President (To Win Colorado)
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(D) Kamala Harris
(R) Donald Trump
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CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Jason Crow*
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DEMOCRATS
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October 19, 2006 06:35 PM UTC
57 Comments
Not a good year for Republicans and criminal investigations.
The actual indictment will not happen until AFTER the election. The El Paso DA is a Republican after all. Although I give Newsome credit for really doing a great job on this one. But the investigation is not yet over.
Trailhead looks to be self-detructing here. I would not be surprised if the indictments keep rolling.
…..there will be absolutely no plea negotiations, no charge concessions, and the only sentence concession will be a stipulation to a sentence at the precise midpoint of the presumptive range (which is probably what the judge would impose upon conviction anyway).
Right Moonraker?
when he did so for, arguably, the nation’s most murderous serial killer (with 48 victims).
did they plead that down from felony murder?
AG Trespassing
I was about to post the same response
THE DENVER POST, JULY 28, 2006
HEADLINE:
Felon claims to be serial killer of 48
Plea deal averts death penalty
“District Attorney John Newsome agreed not to seek the death penalty in exchange for the guilty plea.”
Isnt this usually done to learn where the bodies are located? Or to find out if there are more victims whose names the killer wont release unless the death penalty is taken off the table?
But I ask you, who is worthy of the death penalty if not a serial killer who brutally murdered 48 people?
From the Post story:
“Those seven victims were petite women, about 5 feet tall and about 100 pounds.”
“Women try to present themselves to be one thing, and then always prove to be something else,” he said in an affidavit. He went on to describe them as “low … unfaithful … cheats … users … not of the highest moral character.”
“Browne said he used a variety of methods to kill. He strangled victims with his hands and with ligatures. He used chemicals – chloroform, a compound he found in ant killer, and ether. He shot people and stabbed them. He dumped his victims in lakes, rivers, ditches and, in one case, over a cliff. He was known to cut up the bodies and dump them in trash receptacles.”
If you are opposed to the death penalty for this monster, you should just admit that you are opposed to the death penalty. Be honest and take the political fallout.
The reason that I asked about this plea bargain was because I have heard that DA’s will often take the death penalty off the table to encourage a murderer to divulge information about his crimes. I didnt know what the motivation in this case was.
This guy doesnt seem so much a serial killer, as he does a run of the mill psychopath. The distinction being that he has no set pattern. Both, of course, are abhorrent.
A definitional (it is now a word) spree killer and serial killer.
That came off worse than I for it to sound.
Mr. Toodles, we agree on something. Break out the champagne!
If you kill the man who knows where the bodies of 47 other victims are you are deny the families of those victims the relief of knowing their loved ones’ remains could be found.
Brown knew this and used his info to save his life.
Someone who murders 48 people has checked out of the human race. He deserves the death penalty in my opinion, although I respect my friend Toodles opposition to it.
It is certainly a judgment call, but I would have preferred Newsome winning a death penalty conviction.
a plea-bargin.
Coors got one on his DUI…. Wouldn’t be surprised to see him complaining about that if the DA were a Democrat.
MOONSHILL??
Or has his computer been subpoenaed?
Once again everyone on here is getting ahead of themselves. Morse filed a criminal complaint. The DA has to investigate or turn over to the bipartisan panel usually set up for this stuff.
There is a REALLY likely possibility that Philp is absolved. But of course, you guys wouldn’t be interested in that part of the story…
Waiting to hear how this is actually a positive development for Beauprez.
You’re missing the key word in the story — indictment. That means the DA has already investigated and made a charging decision. This isn’t a formality — indeed, lots of complaints have been made to DAs across the state this year — this is the first INDICTMENT…
Moonraker is right.. sort of.
http://insidedenver….
Of course my hunch is they are holding off because they have something else and want to bring it all together.
Alan is a stand up guy. Politically and strategically sound.
Would he actually go to jail for this? If it’s only a misdemeanor, should he expect community service or what?
He should pull the worst duty imaginable. Like maybe six months of running a Beauprez/Rowland campaign.
cruel and inhumane punishment? Oh, I forgot, Bush got his torture bill passed. Never mind.
I feel like I’m reading a time-warp press release here. According to the article text above (from where, I don’t know), Philp was looking to be charged for this crime today. According to the linked article, it’s just under investigation.
Where did the text on this site come from?
