Will Bunch asks, “Can Democrats grow a spine before American democracy collapses in a limp, lifeless heap?”
Sadly, the answer is know.
When the only dominant moral imperative of Congressional Democrats is careerism, taking a risk to do the right thing is simply not on the agenda.
This sounds a lot like what happened to institutional money market funds during the financial crash in 2008, when you could not redeem from funds that were supposed to be a safe as cash:
There’s still no sign of relief for the hundreds of thousands of investors whose money is trapped in one of the UK’s biggest equity funds, the Woodford Equity Income Fund. The fund is supposed to offer its shareholders daily liquidity, meaning they can take part or all of their money out any day of the week. But that was before a slow-motion (but accelerating) run on the fund forced its manager, hedge-fund legend Neil Woodford, into taking the last-gasp decision, on June 3, to place a ban on redemptions. Since then, investors have been unable to access their money. And it’s not clear how much longer this could go on.
The problems at Woodford have raised serious questions about just how liquid other equity funds in the UK may be. In the past few days, UK’s biggest broker, Hargreaves Lansdown announced that it plans to remove the Lindsell Train UK Equity Fund, the largest managed UK shares fund, and the Lindsell Train Global Equity Fund, from its Wealth 50 Best List due to liquidity concerns, which prompted shares in Lindsell Train Investment Trust to tumble 22% on Friday.
………
The Woodford Equity Income fund has performed terribly for the past two years. Bad bets were made, often on unlisted assets, resulting in big losses, which in turn triggered a cascade of redemptions as the sharpest investors began yanking out their money. The total amount under management at Woodford has steadily shrunk by almost two thirds since 2015, from £10.2 billion to £3.7 billion.
At the very least, Woodford’s investors will have to hang on for another three agonizing weeks, when the decision to gate the fund is scheduled to be revisited. When the last 28-day review period came up, around a week ago, Woodford told the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority that the fund was still not ready to reopen its doors.
………
Most of Woodford’s liquid assets are already gone having been sold off when the giant flood of redemptions began. By this spring, only three of the fund’s 105 holdings were FTSE 100 companies, and only 26 paid out dividends, which is highly unusual for a fund that is supposed to be almost exclusively devoted to equity-income.
In recent weeks Woodford has reduced his holdings in Raven Property and Horizon Discovery, two long-term investments, as well as other listed companies, including BCA Marketplace, New River Reit and Oakley Capital Investments. But most of the remaining assets are highly illiquid, which means selling them will be a lot more difficult, unless at a very heavy discount.
By EU law, equity funds like Woodford’s are allowed to hold a maximum of 10% of their portfolio in transferable securities that are not dealt in an “eligible market” such as the FTSE 250. To get around this rule, Woodford reportedly bundled up his fund’s illiquid unlisted assets and listed them on the minuscule Guernsey-headquartered International Stock Exchange, which despite its impressive-sounding name has barely any trading activity at all.
This was enough to lend his most illiquid assets the appearance, albeit flimsy, of liquidity. The move was within the letter — though not the spirit — of the law, according to the FCA chief executive Andrew Bailey. Mr Bailey told the Commons Treasury select committee that Woodford Equity Income fund was “sailing close to the wind,” adding that “listing something on an exchange where trading does not actually happen, as far as I can see, does not actually count as liquidity.”
So, they engaged in dodgy bookkeeping combined with a run on the fund.
Yet another dodgy player at the big casino.
They have learned nothing.
H/t Naked Capitalism.
Case in point, Bob Bill Barr, who is refusing to recuse himself from the Jeffrey Epstein case, despite the fact that his father hired Epstein at one point, and Barr’s law firm once had him as a client, and defended him from the same charges.
Seeing as how Trump was a close associate of Epstein, we know where THIS is going.
Absolutely shameless:
U.S. Attorney General Bill Barr does not plan to recuse himself from the current investigation into multi-millionaire and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein, according to sources who spoke to CNN and Fox News.
