The harsh sentence of the first defendant in the Bonusgate case is meant to send a message - not to any state workers out there who might be thinking of sending an e-mail on the taxypayer dime, but to the defendants who are awaiting trial.
The message is this: don't exercise your right to a trial before a jury of your peers. Say whatever Tom Corbett wants you to say. Admit to whatever Tom Corbett wants you to admit. Spare him the embarrassment of sending his inept prosecutors to court, where you stand a very good chance of being acquitted of most or all of the charges against you.
The judge really does not want to sit through another one of Tom Corbett's incompetent, six-week dog-and-pony shows, and he would really like you to spare him that.
The thing is, if you go to trial, Tom Corbett will have to show you the evidence against you. And he would probably prefer to keep that evidence to himself. After all, that evidence might reveal something like, oh, say, his main collaborator against you is actually a ringleader in the crimes for which you're being prosecuted. (And also that the collaborator is a total whack-job.) It might expose how he overlooked evidence against other people and then he might have to go back and indict them, too, just to save face. He may even have to come up with a whole different case against some of them, because something is keeping him from charging them in the matters for which you yourselves are indicted.
And all of that would be awfully inconvenient and time-consuming for him. He's got a lot on his plate, what with running for governor and all.
Look, Bonusgate defendants: chances are pretty good that Tom Corbett's going to be Governor. You don't want to make him mad. Look at what he does with the power he has as Attorney General. Dragging people in front of a grand jury for any old reason he feels like. No telling what he might do as governor.
Message: Be afraid. Give in. Give up. Submit. Shut up. It's what Tom Corbett wants.
14 comments:
Wait just a cotton pickin' minute...you mean this blog will continue? How is that possible with Cott in prison? Hmmmm, makes you wonder what Corbett and his OAG cronies do next?
Go Team CASA!
Have you got a link to the case or to a news artlicle reporting the sentence?
TWITTER AMERICAN REVOLUTION ALERT AND CALL TO FREEDOM!
WE NEED A BRETT COTT DEFENSE FUND ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBER.
TWITTERS EVERYWHERE WE NEED TO SET UP A BRETT COTT DEFENSE FUND SO WE CAN RAISE MILLIONS TO HIRE THE BEST AND BRIGHTEST ATTORNEY'S IN THE WORLD TO DEFEND AND FREE BRETT COTT FROM THE ABUSES OF LAW ENFORCEMENT BEING USED FOR HIGHER OFFICE.
JUST ONE DOLLAR SENT TO THE DEFENSE FUND, PREFERABLY BY CHECK, TO ACCOUNT FOR IT, AS A SHOW OF SUPPORT, OR CASH ASKING FOR A RECEIPT, CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE.
THE ONE THING IN AMERICA WHEN YOU HAVE MONEY YOU CAN PROPERLY DEFEND YOURSELF.
THE MONEY WILL GO TO HIRING FORMER PROSECUTORS AND TOP INVESTIGATORS THAT CAN RESEARCH THE ABUSES OF THE PENNSYLVANIA OAG AND THEIR PROSECUTORS AND CORBETT.
LAW STUDENTS THAT CAN VOLUNTEER THEIR TIME WITH LAW PROFESSORS TO POINT OUT THE ABUSES OF THE PENNSYLVANIA GRAND JURY SYSTEM UNDER TOM CORBETT.
PUBLIC EDUCATIONAL CAMPAIGNS OF WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF YOU DARE SPEAK OUT TO DEFEND YOURSELF ON TWITTER OR BLOGS.
PLEASE I AM NOT RELATED TO BRETT COTT AND DO NOT AGREE WITH EVERYTHING HE BELIEVES OR SAYS, BUT HIS IMPRISONMENT BY CORBETT OAG AND SENTENCE BY JUDGE LEWIS NEEDS TO CHALLENGED AND ONLY MONEY CAN DO IT.
MILLIONS CAN BE RAISED TO STOP THIS KIND OF ABUSE, PLEASE CASABLANCAPA SET UP A CASBLANCAPA DEFENSE FUND.
ONE GROWING PYRAMID OF PROUD TWITTERS PUTTING JUST $1 DOLLAR INTO THE MAIL CAN SEND A BETTER MESSAGE ALONG WITH MILLION OF MESSENGERS AND BRING WORLD ATTENTION TO CORBETT ABUSES OF POWER.
