To Do Nothing?

By Shannon

“Thank you.  I wanted someone to give him a voice besides me and you did that,” the victim’s daughter told me after the capital murder trial.  When people think of the Mexican border they think of drugs.  It’s true this man was murdered because he failed to pay his drug suppliers (tied to cartels) and his drug runners, but there was so much more to his life than drugs.  Eight children wondered for 15 years if it was possible that their father abandoned them.  Now, 17 years and 3 convictions later, they are finally planning a memorial service so they may say goodbye with the dignity stolen from them so long ago.

Prosecutors along the 2000 mile US-Mexican border give voice to more than murder victims.  We also help victims of human trafficking.  Federal Agents discovered a 13 year old girl with a man previously convicted of raping a child because her mother sold her to him for $20.  Because of a jurisdictional technicality they could not hold him or her.  Because I spent months building a relationship with these Agents, they called me.  I came up with a plan, but it had to be executed by another agency.  The territorial pissing contests among law enforcement agencies are legendary.  I’ve worked for years to overcome those boundaries here.  They may not trust each other, but they trust me.  As a result the second agency executed my plan and a child was saved.

That was domestic trafficking, but here on the border we have international human trafficking – and not just Mexican victims.  I’ve worked the case of a child brought here illegally from the Dominican Republic with entry made illegally through Mexico.  She too was sold by her mother, but this time for a green card.  When the green card was obtained, mom went to New York and left her child as the man’s housekeeper, cook, and sex slave.   That man is in prison now.  We’re looking for mom.  The child is in counseling and living with a family who wants to adopt her.

To get into America, people who come by way of Mexico must pay “Coyotes” who work for cartels to transport them here illegally.  If they by-pass the Coyotes the cartels will kill any family that remains in Mexico and/or will kill them here when they find them.  This deters others from by-passing their system.  Since there are cartel cells in every state, finding those who fail to pay is not hard.  When the Coyote brings them here they retain the victims’ things and they tack on an additional charge not discussed beforehand.  They put them in a house with many other illegal immigrants.  They charge exorbitant rent.  They make the women (who comprise 70% of victims) work off the extra money by prostituting them out or forcing them to make porn.  They make the men work it off with forced homosexual prostitution and/or forced manual labor.  The rent is so high and wages are so low that the victims can never purchase their freedom.  To make them easier to handle, the Coyotes will force feed the immigrants illegal drugs which forces them into more debt as they get hooked.  To control the younger ones they give the child a puppy and when the child won’t do what is demanded, the puppy is beaten or killed in front of the child.  The immigrants’ only hope is that law enforcement discovers them.  Of course they won’t call 911 because that could get their loved ones or themselves killed. 

On Monday I referenced a blog that said that border prosecutors are a waste of money.  It talked about a unit in Texas that was funded for 2 years with  $1 million per year for 18 attorneys (according to information I got via telephone) in 16 jurisdictions that cover 1250 miles of the almost 2000 mile US-Mexico border.   That money pays for salaries, training, and educating officers and the community in how to detect human and drug trafficking.  In 2009, the unit’s funding amounted to 0.0010% of the total budget.  $75.5 BILLION (41.5% of the budget) was spent on education.  Under the proposed 2011 budget the unit would be 0.0012% of the total budget.  $70.5 BILLION (42%) is budgeted for education.  In 2010, the federal government spent $3.72 trillion on US-Mexico border security and it was all slated for additional Agents and soldiers.  Without attorneys in the courtroom, the work started by Agents and Soldiers cannot be finished.

Trafficking victims are not kept at the border.  They are in every state because the cartels are in every state.  What I do here affects your neighborhood and our families.  Texas and other states along with the federal government spend billions annually on domestic welfare.  Why shouldn’t 1 state spend 1 million each year to help train, empower, and pay special prosecutors so they may give voice to these most hopeless victims?  Does the welfare of the invisible not matter?

What about those who say it is a waste of time and money to fight the drug problem in America?  Remember the child sold for $20?  She was sold because her mom needed to buy her drug of choice.  It’s not uncommon for drug-addicted parents to sell their children, no matter the age, to get a hit.  Around 85% of the child rape cases I’ve worked had drugs as an underlying factor.  The other 15% were just sickos.  Almost 100% of home invasions, robberies, and burglaries I’ve worked had drugs as an underlying factor.  According to the FBI 80% of crime in America is perpetrated by gangs.  Gangs’ major source of income is running drugs in America and their ties to the cartels are getting stronger every day.  Will we ever be able to completely win the “war on drugs”?  No, but shouldn’t we still fight?  If YOU were for sale would you want me to keep fighting?

