114 replies to this topic

[Bucknahs Bum Ankle]

I don't like selective enforcement. Another thing you can't do is leak sealed grand jury testimony but apparently no one cares? That is what is so hard to understand. Other things you can't do are defraud taxpayers, insider trading, and get free money given to your wife and her shopping budy from the Fed's unelected Government officials, but apparentently no one cares about that either. That is what is so hard to understand. How many articles does Matthew Taibbi have to write? How can someone, a reasonable man or woman, care about something as de minimis as Barry Bonds; lying's impact on the integrity of the justice system, when the lack of integrity of the system is flaunted and laughed at by the richest, most corrupt sons of bitches with nary a protest because the only people who could do anything about it aspire to those very same corrupt sons of bitches one day.

:slowclap:

Seriously, very good post.

[Sampo Gida]

Makes no sense... how can they nail him for obstruction when the jury is hung on whether or not he was lying on any of the other 3 counts? The obstruction was the overall whammy. He would have to be guilty of lying on one of the others... and if he lied of one, I think they would have to say he lied about all 3.

Sounds fishy... If I was the defense I'd be going ballistic.

Not really, he was not convicted of lying but evading a questions. He eventually gave the answer to the question he evaded, and the jury did not consider the answer to be perjury.

Basically, he was convicted for not answering yes or no the first time it was asked, and making someone work harder by asking follow up questions to get him to answer.

[smastroyin]

I don't like selective enforcement. Another thing you can't do is leak sealed grand jury testimony but apparently no one cares? That is what is so hard to understand.

To be fair, there was a fairly extensive to-do about the leaked testimony which led to the whole business I refer to with Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada. They were subpeona'd to reveal their source, since they published the leaked testimony, and they refused to do it, and everyone got their tails in a tizzy because a judge threatened them with contempt. They were "saved" when Troy Ellerman (one of Conte's defense lawyers) confessed to leaking the testimony, and he will spend a couple of years in jail.

[gaelgirl]

Ellerman has served his time and is back out on the street. He served 16 months and, if I recall correctly, ended up serving more time than anybody else involved in the case. Not sure if that has changed with all the different stints Greg Anderson has served. The whole case is incredibly fucked up in a lot of ways. Just about every party involved broke some law at some point. George Dohrmann wrote an article after the verdict that basically said nobody won. I agree with that.

As for the obstruction of justice verdict, that was totally bizarre. Every witness evades questions to one degree or another. Even in this very trial -- Kathy Hoskins and Kim Bell both seemed (from descriptions of their testimony) to deflect or outright avoid answering some questions. Every lawyer learns how to question a witness to force them into an answer. I'm the daughter of a lawyer, it was like being on trial every time you hand to answer if you fed the pet or did your homework.

Anyway, that obstruction of justice conviction was on the count specifically referring to a sort of non-sequitur about not getting into other people's business because he's a celebrity child. He directly answered the question eventually (which, actually, was one of the perjury counts). The legal basis of the conviction is that his story about being a celebrity child directly prevented the grand jury from carrying out justice in their investigation. It's nonsensical. I suspect, though anything could happen in this ridiculous case, that it might be overturned on appeal. Or even at the hearing next month.

Having said that, it's entirely possible that next month Judge Illston decides to unilaterally convict Barry Bonds on four counts of perjury but throw out the obstruction conviction. I don't even know if that's legally permissible (especially since she threw out one of the counts already). But who knows what the fuck could happen with this case.

[Lars The Wanderer]

$4,000 fine, 250 hours of community service, 30 days home monitoring.

Money well spent!!

[mauidano]

Not to go all V&N, but . .
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute Lloyd Blankfein.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute Jamie Dimon.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Lehman Brothers.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Moodys.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Standard & Poors.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Bear Sterns.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Morgan Stanley.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Bank of America.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to prosecute anyone at Citibank.
The U.S. gov't can't be bothered to actually prosecute not just fine Angelo Mozilo.

But they've got all the time in the world and a fucking hard on for Barry Bonds.

+++++++++1

[rembrat]

$4,000 fine, 250 hours of community service, 30 days home monitoring.

Money well spent!!

In this hellhole

Link

[OttoC]

I don't like selective enforcement. Another thing you can't do is leak sealed grand jury testimony but apparently no one cares? That is what is so hard to understand. Other things you can't do are defraud taxpayers, insider trading, and get free money given to your wife and her shopping budy from the Fed's unelected Government officials, but apparentently no one cares about that either. That is what is so hard to understand. How many articles does Matthew Taibbi have to write? How can someone, a reasonable man or woman, care about something as de minimis as Barry Bonds; lying's impact on the integrity of the justice system, when the lack of integrity of the system is flaunted and laughed at by the richest, most corrupt sons of bitches with nary a protest because the only people who could do anything about it aspire to those very same corrupt sons of bitches one day.

Hear! Hear!

[Smiling Joe Hesketh]

$4,000 fine, 250 hours of community service, 30 days home monitoring.

Money well spent!!

$30 million spent on the case. What a stupendous waste.

Jeff Novitsky's the one who should be getting charged now for wasting so much for so little. Clowns, the whole lot of them.

[Mystic Merlin]

What a perverse system.

[dcmissle]

In the large scheme of things -- people are exculpated on death row with some regularity after the DNA test results come in -- this is small potatoes. Many aspects of our criminal justice system are tragic.

In this instance, the prosecution and defendant come off deeply flawed and humbled and thus have gotten what they richly deserve. Only we taxpayers are screwed.

[Resonance Wright]

...and he's going to appeal.

Barry Bonds gets hit with a $4000 fine, living 30 days in a house the size of Rhode Island, and having to perform 250 hours of community service, when he was facing 15 months in prison for a crime for which he had already been convicted. And he's appealing.

Did I miss something?

Edited by Resonance Wright, 16 December 2011 - 07:31 PM.

[uncannymanny]

...and he's going to appeal.

Barry Bonds gets hit with a $4000 fine, living 30 days in a house the size of Rhode Island, and having to perform 250 hours of community service, when he was facing 15 months in prison for a crime for which he had already been convicted. And he's appealing.

Did I miss something?

I don't get it...he's got them pinned but he should accept it because it's a moral win? Would you?

[Curtis Pride]

According to Lester Munson, Bonds got a favorable judge.

ESPN

[Comfortably Lomb]

$30 million spent on the case. What a stupendous waste.

Jeff Novitsky's the one who should be getting charged now for wasting so much for so little. Clowns, the whole lot of them.

Seems like a stereotypical prosecutor. People make fun of defense attorneys because it's easy but in my experience (and not because I've been charged or anything) prosecutors are the real douches of this part of the legal system. Overly aggressive know-it-all alpha-male jerks, the lot of them.

Edited by Comfortably Lomb, 17 December 2011 - 09:47 AM.