A Department of Justice official told CNN on Tuesday that “Bill Barr has consulted with career ethics officials at DOJ and he will not recuse from current Epstein case.”
Barr, however, has recused himself “from any review of the earlier case in Florida,” in which Epstein received a controversial plea deal.
………
CNN legal analyst Elie Honig said Barr’s decision not to recuse himself from the current case was “trouble.”
“I have zero confidence Barr will let this case play out in its natural course if it should start to implicate or do collateral damage to powerful, politically-connected people,” he tweeted.
Un-dirty-word-believable.
— Amir (@AmirAminiMD) July 7, 2019
This in less than 280 characters, encapsulates everything that is wrong with the coverage of the Presidential campaign.
He’s already done times for this, where his high-power lawyers got him off with a slap on the wrist.
As a result of a series of Miami Herald exposes about how prosecutors cut him a sweetheart deal, he was rearrested as he stepped off of his private jet, named (I sh%$ you not) the Lolita Express, at Teterboro, NJ.
The FBI executed a search warrant, and they found sexually explicit videos of underage girls on disks found in a safe in his home:
A trove of lewd photographs of girls, discovered in a safe inside the financier Jeffrey Epstein’s Manhattan mansion the same day he was arrested, is deepening questions about why federal prosecutors in Miami had cut a deal that shielded him from federal prosecution in 2008.
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan charged Mr. Epstein on Monday with sex trafficking, dealing an implicit rebuke to that plea agreement, which was overseen by Alexander Acosta, then the United States attorney in Miami and now President Trump’s labor secretary.
The indictment in Manhattan could prompt a moment of reckoning for the Justice Department, which for years has wrestled with accusations that it mishandled the earlier case and has faced a barrage of litigation from Mr. Epstein’s accusers. In February, the Justice Department opened its own internal review into the matter.
………
Mr. Epstein, a hedge fund manager, avoided the possibility of a lengthy prison sentence, largely because of a secret agreement his lawyers struck with federal prosecutors in 2008. His social circle is filled with the rich and famous, including former President Bill Clinton and Prince Andrew of Britain.
Yeah, also this guy hung out with Epstein:
Epstein is the guy with the gray hair 3rd from the left.
The guy on the left is (of course) Donald John Trump.
Mr. Clinton’s office said in a statement on Monday that he knows nothing about “the terrible crimes” connected to Mr. Epstein.
In 2002, Mr. Trump described Mr. Epstein as “a terrific guy,” telling New York Magazine, “It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”
Clinton knew, and Trump Knew, and so did everyone else in his circle, and they looked the other way, because he was one of them.
Our so-called elites are rotten to the core.
Several of Mr. Epstein’s accusers said they were relieved that authorities seemed to be taking their complaints seriously after many years.
Yeah, it only took 10 years, and a dogged reporter, Julie Brown, for his victims to have their day in court.
I really hope that the prosecutors, including Trump’s current Secretary of Labor, get keel hauled over this.
I am heartened that some of the regime change mousketeers are finally turning their eyes toward the House of Saud, and seeing it, and particular its young scion Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, as a threat to peace and stability.
On the other hand, I am terrifed that they are comparing him to Saddam Hussein, because this implies an eventual invasion, and invading Saudi Arabia, which would involve the “Infidel” in Medina and Mecca, would create a clusterf%$# that would make our little adventure in Iraq look like a game of Parcheesi.
We need to stop our incompetent meddling.
Well, it appears that Elon Musk has finally come up with a sustainable business model for Tesla.
Unfortunately for him, his business model is to sell only commercial self driving cars for hundreds of thousands of dollars, because self driving is such a value enhancer, because you can rent out your car as a hack while you are not driving.
Checker Motors made a dedicated taxi and failed almost 40 years ago, and while the car was specifically made to the needs of the taxi industry, it could not compete with the volume advantages of major car manufacturers.
Seriously, the idea that Tesla self-driving, which I expect to remain a decade away into the 2030s, is not going to be an exclusive feature of Tesla Motors, and (if cost trends continue) the marginal cost of the system will be under $10,000.