BRETT COTT AND HIS LAWYER CANNOT SPEAK, TWIT, OR DEFEND HIMSELF, SINCE HE IS IN PRISON, BUT WE ALL CAN, BY JUST SENDING $1 DOLLAR!
I like this judge a lot better than Fumo's guy. I hate to say I told you so Mike, (see my email from July 7, 2005) but I did. Bill, John, you're up next...
That doesn't change the fact that Corbett's a clown party hack with very poor judgement.
Nobody should be surprised that we get such dimwit, self-dealing republicrats. That's what you get when you sell your multiparty democracy to a 2 party "system" stacked with 2 hopelessly corrupt parties. Build more Gutterment, eliminate competitive elections, trample the Constitution.
Clear a bottum bunk at Gitmo for traitor repulicrats.
From Above
The memo states that Mr. Cott's "criminal scheme" of getting public funds while working on politics "was not limited to one, or even a few, aspects of the campaigns. It was all-encompassing. Defendant and his cohorts essentially took over [legislative] campaigns, directing and participating in every campaign component."
The state said Mr. Cott did illegal work "on the campaigns of Fred Vero, [retired Rep.] Thomas Tangretti, [state Sen.] Wayne Fontana, Kim Tesla, Joe Schafer, Chet Orelli and others."
In addition, the state said, Mr.Cott had "unlawful involvement" in 14 other campaigns, including those of Rep. Chelsa Wagner and former Rep. Shawn Flaherty.
In November 2006, Democrats wrested control of the state House from Republicans for the first time in 12 years.
Deputy Attorney General Patrick Blessington told the judge that Mr. Cott, from 2004 to 2006, was paid a salary of $223,000 plus bonuses of more than $39,000 for doing political work.
His voice rising, Mr. Blessington said, "This defendant was consumed by campaign work. He got bonuses of over $39,000. He was arrogant. He was stealing the taxpayers' money. It's a crime."
Mr. Cott, he said, is a "recalcitrant, remorseless defendant and has shown no contrition."
Mr. Walk fired right back, calling Mr. Cott's trial "a political process set out by Tom Corbett, who wants to be governor."
Prosecutors and the defense attorney, naturally, had widely different reactions to the stiff sentence. It "sends a loud and clear message that this kind of activity [illegal use of taxpayers funds for political campaigns] will not be tolerated, and people will pay for their crimes," Mr. Costanzo said.
Mr. Walk, however, said he was shocked and disappointed by the severity of the sentence.
"There are drug dealers and violent offenders who don't get that much time," he said. "We didn't expect this. The sentence is excessive and unnecessary."
He said that Mr. Cott had no previous arrests or convictions.
Mr. Walk complained that the judge seemed to have decided on the sentence even before the hearing was held Friday. "He read prepared remarks" as to the sentencing, Mr. Walk said, apparently not paying much attention to the defense attorney's lengthy speech about what a hard worker and good person Mr. Cott is.
Mr. Cott chose not to say anything to the judge on his own behalf, but Mr. Walk said that wouldn't have changed anything. "It was clear that he [the judge] had made his mind up," Mr.Walk said.
INSIDE
• Attorney General Tom Corbett's office abandons search for Twitter names. Story, Page A-3.
Bureau Chief Tom Barnes: tbarnes@post-gazette.com or 1-717-787-4254.
Read more: http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10142/1060109-454.stm#ixzz0ofuwI99g
I would not be so darn sure that Tom Corbett IS going to be the next governor. Teabaggers don't like him and may not vote. He's an insider but can't even keep tabs on his own department -- if he knew how it worked.. He's proving to be less than truthful and I think that a lot more is going to come out in the next few months to derail his little carnival caravan. When the commercials start to air against this rogue AG, Dan Onorato's going to look pretty good to a lot of people.
The Secret Immunity Witness cannot be Bill DeWeese.
Bill DeWeese went before the Grand Jury for 15 hours.
Bill DeWeese has been indicted on 6 counts by Tom Corbett.
The rumor is Todd Eachus is the Secret Immunity Witness.
This is why Todd Eachus has not been indicted to date.
I support the Defendants and those convicted because they are being the scapegoats for the many and that is a miscarriage of justice.
From Scott Horton at Harper's No Comment blog:
Il n’y a point de plus cruelle tyrannie que celle que l’on exerce à l’ombre des lois et avec les couleurs de la justice: lorsqu’on va, pour ainsi dire, noyer des malheureux sur la planche même sur laquelle ils s’étoient sauvés.