I keep telling people on this blog that the criminal justice system and politics aren’t the same thing and don’t work on the same time table. These junior pols should learn to wait for it.
There would be no use for you on this site 🙂
Then it won’t seem quite so bad
Per http://www.rockymoun…
it looks pretty straightforward. The DA was going to charge Philp and then decided to hold off. He says he is still “investigating.”
Should he actually charge Philp it will be a sad day for all of us. Even partisan Dems shouldn’t want to see this happen. Everyone will automatically be subject to prosecection for excercising basic rights.
It is very easy to argue that Clear Peak and Main Street Colorado have been much more egregious in their political speech this year (e.g. accusing Republicans of being for cancer). Up until now, DA’s have sent these complaints on to a bipartisan panel of DA’s set up by the AG (both Dems & Reps).
better watch out. The veracity of political statements should be worked out in civil court. I can’t believe that Newsome, who recently plea bargained the serial killer of 48 people, wants to clog his court up with a free speech case, because that is what this will become.
I hope you are not referring to the first amendment and the right to free speech, because it is not a right to slander a person. Willfully misleading a person, and telling out right lies or fabrications about them is not something that should be allowed.
If he committed a crime he should be prosecuted. If Clear Peak or any other organization committed a crime they too should be prosecuted. Campaigns across the country intentionally mislead and misconstrue voting records. If this wasnt so popular Karl Rove wouldnt have as much clout as he does. If you want examples look at the Ohio race for governor and Senator or Vernon Robinson’s ads in North Carolina.
To me this is a good thing. It sends a signal that lying is not going to be tolerated, and if you do intentionally lie, there will be consequences. An argument can be made that McCain-Feingold is doing more to hurt our exercise of basic rights than this will ever do.
Public figures, especially political figures, have fewer civil protections against slander than do private citizens. This law turns that concept on its head, and grants criminal protections from slander to political figures that private citizens don’t have.
It is the creation of a political class to punish citizens (or groups of citizens) who speak out against them. The effect is to suppress free speech.
Would you extend the law to prosecute people on this blog who get their facts wrong? It is the same concept. If people are afraid that cops with guns will show up they’ll damned well stop talking.
No. These matters are properly handled in civil courts. Make an error, lose a lawsuit and pay is a sufficient sanction. Make an error, go to jail, maybe become the victim of violence in jail? Strike the colours. Speech is dead. Democracy, dead.
I was alive when it was the law in some states that Black people had to ride in the backs of buses. That was the law. You were a law abiding citizen when you enforced or reported someone breaking that law. But it was an evil law and the moral disobeyed it.
Let this be a test case. Let the ACLU send their best. Let it go through the appeals process. And let it be ripped from the statute books.
Im sure I am not getting this correctly. As I read it (the origianl article, that is) Philp knowingly (?) dissemenated information that was false with the intent of dissuading voters from voting for the guy. He is know being charged with a crime, because of this action.
Now I agree that libel and slander laws are generally acceptable in recovery for the person that has been slandered, but I would think it a miscarriage of democracy to knowingly falsify information with the intent of harming that persons chances. I guess my question is, how would this be applied and how would it harm the average citizen?
For example: Lets say that you are running for office. I am running a 527 that starts an ad campaign accusing you of drinking wine coolers when I know for a fact that you fancy an 18 yo Scotch. The people react with outrage at your perceieved fru-fru drinking ways and you dont get elected. Lets assume that if it were not for my ad you would have been elected (I dont know about the current case, and obviously we dont know who will be elected). Is that not a miscarriage of democracy? People voted one way because of a false perception that I knowingly perpetrated. And I perceive a difference between an ad campaign and a lowly blogger (such as myself), who might say the same thing. The presumption being that the 527 has greater reach than the blogger.
It is not a matter for the criminal courts. Civil suits may be filed. Broadcasters, licensed under the FCC, may be appealed to and the ad in question pulled. But to involve cops with guns and the threat of imprisonment is to intimidate.
Does a 527 have a greater reach than Drudge? Than MyDD? Than the Daily Kos? Do we place them under the same law, throw them in jail?
Laws are made by people who run for elected office. Being human, they will afford themselves every advantage if we let them.
I limit myself to this and another forum for debate, otherwise I would get nothing done. Like so many issues in this election, I am eagerly awaiting resolution (courts or otherwise).
It would only be a sad day for you, who seems to feed off this stuff.