But still, Elon Musk has declared that it won’t sell private automobiles once its “Autopilot” is ready for unsupervised road use.
This dude is one lab accident, and one platypus, away from becoming Heinz Doofenschmirtz:
The company believes its vehicles will be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars over their useful lifetime.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has warned that the company’s car pricing will potentially multiply after the company launches its ride-hailing service.
The executive recently claimed Tesla’s vehicles will be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars over their useful life when operated as part of a fully autonomous robotaxi fleet. The presentation did not answer the obvious question at the time: why would Tesla sell any cars to consumers if they become worth so much more for a taxi service?
Musk yesterday confirmed the likely price increase when asked on Twitter if consumers have limited time left to buy a Tesla car before prices “go up severalfold to balance supply and demand” once the company solves full self-driving.
“To be clear, consumers will still be able to buy a Tesla, but the clearing price will rise significantly, as a fully autonomous car that can function as a robotaxi is several times more valuable than a non-autonomous car,” he added in a later post.
Seriously: This business model is delusional.
Unlike Oracle, or Peoplesoft, or SAP, any car can operate on any road.
There is no vendor lock-in.
I am not surprised that Elon Musk became rich through regulatory arbitrage and luck, but I am puzzled as to why people see him as a visionary, as opposed to a purveyor of Silicon snake oil.
So says Bernie, so say we all:
Great video from @BernieSanders, in 2018, on the importance of canvassing pic.twitter.com/1U0WXRd2uy— People for Bernie (@People4Bernie) June 28, 2019
Seriously, it’s tough to go up to strangers an ask them to vote for your candidate, but just do it.
I love it when evil goes up against evil, because it’s a win-win for the rest of us:
A leading U.S. retail group, whose members include Walmart, Target, Best Buy and others, has penned a letter to the Federal Trade Commission that details its concerns over big tech companies’ dominance. The letter specifically calls out Amazon and Google for their control over the majority of internet product searches, how price and product information reaches consumers and other concerns.
The letter, written by The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA), urges the FTC to take a closer look at the big tech platforms. The group also offers to help in any antitrust investigations.
“It should…be quite concerning to the Commission that Amazon and Google control the majority of all Internet product search, and can very easily affect whether and how price and product information actually reaches consumers,” write the RILA. “Moreover, these firms are extraordinarily adept at determining how small changes in the way in which information is conveyed affect consumer behavior — given that nearly everything they do is driven by big-data science and machine learning models,” the letter continues.
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The group asks the FTC to consider rules and enforcement actions that require companies to disclose where products come from, whether they’re new or used, whether their sale is authorized and how the price from one seller compares to others. Amazon is mentioned here as an example of the problems that can arise when a firm controls an “essential platform” like Amazon Marketplace and also competes on that same platform.
Additionally, the letter asks the FTC to look beyond the consumer benefit of lowered prices or free services — sometimes by subsidizing the platform with other profit streams.
Here is hoping that they manage to reduce each other to a bloody pulp.
The oil rich former Soviet Republic has spent billions attempting to save its failing banks, and now, it is ditching the banks, and will write down its people’s debts, the exact opposite of what Geithner and the Federal Reserve did in the USA.
I expect the new Kazakh President to become Hitler of the Week™ shortly, because bailing out people and letting the banksters and their investors take the the hit is just unAmerican.
I am aware that there is very little to recommend Kazakhstan.
Kassym-Jomart Tokayev was elected in an unfair election, hand picked by his predecessor, Nursultan Nazarbayev, who is notorious for the suppression of free speech, torture, etc.
This is a case of a stopped clock being right twice a day:
Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said he’ll write off bad loans held by a sixth of the central Asian country’s population, while signaling a sharp change in policy to end costly state bailouts of private banks.
The loan-forgiveness program is Tokayev’s first major policy announcement since he was elected president on June 9 in a choreographed transfer of power that began when longtime leader Nursultan Nazarbayev stepped down as head of state in March. His victory was met with rare and widespread protests.