“All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”  ~ Edmund Burke

Cross Examination is Hard!

A lot of people think that a lawyer's job is easy. In fact, many defendants believe they are smarter than their attorney. While this may be true in some cases when it comes to common sense or street smarts, it is not true for the art of cross examination. It is a fact that without experience and training, the art of trial work is not to be taken lightly. This poor thing simply pretended to have a heart attack. He learned two valuable lessons today: 1) He should let a lawyer represent him, and 2) he should never try to be an actor.

To Deport or Not To Deport - That Is The Question

By Shannon

The job description of prosecutors is defined in the criminal statutes of most states.  Each definition includes the word "justice" as in: it is a prosecutor's job "to do justice" - not win or get as many convictions as possible, but TO DO JUSTICE.  As I get older, more experienced and mellow out, I find that I see many shades of grey in between the black-and-white that I saw exclusively in my youth.  Justice is not always clear.  There is a scenario that comes up continually on the border and I'd like to know how you - our readers and fellow citizens - would like it handled.  Understand that no two cases are alike and there are often mitigating and/or aggravating circumstances.  It's hard to design a bright-line rule in matters of law, but there is wisdom in the multitude of counselors, so I'd appreciate your input via your comment on this post.

Very often the crimes I prosecute have illegal immigrants as defendants.  A conviction for most felony crimes will result in deportation.  Though I am sure it varies by jurisdiction, most of the felonies committed by illegal immigrants in my jurisdiction are drunk driving, family violence, and drug possession.  The defense attorneys always want us to reduce the charge to non-violent misdemeanor crimes so that their client may avoid deportation.  This would mean taking a felony family violence case in which someone has real damage to their body and which subjects a defendant to 2-10 years in prison and deportation and reduce it to a minor assault that subjects the defendant to no more than 1 year in the county jail and keeps him near his victim.  It would mean taking someone with 3 or more drunk driving convictions which subject the defendant to 2-10 years in prison and deportation and reducing it to a misdemeanor which subjects the defendant to no more than 1 year in the county jail and keeps him on our roads.  (By the way, illegal immigrants rarely serve a day in prison after a conviction because they are deported almost immediately.)

I'm not always sure what justice requires in these cases.

On the one hand, they are already breaking the law by being here.  When you add a felony offense on top of that, perhaps they deserve to be deported.  Especially when they are putting the lives of citizens - the lives of your parents, spouses, and children - in danger by driving drunk (and to add insult to injury they are also driving without a license or insurance).  There is a right way and a wrong way to enter this country.  One respects our laws and one does not.

On the other hand, with Mexico in the mess it is currently in and with the death toll always climbing it is hard to look someone in the face and send them back.  On top of that they very often have wives and children here who will not be subject to deportation because the only crime they've committed is being here.  I'd have to permanently break up a family.  That is heartwrenching.

The law requires convictions and deportations.  I have to uphold the law, but it is also the law that says my job is to seek JUSTICE.

What does justice require? 

What do you would wish your own public officials would do in these cases?  Please comment.

Fear and Loathing in a Mental Ward

By Ann

After I push through the imposingly heavy door, I have to wait for it to close before I can open the next one because it won’t unlock with another door open. This is to keep "them" out of the rest of the hospital.  The “them”  are the mental health patients who have been committed because they are a danger to themselves or others. Today I have the privilege of representing a patient in a hearing whereby the staff will testify and commit her to the hospital against her will.

 I walk down the hall and see her.  She is a young, tiny, docile woman sitting melancholy in a chair.  I naively assumed the hearing would be your run of the mill type with the doctor stating his opinion that she is suicidal and in need of just a few more weeks of treatment to allow the medicine to accumulate in her system.  

I was wrong!

As soon as I introduce myself to her – everything changes.  Her demeanor and actions erupted in a manner that is so shocking that even though I have never experienced an earthquake, I am confident that I can now identify with victims of any natural disaster.  

