Originally published at: Felony convictions for corrupt naval officers vacated after prosecutorial misconduct; they plead guilty to misdemeanors and get $100 fines instead | Boing Boing
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Any word on what happens to the prosecutors; or do they just qualified-immunity their way merrily along?
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Their punishment is being told off by the judge and the comically low fines used to punish the guys who walked off with $500k while setting fire to $35m more.
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They could be subject to further sanctions or even suspensions by the courts or by their bar association. They should be disbarred, in my opinion, but bar associations are extremely reluctant to do that, reserving that punishment for repeat offenders.
The AP article didn’t go into a lot of detail on what the prosecutorial misconduct was. Honestly, it had to be pretty bad for the current US attorneys to agree to drop the charges and just have them plead guilty to misdemeanors. That’s all but admitting that the facts alleged in the defense’s motions are all true. the Wapo article has more details. Some of it pretty bad. The tl;dr of it is that the former prosecutors mostly just relied on the word of Leonard Francis, the crooked defense contractor behind all this. And a lot of the evidence he provided prosecutors was pretty clearly doctored or just completely fabricated. It honestly called into question whether or not these officers were actually guilty. Were the officers actually guilty or did they just take this sweetheart deal to get this over with and be done with it? Who knows. Innocent people accept plea deals. Sometimes the risk and expense of going to trial just aren’t worth it.
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It is so frustrating when news articles don’t name the prosecutors and/or law enforcement who engaged in the misconduct and don’t link to the actual court opinions being discussed. It’s pretty easy to do!
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Min-use the Gov’t travel credit card in the Navy - rent a video, mistake for a personnel ccard, small stuff. And that will get a person booted from the Navy. OMG; stuff like this has to be seen to be believed, and OMG; worst. Stain. Ever. In a seaman’s record jacket. OMG; a $12 movie! Stop the boiler Smitty, stop the boiler. 
Yeah, that’s the rule.
Police or prosecutors cheat, they lose by default. That’s the only way this system can ever have a chance at being fair. It’s already not fair for so many reasons that if the “good guys” cheat to win, and then get caught, the “bad guys” get freed/off/away with it.
There’s enough injustice in the system that cheating asshole prosecutors and cops get away with. When they get caught they should face the consequences of being responsible for the “bad guys” getting away with it because of them.
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