Bank bailouts are also a sensitive issue in Kazakhstan, which has been mired in a decade-long crisis in which the government has pumped at least $18 billion into lenders to keep the sector from collapsing under the weight of bad debts. The central bank is conducting a review of asset quality, prompting speculation that a new round of bailouts may be in the works.
………While the debt-relief initiative may help lenders, the total cost is likely to come in at “a bit less than $1 billion,” according to Tokayev. More than 3 million Kazakhs in the energy-rich country of 18 million will get help to escape debts averaging 300,000 tenge ($790), he said. It is aimed at “people who find themselves in very difficult living circumstances,” he said.
About 4,000 people were detained by police during a rare outburst of protests against what activists said was a lack of real choice in the recent vote, which Tokayev won easily with 71% support. Leader-for-life Nazarbayev, 78, handed the presidency to Tokayev in March, who called the early election “to remove any uncertainty.” International observers criticized the conduct of the vote.
The math is pretty simple: $18 billion did not solve the problem, versus less than $1 billion to write down personal debt, and let the banks and the banksters burn.
Works for me.
About f%$#ing time. It’s bad enough that the current Democratic Party consults make elections more expensive because they get a percentage of the media buys, but they also suck at what they do:
Two alums of Sen. Bernie Sanders’ (I-VT) 2016 presidential campaign have launched a consulting firm to help progressive candidates win elections and to stick a thumb in the eye of the Democratic Party establishment.
MVMT Communications is the brainchild of Karthik Ganapathy, who previously served as battleground states communications director for Sanders, and Mike Casca, the rapid response director on Sanders’ campaign.
“The sort of calcification around the Democratic Party’s agenda has been driven a lot by the consultant class,” Casca, who went on to serve as communications director for New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, told The Daily Beast. “We have a party that is driven by a core of strategists that run a lot of their business on corporate clients and it affects everyone’s thinking.”
The launch of MVMT Communications comes as the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has said it will not grant contracts to consultants who work with candidates who are running primary challenges against sitting incumbents. Though Ganapathy and Casca didn’t say they created their firm in response to that decision, it is clear that their impetus for doing so was, in part, to try to rally in support of those candidates challenging entrenched incumbents.
Let’s hope that they are more competent than the current lot.
When you “buy” a Prime Membership, you are selling yourself to them:
Amazon’s Alexa smart assistant may be useful, but the privacy concerns aren’t going away anytime soon.Now, in a fresh turn of events, the retail giant has confirmed that it keeps transcripts and voice recordings indefinitely, and only removes them if they’re manually deleted by users.
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Privacy in the Internet of Things space has already been a hot topic. Earlier this April, Bloomberg published a piece about how thousands of Amazon employees listen to voice recordings captured in Echo speakers, transcribing and annotating them to improve the Alexa digital assistant that powers the smart speakers.
Then in May, the retail behemoth came under further scrutiny for its data collection practices after CNET reported that Alexa assistant not only keeps your voice recordings, but also keeps a record of your voice transcriptions for improving its AI algorithms, with no option to delete them.
………
Amazon’s response points out that even developers of Alexa skills can keep a record of every transaction or routinely scheduled activity a user makes with an Echo device. “When a customer interacts with an Alexa skill, that skill developer may also retain records of the interaction,” the company wrote in its response.
………
But the lack of clarity surrounding its data collection and retention policies has revived debates over the sometimes conflicting goals of convenience and privacy. And Coons isn’t exactly satisfied with Amazon‘s reply.
“Amazon‘s response leaves open the possibility that transcripts of user voice interactions with Alexa are not deleted from all of Amazon‘s servers, even after a user has deleted a recording of his or her voice,” he said in a statement. “What’s more, the extent to which this data is shared with third parties, and how those third parties use and control that information, is still unclear.”
I believe the technical term for this sort of business and technical practice is, “Dystopian.”