She is screaming and yelling and crying and flailing.   She wants a real lawyer.  She wants a paid lawyer.  And she wants to cut me.   The staff cower.  The nurses run for cover and the hospital security is called.  In the meantime, a brave hospital employee ushers us to a room where we can talk privately.   I foolishly allow myself to be led to a room with this tasmanian devil human hybrid.  I use the word room liberally because it was really a cage.  I walk in and look for a chair.  No luck. 

There is just her bed.  It is just a twin sized mattress covered in dirty sheets.  The windows are covered in bars and wire mesh.  I try to find the least offensive corner and rest my bottom half on and half off as I try to appear confident and in control.  

This becomes increasingly hard as she sits right on top of me.  She is yelling and crying and threatening some more. I redirect again and again and assure her that she has done nothing wrong and I hope that she doesn’t have anything in this room to cut me.   I try to explain the hearing to her.  I try to explain the situation and I try to get her position on paper.  I try to do this while tuning out the fact that she is not merely invading my space, but she has completely conquered it and now I can smell her breath.  I try to do this while tuning out the fact that I am sitting on a bed covered in a microcosm of filth, crazy person dander, and that it was the very spot where she was restrained for a period of at least 6-7 hours because she is violent and homicidal.  I am consumed by fear which is why I let myself get into this precarious situation.   I feel the classic signs of fear: heart racing, dry mouth, tunnel vision, and poor judgment (hence the cage room meeting).  Then the spell is broken just as quickly as it came.   She cried on my notepad and her teardrop fell right on the “I” in the word homicidal on the commitment petition.  Time stops as I look at the paper and feel myself in the midst of a rational epiphany.  I realize that everyone in this hospital is crazy.  My client has bona fide organic reasons for her craziness, but the staff are completely bonkers for putting me in this room, on this bed, with a severely agitated and unstable person.  I am no longer afraid.  I am now consumed with impatience and annoyance with the collective imcompetence and lack of judgment exhibited by the “professionals.” With righteous indignation, I stand up and bring her to the next room. I announce to the staff that  this meeting room isn’t working for me and we’re just going to use the room across the hall because it has a table and chairs.  And so we did. 

Border War Zone

By Shannon

A reader sent me this link:  http://gritsforbreakfast.blogspot.com/2011/04/border-prosecution-pork-so-far-remains.html  It is a blog by a Texas prosecutor talking about why border security in the form of prosecution is wasteful.  He doesn't know what he's talking about.  It is true that El Paso has one of the lowest crime rates for a city of its size, but that doesn't mean thousands of miles of border are safe. 

As someone who lives in a southwestern state on the Mexico border and is a prosecutor I can tell you that the border is something that gets too little media coverage and that you must live here to understand what goes on here.  Just because Janet Napolitano declares it safe doesn't mean the border is secure.  There are giant holes along the border that are unmanned and unfenced and therefore are unsecured.  There are middle eastern terrorist cells smuggling their people into Mexico and through those holes into America.  There are whole sections of desert that Americans are told to stay out of because the cartels use those routes to smuggle drugs and humans and will shoot anyone in those areas.  There are sections of the border that require special equipment to be used by Border Patrol Agents because Mexican criminals come over and set booby traps to frighten law enforcement away.  Some of these traps include wires so thin and stretched so tightly that they will instantly decapitate Agents on ATVs if they fail to wear special equipment.  Law enforcement is routinely stoned from the other side of the border - sometimes fatally.  There are always bounties offered for the assassinations of law enforcement officers.  Sometimes those bounties extend to federal and state judges and prosecutors.  The border looks safe because there are tens of thousands of men and women who stand in the gap for you and say to the criminals, "This far - no further." 

I would like to congratulate all those who stand with me on this side of the border and win the war today even if we may lose a battle tomorrow.  I would also like to encourage Grits and the rest of the nation to educate yourselves because the media won't.  There are cartel cells in EVERY state including Alaska and EVERY major city and even in some non-major cities like Fort Collins, Colorado.  We at the border war NOT against those who sneak in yearning for a better life.  We at the border stand between you and the cartels.  We do that in the field AND in the courtroom.  An Agent's efforts are all for nothing if there's not a lawyer standing by to finish what the Agent started.  Here's an excellent article about the border.  It is a starting point.  Please do your homework on this issue.  http://www.aolnews.com/2011/04/22/expert-sylvia-longmire-mexican-drug-cartels-infesting-us-even/

Cartels are here.  Cartel violence is here.  How bad should we let it get before we respond with boots on the ground and shoes in the courtrooms of the American-Mexican border?