Jacques Arraignment Scheduled

~Michael Jacques


Michael Jacques could face the death penalty in the murder of 12-year old Brooke Bennett.

Last week, he was indicted for drugging, sexually assaulting, strangling and smothering Brooke.

The arraignment in U.S. District Court, before Judge William Sessions, will take place Wednesday at 1:30pm.

Fox 44

OJ SIMPSON VERDICT: Guest Entry Commentary

Guest Entry by Mort Snerd

Mulligan

In the courtroom in Los Vegas, the lights are now turned off. The echo’s of audio tapes has faded away along with the passion and heat of legal discussion and argument. A man who has demonstrated unusually gifted athletic ability and a sometimes uncontrollable urge to protect his property and “stuff” has been lead away in handcuffs. As his friend and legal counsel remarked in the closing remarks, “being stupid and being frustrated is not being a criminal” but left out the word arrogant.

This trial had nothing to do with events in Los Angles but has everything to do with who O. J. Simpson really is and the events that occurred in the Palace Station. He assembled a band of buddies to go and get back “his stuff”. Then went to the hotel and for a five minute period, kept two people contained in a room. The band bagged and removed all the “stuff” in the room making sure the room phone was unplugged. This is Robbery and Kidnapping, pure and simple. There is nothing complex or open to interpretation about it.

Add a little “stupid” to the mix by having O. J. Simpson select Mr. McClinton to accompany him and according to Mr. McClinton own testimony, he brandished a gun during the commission of this robbery and kidnapping which now makes it Armed Robbery and kidnapping with a deadly weapon for the O. J. Simpson band.

This is not a game of Golf where your friends can give you a Mulligan or a “Do over” Mr. Simpson. Once you removed the items from the room, it became a Robbery. Once you said, no one leaves the room, it became Kidnapping. Once a member of your band of buddies brandished a weapon, it added Deadly weapon extensions to the crimes. You cannot return the “stuff” taken and have it all undone. Being “stupid” is neither criminal nor an excuse. You are now a “Convicted Felon”.

Friends, family and society did not do you any favors by allowing you to get away with bad acts such as physical abuse of women or road rage. Who can forget the battered face of Nichole Brown in the hospital who did nothing more than preventing you from entering the house? Or the face of Christina Prody who “fell” at a gas station? While you sit in your cell, reflect upon the fact that your friends, family and society taught you the lesson of arrogance that you seemed to have learned so well.

Just my opinion,

Mortie

Thank you very much Mortie. Sprocket

OJ SIMPSON VERDICT!

Update!
It's a historic day. 13 years ago today, OJ Simpson was acquitted of the murders of his wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, and he walked out of Ito's courtroom a free man. Today, the Nevada jury worked late into the night deliberating for 13 hours to bring in verdicts in this case.

C.J. Stewart GUILTY ON ALL 12 CHARGES!!

OJ Simpson GUILTY ON ALL 12 CHARGES!!

This is poetic justice. OJ stood there with a resigned expression on his face, his lips pressed together. As he looked at the jury as the counts were read, it was like he was nodding his head a bit as if yes, he knew he was guilty.

People in the gallery behind the defendants were crying.

The people request that bail be revoked.

Bryson makes a few motions to the court, that are all denied. He requests time for Stewart to get his affairs in order. He's not a flight risk, he turned himself in. That motion is denied.

Galanter stands up requesting extension of time to file more motions. Glass denies the request.

CJ Stewart and OJ are taken into custody. A close up OJ in handcuffs.

Glass rules that both convicted men are to be remanded with no bail.

Galanter asks for time to prepare new motions again, and Glass denies that request.

Glass rules court is in recess.

A press conference will occur shortly.

Update!
There will be a press conference shortly.

It's a fitting end. OJ's greed, to keep his possessions out of the hands of the Goldman family drove him to this place. He has no one to blame but himself.

Sentencing will be December 5th, at 9:00 am.

CNN.Crime

Vermont Dismisses Charges Against Brooke Bennett’s Former Stepfather

Ray Gagnon was arrested in July following the disappearance of 12-year old Brooke Bennett. The former stepfather of Brooke has been held on obstruction of justice charges.

Vermont has filed a motion to dismiss the charges because Gagnon has been indicted by a federal grand jury in Texas on charges of production and transportation of child pornography.

He admitted he has downloaded a vast amount of child pornography from the Internet, including images of children as young as 5 and that he stores the images on his laptop computer.