The rest of us would probably be celebrating that somebody actually got their peepee slammed in a desk drawer for telling blatant falsehoods in a campaign ad.
That would send people like you scurrying to places like NCIC for new material.
You are safe for the moment, but would you blog anymore if you could go to jail for getting something wrong? That would put a cramp in your spontaneity, wouldn’t it?
But the hypothetical is only as valid as the premise.
Your premise isn’t valid. We’re not talking about blogging, reporting, opinion, satire, or anything related.
We’re talking about violations of CRS 1-13-109.
any of those things. Maybe to include the protection of the flag? You are secure for the moment, the same way Mr. Philp was secure a moment ago. The world is not static, my friend.
Britain recently passed a speech law that has been used against journalists. The Mayor of London was called up on charges for making a joke. The author who just won the Nobel Prize for Literature was up on charges for expressing an opinion that the Turks massacred the Armenians. And the French just passed a law that makes it a crime to express the opinion that the Turks didn’t massacre the Armenians.
Look beyond Colorado and you will see that this stupid Colorado law is but a small evidence of a mass worldwide roll back of free speech. I will be long dead when you reap the harvest from it. And I don’t believe you will like it very much.
I’m with bradshaw 100 percent on this. The law won’t stand, although the ACLU could use a better test case than Philp’s, as he’s unlikely to even go to trial, much less sustain a conviction (sounds like Trailhead made a good-faith, if bungled, attempt to base its ad on city council minutes and news reports).
In addition to the British, Turkish and French examples, you can look to the rarely invoked criminal libel law on the books in Colorado. As recently as 2003, armed Greeley police showed up at the home of Thomas Mink, publisher of a satirical webzine, The Howling Pig, and seized his computer in a criminal libel investigation. The ACLU is seeking a declaratory judgment ruling the statute unconstitutional. After losing the first round, when a judge ruled Mink lacks standing to challenge the law (prosecutors dropped the charges), an appeal is under way.
From the ACLU’s case description at http://www.aclu-co.o… :
“Colorado’s rarely-used criminal libel statute makes it a felony to publish statements “tending to blacken the memory of one who is dead, or to impeach the honesty, integrity, virtue, or reputation or expose the natural defects of one who is alive.” A number of antiquated statutes with similar language have been held unenforceable in other states.”
As to the Philp case, just as a student doesn’t surrender first amendment rights at the schoolhouse door, neither do citizens when they band together to air political views. I understand the reasoning behind the law — it’s impossible to unring a bell after inaccurate ads have aired and civil remedies won’t make a losing candidate whole after an election — but those are the breaks in a society that takes free speech as a basic value.
the mistake was immaterial to the message in the ad. To tell you how f*d up the law is – the ad literally called John Morse “incompetent.”
But Morse is complaining that 14 felonies got plead down to 1 count menacing (felony) instead of 14 felonies down to 1 count menacing (misdemeanor).
Meanwhile, Main Street Colorado is actually accusing Republicans of being in favor of cancer. Jeff Shaw is for it because Trailhead takes insurance money (WTF?!)
Bill Berens is for cancer because the legislature in ’03 voted not to mandate screenings… Berens wasn’t in the legislature in ’03 (??!!).
And don’t forget that Knaus & Willard (Clear Peak) were actually caught admitting that their first ad against Knoedler was a lie because they said the “plan” was to replace it with another ad – in which the ‘factual’ basis was changed.
Those are much more blatant than the Morse ad.
Under the same URL, so the old text is erased
See Title
That’s not “updated”, that’s a completely different release with a completely different set of quotes indicating a completely different occurrence.
I just want to know if the quotes are accurate. I don’t care if the text has changed. If the quotes are right, Philps is already in the bag and someone’s trying to hide it for a bit longer.
Interesting point. I hadn’t noticed the difference earlier, but now share your concern.
here where Newsome appears to be not so happy about Scott’s letter. Seems Scott’s letter was a fund raiser and is accusing Newsome (whom many of the 527s call a “RINO” down here and who was the victim of many Lambornesque attacks in his primary against May) of being dhummy with Morse.
This actually is a “two birds with one stone” attempt by Scott – one, get money from donors bacause of the threat and two, get a set up for a RINO claim and “aiding and abetting the enemy” charge in the next election against a moderate Newsome. This is the sort of thing that could make Newsome take a real shot at the 527s.