Wayne LaPierre decided to go hard-line, going after the grieving parents, and then, LaPierre spent over $70,000 of NRA money on a vacation in the Bahamas.
That is unbelievably cold:
Twenty young children had just been gunned down by a semiautomatic rifle in their classrooms in Newtown, Conn., in December 2012, and inside the hardened bunker of the National Rifle Association, rattled officials were wrestling with rare feelings of self-doubt.
In the past, the gun rights organization had responded to mass shootings with unapologetic, high-profile attacks on any attempt to restrict firearms. But several senior NRA officials — laid low by images of sobbing parents planning their children’s funerals rather than tucking presents under Christmas trees — thought the organization should take a less confrontational approach this time, according to multiple people familiar with the internal debate.
Over the objections of some top officials, however, NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre struck a defiant posture. In fiery public appearances crafted by Ackerman McQueen, the organization’s longtime advertising firm , LaPierre announced that the group would create a model program to train armed security guards who could protect schools from shooters, saying that was the only measure that would keep children safe.
Then LaPierre and his wife left for the Bahamas, a trip they billed through Ackerman McQueen — and was ultimately paid for by the nonprofit organization. Their post-Christmas flights to and from Eleuthera, known for its pink beaches, cost the NRA nearly $70,000, according to internal documents and people familiar with the trip.
………
New details about how the NRA handled the tumultuous moment show how Sandy Hook —one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history — divided the leadership of the powerful gun rights organization. The episode also showcased the symbiotic relationship between LaPierre and Ackerman McQueen, an alliance that defined the NRA for more than three decades, several former officials said.
During that period, the bills for LaPierre’s wardrobe and his private jet travel flowed through the Oklahoma-based ad firm, recently revealed internal documents show, a practice that critics say shrouded the nature of the costs from some NRA leaders and members. At the same time, Ackerman McQueen collected tens of millions of dollars in consulting fees and kept a tight grip on the NRA’s aggressive messaging, according to documents and people familiar with the dynamics.
Who cares about dead children when you have a movement to loot, huh?
There are a lot of repulsive people in the world, but Wayne LaPierre is in a whole new class of contemptible.
My guess is that they are really upset because it makes it much tougher for ISPs to collect data to resell to advertisers.
I call hypocrisy for their accusation that Mozilla is an, ‘internet villain’ for using DNS-over-HTTPS:
An industry group of internet service providers has branded Firefox browser maker Mozilla an “internet villain” for supporting a DNS security standard.
The U.K.’s Internet Services Providers’ Association (ISPA), the trade group for U.K. internet service providers, nominated the browser maker for its proposed effort to roll out the security feature, which they say will allow users to “bypass UK filtering obligations and parental controls, undermining internet safety standards in the UK.”
Mozilla said late last year it was planning to test DNS-over-HTTPS to a small number of users.
Whenever you visit a website — even if it’s HTTPS enabled — the DNS query that converts the web address into an IP address that computers can read is usually unencrypted. The security standard is implemented at the app level, making Mozilla the first browser to use DNS-over-HTTPS. By encrypting the DNS query it also protects the DNS request against man-in-the-middle attacks, which allow attackers to hijack the request and point victims to a malicious page instead.
DNS-over-HTTPS also improves performance, making DNS queries — and the overall browsing experience — faster.
………
The ISPA’s nomination quickly drew ire from the security community. Amid a backlash on social media, the ISPA doubled down on its position. “Bringing in DNS-over-HTTPS by default would be harmful for online safety, cybersecurity and consumer choice,” but said it encourages “further debate.”
One internet provider, Andrews & Arnold, donated £2,940 — around $3,670 — to Mozilla in support of the nonprofit. “The amount was chosen because that is what our fee for ISPA membership would have been, were we a member,” said a tweet from the company.
Mozilla spokesperson Justin O’Kelly told TechCrunch: “We’re surprised and disappointed that an industry association for ISPs decided to misrepresent an improvement to decades old internet infrastructure.”