Gagnon rented a room in a house in San Antonio owned by Kevin Grosenheider. Allegedly, Gagnon called Grosenheider and told him to throw out a safe that contained the laptop.

The safe was reportedly thrown into a dumpster. The FBI ended a lengthy search, without recovering the safe.

Gagnon also faces charges of possession of child pornography in Alabama. His former home was in Cullman, Alabama.

Fox 44

Phil Spector, OJ Simpson & Kazuyoshi Miura

Phil Spector's retrial for the murder of Lana Clarkson over five and a half years ago kicks off today with 300 jurors showing up at the Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center today and tomorrow. Judge Larry Paul Fidler's courtroom 106 is not large. A placard on the wall indicates the seating capacity is "80."

Here's how the process works. 75 potential jurors will show up in the morning and squeeze into 106. Another 75 will show up in the afternoon. The same process will be repeated on Friday. There may be a pre-screening process to exclude those jurors who can not serve due to hardship reasons. The remaining jurors will then receive a detailed questionnaire to fill out and turn into the court at a later date. Copies of the jurors questionnaires are then turned over to the prosecution and the defense. I'm betting that sometime later, the questionnaire will released to the public.

During the first trial, the initial stages of jury selection was not open to the public. The reason was logistics. There just are not enough seats in the gallery and jury box to accommodate any extra bodies in the courtroom. Ciaran McEvoy, who covered the first trial for City News back then, told me that he waited out in the hall (possibly for days) until there was a free seat that he could occupy.

Yesterday, it was agreed that the kick off of voie dire would be moved back one week from October 14th to October 20th, to give counsel more time to review the jurors responses.

Back on September 15th, Spector's lead counsel, Doron Weinberg made an initial petition to the court for Spector to replace his 1 million cash bond with "his own property." The people objected. This could possibly reduce the bond to half it's current amount. Fidler responded that this is a lengthy process to get the property valued and to determine if there were any title liens. He would allow the defense to submit [the request] "under seal." It may be a while before we get to know if Fidler approves a bond reduction or a property swap for the cash bond. This could be an indication that Spector is hurting for cash, seeing as how he's got a few lawsuits pending for nonpayment of royalties and hotel bills. If he really is hurting, why not sell his catalog? Do you think Spector would consider parting with that continual cash cow to pay his lawyers? It could just be like Michelle Blaine has indicated on her blog, Spector is typically not fond of paying bills.


OJ Simpson's defense in his robbery trial rested yesterday and this morning, all parties are currently hammering out jury instructions. Those of us who have watched this trial on The Legal Edge, are anxiously awaiting the start of closing arguments. There is the hope that the jury will receive the case sometime today. Tomorrow is the 13 year anniversary of the "not guilty" verdict in OJ Simpson's infamous murder trial. OJ Simpson is currently facing 12 counts, including kidnapping. How astronomically coincidental would it be if this jury reaches a verdict tomorrow?

Kazuyoshi Miura is currently sitting in a jail cell in Saipan, waiting to be picked up by LAPD detectives and returned to Los Angeles to stand trial on conspiracy murder charges. It's been speculated in the Asian press that this will not happen until sometime next week. On September 26th, Judge Van Sicklen ruled that double jeopardy applied, and he could not be tried on the murder charge. Miura was convicted of the 1981 murder of his wife, Kazumi, in downtown Los Angeles in his native Japan but the verdict was later over tuned by a higher court. The Japanese are fascinated by all things Miura, and his notoriety and murder trial in Japan are often called "Japan's OJ case."

CNN.Crime

Michael Jacques Indicted in Brooke Bennett’s Kidnapping and Death

~Brooke Bennett

A federal grand jury has found Michael Jacques drugged and sexually assaulted Bennett, then smothered her to death with a plastic bag in a premeditated killing.

Jacques also faces other charges, including five counts of child pornography.

The grand jury indicted the uncle of slain 12-year-old Brooke Bennett for her death on special findings that make him eligible for the death penalty if found guilty on the charge of kidnapping with death resulting.

It is up to the US Attorney General whether or not to seek the death penalty and his decision isn’t expected for several months.

According to the indictment, special findings are what may make this a death penalty case. The special findings are:

-- Jacques intentionally killed Brooke Bennett
-- Jacques intentionally injured her, leading to her death
-- the crime was especially cruel
-- the crime was premeditated
-- the victim was a pre-teen

At the moment, there is no date scheduled for Jacques arraignment.

