I didn’t dig into how many eventually gained employment in jobs that actually require a degree Obviously some jobs should require a certain level of education such as medical doctors, lawyers, school teachers, certified accountants, HR people, perhaps banking, etc. Other than those, I think the need for college is way overblown.

According to the schedule that I saw it is Bridge City and then Lake Charles Barbe.

I used to order them off of Amazon until I found them at HEB on FM365 in Port Arthur. I like most beans but Anasazi are my favorite.

Have you tried the Anasazi beans?

The system runs on plea deals. No person who takes over as DA can throw the book at everyone and bring each accused person to trial. It would take many more courts, judges, jails and prisons.