Doesn't crap like this make you ANGRY??!!?

Question

Article Most Popular Change Type Size Judges who ignore no-bail law may as well give you the finger
Laurie Roberts
Republic columnist
Mar. 21, 2007 12:00 AM

It's now been 17 days since Jocabed Dominguez-Torres was arrested and accused of getting drunk, running a red light and killing a 20-year-old Peoria man. Seventeen days since the courts were notified that she's in this country illegally and thus can't be released from jail under a new law approved by voters.

So what, you might ask, have our judges and commissioners done to comply with the overwhelming will of the people?

They set bail. Then they reconsidered. And lowered her bail. advertisement




In judicial speak, I think they just gave Arizona voters the finger.

It's been just over two weeks since Scott and Patty Miller lost their only son, Chris, and were ushered into the court system. Their reaction thus far?

"Complete dismay and total loss of confidence," Scott told me Tuesday. "For us to have gone through the last two weeks trying to deal with the grieving process all the while having to fight the legal system just to do what the voters said was the right thing to do to me is just unconscionable."

Chris Miller was killed just after 2 a.m. on March 4 when Peoria police say Dominguez-Torres, 22, ran a red light and crashed into the car in which he was riding. Her blood-alcohol level was 0.20 percent, 2 1/2 times the legal limit.

Peoria police notified court officials that she's here illegally and that she admitted to buying forged resident and Social Security cards on the streets of Phoenix.

Yet Commissioner Kathleen Mead set her bond at $150,000. This, despite Proposition 100.

You remember Prop. 100. It's a new law that denies bond in cases such as this to people here illegally.

It passed last November in every county of the state. It passed by the widest margin of any proposition on the ballot. It passed because 78 percent of this state's voters decreed that it shall be the law of the land.

Just not, apparently, in Maricopa County Superior Court.

After Mead set Dominguez-Torres' bond, a court spokeswoman explained to me that commissioners can't deny bond on the say-so of the police or even the suspect. They must get word from an official source, she said, which is tough given that bail must be set within 24 hours of an arrest and the people in Immigration and Customs Enforcement who could give the high sign don't work weekends.

Mead had to set Dominguez-Torres' bond on a Sunday.

The next day, March 5, the courts got that official word from ICE when they put an immigration hold on Dominguez-Torres.

"I don't know how much more official we can get," ICE spokeswoman Lauren Mack told me.

Yet five days later, Commissioner Michael Barth lowered the bond to $50,000.

On Monday, a Maricopa County prosecutor asked the court's presiding criminal judge, James Keppel, to change Domiguez-Torres' status to non-bondable, pointing out that our state Constitution now requires it. Keppel's response: "I'm not the Court of Appeals."

He's holding a hearing Thursday morning to decide whether he has the authority to overturn Barth's bond.

No word on whether anyone in the court system is worried about whether they have the authority to overturn voters.

Neither Keppel nor the court's presiding judge, Barbara Mundell, returned calls to explain how the arbiters of law can just ignore it.

However, courts spokeswoman J.W. Brown e-mailed me to let me know that judges are sworn to follow the law.

"Several times each week, they order individuals charged with serious felonies be held without bond," she wrote, "when information presented to the court shows the proof is evident or the presumption is great that the person committed the alleged offense and is in the U.S. illegally."

And yet Dominguez-Torres remains in jail on that $50,000 bond. If her family puts up $5,000, she'll be taken by ICE to a detention center, and if she doesn't fight deportation, she could be back in Mexico by April Fools' Day.

Fitting, don't you think?

Sorry some of you don't have the attention span of a TWO YEAR OLD when it comes to reading!!

Peoria is in Arizona. And while there are many crimes committed by legal Americans, those committed by ILLEGAL aliens are PREVENTABLE crimes that should NEVER have happened in THIS country!!

to "mexican american "this was NOT form an "anti-illegal website"!! It's in today's on-line nedition of the Arizona Republic newspaper!!! Try READING the news sometimes!! You MIGHT learn something!!

to 'summermoon dancer" I don't like it when ANY child is molested or murdered!!
1. I didn't KNOW about this happening, so don't go saying that i wouldn't care!!!!!!
2. The person that did this was mentally handicapped!!(his parents/guardians should be held responsible)
3. That STILL does NOT alter the fact that ILLEGALS have NO business being in this country,committing crimes against OUR citizens!!!