“Despite claims to the contrary, a more private DNS would not prevent the use of content filtering or parental controls in the UK. DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH) would offer real security benefits to UK citizens. Our goal is to build a more secure internet, and we continue to have a serious, constructive conversation with credible stakeholders in the UK about how to do that,” he said.
F%$# the ISPA.
They did things like posting bigoted memes and jokes about shooting immigrants.
It was a blockbuster when ProPublica revealed this a week ago, and management was shocked, and promised a thorough investigation.
Well, in news that surprise no one, Customs and Border Protection knew about this for years, and never did anything about it.
When you consider the scope of the Facebook group, particularly when juxtaposed to the gratuitous brutality of the organization, this is not a surprise:
Customs and Border Protection officials have been aware for up to three years that a secret Facebook group for current and former Border Patrol agents was posting offensive messages — far longer than previously reported.
Border Patrol leadership knew about photos posted to the group as far back as 2016, when agents reported them, according to a current Homeland Security official. The images — several of which were provided to POLITICO — show agents engaging in conduct that includes simulating sex acts and taking selfies while defecating. A former DHS official said he was aware of the Facebook group during the past year.
Neither official knew of any serious punishment ever leveled at members of the Facebook group.
ProPublica reported Monday that comments in the “I’m 10-15” Facebook group posted as recently as last week mocked the death of a 16-year-old detained Guatemalan migrant, made bigoted remarks about throwing a burrito at two Latina congresswomen, and posted obscene and misogynistic illustrations of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.). The group’s name refers to the code used to signal “aliens in custody.”
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But screen shots provided to POLITICO and interviews with the two DHS officials indicate that the agency wasn’t blindsided by ProPublica’s report. Staffers in CBP’s public affairs office monitored the Facebook group over the past year “as a source of intelligence” to see “what people are talking about,” according to the former DHS official.
“We were not talking about ‘10-15’ as a liability or an asset or as an item of concern,” the former official said.
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The DHS inspector general’s office — the department’s internal watchdog — has launched an investigation into the recent Facebook posts, officials said Tuesday.
Nearly half of DHS was in this group.
Anyone who was in this group should have their clearances pulled until it can be shown that there has been no wrongdoing.
Well, now he has created a unit dedicated to investigating wrongful convictions and police misconduct.
I hope that this includes a review of McCulloch and his lieutenants before the statute of limitations expires as well.
I guarantee that you will find prosecutors have knowing submitted false testimony, because that’s what McCulloch did in the Michael Brown case:
St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell, who was elected last year on a radical reform platform, has taken a huge new step in that direction, establishing a unit to tackle wrongful conditions and abuse by the police.
The Conviction and Incident Review Unit, whose staff will report directly to Bell, will review past convictions where defendants claimed innocence as well as investigate police shootings and allegations of police misconduct.
………
For Bell — a former public defender, municipal judge, court prosecutor, and son of a cop — the inspiration came from those efforts as well as his personal experiences. “I’ve been practicing for 18 years,” he said in an interview with The Intercept, “and so I knew that there’s things that needed to be done differently.”
Bell campaigned on using data-driven research to reform the criminal justice system, including establishing an independent unit to review past convictions, a process that his predecessor Bob McCulloch did not have a system for. McCulloch had a reputation for being uncomfortably close with law enforcement, and the community’s distrust of him was only exacerbated following Officer Darren Wilson’s fatal August 2014 shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Against the wishes of the community, protesters, and activists — including the NAACP — McCulloch declined to appoint a special prosecutor in the case of Brown’s murder. The community channeled anger with the handling of Brown’s case into organizing power that propelled Bell to victory.
………
The unit’s independence is crucial, said Nina Morrison, senior litigation counsel at the Innocence Project; she has represented numerous clients who have become exonerated, thanks in part to the work of conviction integrity units.
It’s not enough to exonerate those who are innocent, you also need to prosecute people who break the law to close cases.