Fox 44

CNN.com

Casey Anthony: Suspect!

Guest Commentary by ritanita!

I had promised myself I wouldn’t write any more about this case until something big happened. I’ve gone about my life, followed up on news releases, chatted with my buddies, and tried my best to put the missing little girl, Caylee Anthony out of my mind.

It hasn’t worked. This little girl haunts my dreams and follows me wherever I go. Sweet, innocent little Caylee never realized she wasn’t totally loved and cherished by her mother. She didn’t realize she was a pawn between her mother and her grandmother. She didn’t realize she was in the way of her mother’s "alternate lifestlye."

Now, it’s been 119 days since she visited her great-grandfather at his assisted living home on Father’s day. It’s been 119 days since she sat his lap, gave him a kiss and rested against his chest It has probably been 119 days since that last loving, peaceful moment Caylee had in her all too short life.

If you listen to Leonard Padilla, June 15 was the day that, after the visit to the nursing home, Cindy Anthony confronted her daughter about her thieving ways. He essentially tossed blame to Cindy for Casey’s departure:

PADILLA: They have to get away from the truth. They can`t live with the truth. Cindy should go back to the realization that she is the one that caused Casey to leave the house that night. If she would realize that .

GRACE: I disagree with you, Leonard. You don`t make somebody else do something. Casey - Mom Casey Anthony was already leaving the house and shacking up with one guy after the next. Where she was keeping the child, I don`t know. But her mother did not make her do these things. They may have had an argument, but she was acting on her own volition.

PADILLA: Cindy put her hands around Casey`s throat and practically choked her out that night. It scared the hell out of Casey. It had never happened before.

It’s a real shame that the Anthony’s hadn’t followed through with their plans to gain custody of Caylee before this day. If they had followed through, Casey would have had to leave the house on her own that night.

Where Casey spent that night, and the people she spoke to then, we don’t know. What we do know is that it was the last time Caylee was seen alive.

Now, her mother’s situation has been changed from Person of Interest to Suspect. This tells us now that there has been a crime more serious than felony child neglect. It tells us that the investigation is circling in around Casey, only Casey.

We have to be patient now, very patient. We have to trust the OCSD and the FBI to continue in the investigation and pin down every moment, every witness, every piece of forensic evidence. It will be a difficult case to prove without a body and it will take time. In this case, I have faith in the system. They will put together their case and present in a court of law.

For the peace of those who truly loved her, I pray that Caylee is found and justice satisfied for this precious little girl.

CNN.com Nancy Grace Transcripts

WESH

CNN Find Caylee Blog

CNN.Crime

Case Anthony Offically Called a Suspect in Daughter Caylee's Disappearance

WESH News is reporting that today, Orange County Sheriff's for the first time they have labeled Casey Anthony a suspect in the disappearance of her daughter, Caylee. OCSO stated there were two reasons why Casey's status changed from a "person of interest" to suspect today. First, the evidence they've received from the FBI indicating there was a "high probability" that little Caylee's body was in the trunk of her mother's car, and second, the many lies she has repeatedly told investigators.

It's about time that OCSO changed her status to suspect. Virtually every thing that has come out of her mouth about her daughter's disappearance has been proven to be a lie. Let's hope that this latest statement by OCSO means that murder charges are not far behind.

Anthony's attorney, Jose Biaz, would not comment beyond saying it didn't matter what the OCSO called her.

Earlier today Anthony entered a written "not guilty" plea on the fraud charges. She will most likely not appear at an arraignment on those charges because of the written plea.

Ever since Casey Anthony has been in and out of jail on various charges, the drama in the street outside her house has been a growing problem for the Sheriff's office, and the peace and quiet of her neighbors. There have been 138 calls from the Anthony family themselves and 158 from the neighbors.

The homeowner association in the Anthony neighborhood has twice tried to get a judge to issue a temporary injunction on the protesters, and move them to an empty lot. Both requests have been unsuccessful. The Anthony's and their attorney, Mark Nejame went so far as to make a plea to the Mayor and several Commissioner's for help in dealing with, ". . .the miscreants, these lawbreakers. . ." as Nejame called them. He went on to say, "I won't dignify them by calling them protesters. They were agitators, and unfortunately and sadly, they just thought it was best for them and their neighbors and their community not to do them at their home anymore."