Et comme il n’est jamais arrivé qu’un tyran ait manqué d’instruments de sa tyrannie. Tibère trouva toujours des juges prêts à condamner autant de gens qu’il en put soupçonner. Du temps de la république, le sénat, qui ne jugeoit point en corps les affairs des particuliers, connoissoit, par une délégation du peuple, des crimes qu’on imputoit aux alliés. Tibère lui renvoya de même le jugement de tout ce qui s’appeloit crime de lèse-majesté contre lui. Ce corps tomba dans un état de bassesse qui ne peut s’exprimer; les sénateurs alloient au-devant de la servitude; sous le faveur de Séjan, les plus illustres d’entre eux faisoient le métier de délateurs.
No tyranny is more cruel than that which is practiced in the shadow of the law and with the trappings of justice: that is, one would drown the unfortunate by the very plank by which he would hope to be saved.
Moreover, no tyrant ever lacks the instruments necessary to his tyranny. Tiberius always found the judge who was prepared to sentence any person of whom he had the slightest suspicion. In the time of the republic the senate, which did not as a body pass judgment on specific transactions, nevertheless, through a delegation of the people, took cognizance of crimes that were imputed to allies. In a like manner, Tiberius referred to this body the adjudication of all crimes which he considered an act of offense against his person. The senate then fell into a state of utter degradation such as can scarce be described; the senators themselves led the processional into their own enslavement. Under the patronage of Sejanus, the best known among them competed to be informers for the emperor.
–Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu, Considérations sur les causes de la grandeur des Romains et de leur décadence, ch. xiv (1734) contained in Œuvres complètes, vol. ii, p. 144 (R. Caillois ed. 1951)(S.H. transl.)
The American Founding Fathers were influenced by the lessons they drew from a study of antiquity and particularly helped in this process by Montesquieu and his essay of the rise and collapse of liberty in Rome. In Montesquieu’s study of Tiberius, he reflects how the institutions of government were steadily corrupted by those who sought the favor of the emperor. Judges convicted and sentenced anyone of whom Tiberius grew suspicious; senators vied with one another in denouncing their rivals to him. This reflects the weakness of human nature in the face of power, but Montesquieu focuses on how it causes the disintegration of the justice system. There is something particularly pernicious about a situation in which the outer trappings of justice exist, but the substance has been replaced with a craven homage to the power of the executive. Montesquieu drew on Tactitus for his examples, but subsequent human history can recount many others. In 1946, for instance, just this concern about the warping of justice by a tyrannical spirit led to a decision, controversial at the time it was formed, to put justice ministry officials, prosecutors and judges on trial for their complicity in crimes against humanity under the Nazi regime. Powerful as that example was, others can be cited in societies which retain a better semblance of justice. As for example, in the just-past Bush Administration, in which lawyers of the Justice Department issued memoranda approving torture with presidential authority, authorized warrantless surveillance, launched bogus prosecutions of political rivals and indulged the bribing of foreign government officials in commercial dealings, all in the name of executive power elevated above the law, but given the benefit of formal legality.
Don't put the label "Party Hack" on Corbet. A Party hack is an honorable party person with the
intelligence to know what not to do.
By his actions, TOM CORBETT IS NEITHER INTELLIGENT OR HONORABLE>
yo boyz. Why is there a filter on this blog? I thought we were for FREE SPEECH???
Tom Corbett WILL NOT be our next Governor. Dan Onorato will be our Governor. I don't think the citizens of Pennsylvania want to go back to the Bush era. With Corbett, you could make him mad or look at him strangely and he might convene a Grand Jury to put you in jail. How many miles does Corbett log doing political work versus State Business. My guess would be 70% politics and 30% business.
Obviously the A.G. filed the subpoena under a false pretense [i.e it was admittedly for "sentencing" not to "investigate a violation of PA LAW...."], clearly misleading and a misuse of the grand jury and subpoena process. the only question left is what member of the PA bar/citizen has the stones to refer this conduct to the disciplinary board of the PA SUPREME COURT and what citizen will refer it on to the PA STATE ETHICS COMMISSION!!! This action, not the blog, should be the AG's biggest fear.
Tommy C. is a scumbag and Todd Eachus is a piece of shit as well!!
Before this gray epoch ends, Tom Corbett will be in irons himself. He is the Republican Spitzer.
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