But the government of Kiev plans to appeal:
A court in Ukraine issued an injunction against the naming of two streets in Kiev after nationalists who collaborated with the Nazis during World War II.
The district administrative court of Kiev ordered the municipality to undo the 2016 renaming of two main streets for Stepan Bandera and Roman Shukhevych on Tuesday.
But Mayor Vitaly Klitschko on Wednesday wrote on Facebook that the city will appeal the ruling, the Regnum news agency reported. In the meantime, the streets in question will be renamed Moscow Avenue and another will be named for Nikolai Vatutin, a Soviet general who was killed in 1944 by soldiers from Shukhevych’s Ukrainian Insurgent Army, or UPA.
Bandera and Shukhevych were two of Ukraine’s several Nazi collaborators. Some were SS volunteers and mass murdered Jews and Poles, and are now celebrated as anti-communist heroes in Ukraine and by its government.
Several collaborators? More like tens of thousands, and now the Ukraine is glorifying them.
Yes, this sort of crap does effect my view of the conflict between Russia and the Ukraine.
Grilled steaks, chicken for the kids, and fireworks. (Watching, not setting them off myself)
Kind of Norman Rockwell, I guess.
A 16 year raped a drunk 16 year old girl, filmed it, and shared the film.
The judge at his trial said that he deserved leniency because he came from a good family.
This sort of crap is getting really old:
The 16-year-old girl was visibly intoxicated, her speech slurred, when a drunk 16-year-old boy sexually assaulted her in a dark basement during an alcohol-fueled pajama party in New Jersey, prosecutors said.
The boy filmed himself penetrating her from behind, her torso exposed, her head hanging down, prosecutors said. He later shared the cellphone video among friends, investigators said, and sent a text that said, “When your first time having sex was rape.”
But a family court judge said it wasn’t rape. Instead, he wondered aloud if it was sexual assault, defining rape as something reserved for an attack at gunpoint by strangers.
He also said the young man came from a good family, attended an excellent school, had terrific grades and was an Eagle scout. Prosecutors, the judge said, should have explained to the girl and her family that pressing charges would destroy the boy’s life.
So he denied prosecutors’ motion to try the 16-year-old as an adult. “He is clearly a candidate for not just college but probably for a good college,” Judge James Troiano of Superior Court said last year in a two-hour decision while sitting in Monmouth County.
Now the judge has been sharply rebuked by an appeals court in a scathing 14-page ruling that warned the judge against showing bias toward privileged teenagers.
………
In recent years, judges across the country have come under fire for the way they have handled sexual abuse cases. One of the most notorious was in 2016, when a judge in California sentenced a Stanford University student to six months in jail after he was found guilty of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman. After an intense public backlash, California voters recalled the judge.
………
The judge in Monmouth County, Mr. Troiano, was scolded by the appellate court, according to the panel’s decision. “That the juvenile came from a good family and had good test scores we assume would not condemn the juveniles who do not come from good families and do not have good test scores from withstanding waiver application,” the panel wrote in its decision.
………
Family court cases are typically closed to the public, but the judges’ comments surfaced in June when the appeals court decisions were made public, joining a series of contentious sexual assault cases that have ignited outrage over a legal system that advocates for victims say is warped by bias and privilege.
………
In September 2017, the Monmouth County prosecutor’s office recommended that the case be tried in adult criminal court in part because the boy’s actions were “sophisticated and predatory.”
………
The appellate decision criticized the judge, writing that rather than focusing on whether prosecutors met the necessary standards for a waiver, “the judge decided the case for himself.”
………
In 2004, Judge Troiano imposed a gag order to prohibit people in a courtroom from discussing the high-profile case of two Montclair High School football players accused of sexually assaulting a schoolmate. The charges were eventually dropped.
Think about all the times that this does not get press, and some self-entitled rich kid gets off while some black kid gets tried as an adult for having a joint in his pocket.
Sometimes our society makes me sick.
Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Alpine) should resign from Congress so he can spend more time with his lawyers.
Heh.