The Commissioners felt that there was plenty of money in the Sheriff's budget to park an on duty squad car at each end of the street where the Anthony's live at a cost of approximately $4,000 a month. If I was a taxpayer in Orange County, I'd be mighty pissed at this waste of resources. One of the solutions I thought was long past due, the Sheriff's Office finally asked the Anthony family to "move the prayer vigils" from in front of their home to inside their home or their back yard.

Earlier today the Anthony's announced that the prayer vigils would now be held in a local church starting Sunday. Finally forkin' time if you ask me.

CNN Find Caylee Blog

Judge Grants Continuance in Sheley Case

katfish covers the Nicholas Sheley Case!

Today (Friday, September 26th) on my way to the Knox County courthouse in Galesburg, Illinois I noticed that even though it feels like a warm summer day you can see the changes of Autumn starting to take place. IMO there is no place more beautiful during the Fall than the Midwest. Driving the short distance (4miles) from my house to Galesburg there are fields of corn standing tall ready to be harvested and soy bean crops that look like a carpet of lemon-colored coins rolling across the land. Yes folks, this is serious "amber waves of grain" stuff. I'll admit it, I feel a little patriotic about now. LOL

This is my second trip this week to a hearing for Nicholas T. Sheley, a 29 year old Sterling, Il man accused in the deaths of eight people in a two-state killing spree in late June.

In Galesburg, he is charged in the death of Ronald Randall, age 65 of Galesburg. It is alleged that Sheley kidnapped Randall from a car wash, robbed him, bludgeoned him to death and dumped his body behind a grocery-store near a dumpster before stealing his 2007 Chevy pick-up.

There are 7 more victims whose story will be told in a court of law and this blog later on, but for now I want to focus on this case. Sometimes it seems as if victims get lost in the legal shuffle.

I can tell you that "shots of light" of who Ronald Randall was are already starting to "shine" through. His family is in court every hearing and they are usually the first ones there. You can tell he was a good brother and Dad and they are in court for him.

After today's hearing WQAD reporter Chris Minor interviewed 2 men who said they were long time friends of Ronald. They had all worked at the Maytag factory in Galesburg for many years. The men said that Randall had worked well over 30 years at Maytag and had worked until the last day the plant operated (factory moved to Mexico #%*#). You could really sense the pride and love that they felt for Ronald as they spoke.

One last patriotic word before I go into the details of the hearing. As Americans we all have the same constitutional right to a fair trial. Whether he deserves it or not (depends who you ask) Nicholas Sheley will have a fair trial. At hearings on September 11, 19 and 24 and in recent interviews Sheley has requested a speedy trial and expressed his unhappiness with his defense counsel. The judge has heard him loud and clear but until Sheley has been proven fit to stand trial and wave his right to counsel, he will just have to wait like the rest of us. Part of this hearing today is to determine which side will be charged with the delay. Continue reading at katfish ponders. . .

CNN.Crime

Judge Issues Gag Order in Sheley Case!

katfish covers the Nicholas Sheley pretrial hearing.

A little birdy called to let me know that a hearing had been scheduled for accused spree killer, Nicholas Sheley at 2:30 today (Wednesday). [September 24th] Thank you little birdy, I really appreciate the call.

When I arrived at the courthouse, I was informed that the hearing had been moved up to 3:00, then 3:15. I go over some of my notes while waiting....during the arraignment on August 6, Ninth Circuit Judge James Stewart admonished the attorneys for both sides regarding the rules of judicial conduct forbidding counsel from making statements about the case.....he didn't address Sheley that day so that will probably happen today. Everyone is here from both sides but they are in a room off of the courtroom. Must be one of those "secret" meetings that Sheley complained about in his interview. Whatever.

Everyone took their places and Nicholas Sheley was brought in. He looked pretty much the same as he had last hearing, his hair was a little longer and whatever he put on it to make it spike up makes it look darker. Do they allow gel in jail? It was actually 3:45 before the hearing got started.

Judge James Stewart calls court to order and Public Defender James Harrell addresses the court. He says there are some housekeeping that needs done. First, Harrell would like the court to make an official finding that He and Jeremy Karlin are the counsel of record, the issue had been raised but not put on record at the last hearing. Judge Stewart says something like Oh,... you actually want me to say it? Then he says they are counsel of record until a fitness hearing is completed. LOL This judge has a wry sense of humor it appears, at times it's just the way he says something, not what he says. Nothing inappropriate so far...LOL I like that in a judge. Continue reading at katfish ponders. . .