Answer 1

It is stupid how the only thing these anti illegal websites can provide is stories about the worst then compare it to their best.

To the poster of the question: I know you would love nothing more than to see all illegals deported or even dead, but trust me, we are not leaving that easily. A mass deportation would cause huge riots ten times worse than those in L.A.

By the way: I'm not saying she should be pardoned or anything like that. She did a crime and should be punished. What makes me angry is the fact that people like you dig up stories like these and then say all "illegals" are like that.

Edit: I think DAR has it mixed up, it's American Citizens ( mostly white americans) that seem to get off scott free. For example a while ago there was a case where a white teenager and his friends were arrested for breaking into a school and causing 40,000 dollars in damages. What do you think would have happened if he had been black or hispanic. They would have fined him the 40,000 dollars plus jail time. What did they do to the kid? 2,000 dollars and no jail time, not even a suspension from what i heard.

Answer 2

Honestly, ive noticeable humans do that to any age mum and dad. Even ones which can be of their 20s and simply occur to be maintaining are compatible, well epidermis, and many others. People may also be assholes. Im 22 and i'm a nanny, whilst i stroll round with the youngsters, you will have to see the appears i am getting. Its like, who're you to pass judgement on besides even supposing they have been mine and i'm younger? I am no longer all excited for younger mum and dad, however i'm a real believer that if you happen to do the whole lot you'll to make it paintings, then you're well mum and dad nomatter the age. You and your spouse are doing proper by way of your youngster and household. Be proud. You are being an instance to all of the ones youngster mum and dad that suppose they cant do it! You are 19, you're legally an grownup. If they wish to cross judgement first-rate, simply suggests they have got insecurities as good. If i had handed you and your spouse in that trouble, i could have idea "Wow, a tender father stepping up for his spouse and little one, we want extra of the ones." I cant inform you what number of of my girlfriends obtained pregnant and their boyfriends ended as much as be deadbeats. You recognize deep down that you're doing the proper factor, and also you shouldnt want someone elses approval however your toddlers and wifes! You will constantly have any person passing judgement, take it as a lesson and educate your son how one can get beyond the ones varieties of humans and how one can see the well in each and every trouble.

Answer 3

Yes it does. There should be no bail bonding allowed for those illegally here. We have ample proof that they don't show back up in court.

That is why Arizona passed its law to begin with. For a judge to ignore state law seems a bit odd.


To the post below me, we are outraged at all crime. However, those illegally here tend to get away scott free if they get bond. They either would run or ICE would have to deport them - hardly a punishment especially when they tend to come right back.

Answer 4

I don't get emotional about it, but it sure sounds like judges are ignoring laws. If a high bail were set originally, THAT could always be reversed later on an appeal.

Answer 5

Everyone throws a blasted fit about this yet silence on the little boy that was raped and killed by a white child molester and his family covered up the crime for him. The kid was the child of Mexicans and you had no outrage at that now did you? Christopher Barrios is his name and his neighbor was a child molester and a white man.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/03/14/national/main2565816.shtml

Answer 6

WTF? Why would you give an illegal who committed vehicular homicide BOND?!? So they can flea and then kill someone else in another part of these United States? AND THE LOWER IT? Is that judge just WANTING to kill people, because it looks like to me that the judge is letting a person off just because they are illegal. She did the crime, now she can do the time!

Answer 7

I do get angry when I hear if crap like that....I also live in Arizona as well....Chandler area~! I totally agree with everything that you said....Please inore theese people on here as they dont understand the severe problem we have here in Arizona with the immagrents~!

Answer 8

America is a lost cause,get your passports the courts are on their side the goverment too.Be ready to move away from the cities ,quit your jobs,home school,a war is coming soon.

Answer 9

Having different laws for different people is unconstitutional. The Constitution covers all people in the USA, legal and illegal. Hence, the court had to disregard the "will of the people" because it conflicts with the Constitution.

Answer 10

About time they start holding them. I'm tired of reading "presumed to have fled to Mexico" and then find them back getting busted again with yet another crime.