Turley Unloads Following Sentencing
I was a bit surprised at law prof Jonathan Turley’s restraint preceding the sentencing of Trump, today. He had made his views on the lawfare against Trump abundantly clear over a matter of years, but seemed a bit, well, restrained going into today.
However, with sentencing over he unloaded in a must read article, for those who followed this travesty. Some highlights:
With the Trump Sentencing, the Verdict is in . . . for the New York Legal System
Jonathan Turley ^ | January 10, 2025 | Jonathan TurleyBelow is my column at Fox.com on the sentencing of President-Elect Donald Trump. The conviction should be overturned on appeal. However, the most lasting judgment will be against the New York court system itself in allowing this travesty of justice to occur.
Here is the column:
… Merchan has brought down the gavel on the New York legal system as a whole.
Once considered the premier legal system in the country, figures like New York Attorney General Letitia James, Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, Justices Arthur F. Engoron and Juan Merchan have caused the system to be weaponized for political purposes. Trump will walk away from this trial and into the White House in less than two weeks, but the New York system will walk into infamy after this day.
The case has long been denounced by objective legal observers, including intense Trump critics, as a legal absurdity. Even CNN’s senior legal analyst Elie Honig denounced the case as legally flawed and unprecedented while Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., simply called it total “b—s–t.”
It is a case based on a non-crime. Bragg took a long-dead misdemeanor and zapped it back into life with a novel and unfounded theory. By using federal violations that were never charged, let alone tried, Bragg turned a misdemeanor into dozens of felonies and essentially tried Trump for federal offenses.
Merchan not only allowed those charges to be brought to trial but then added layers of reversible errors in the effort to bag Trump at any cost. For that, he was lionized by the liberal media and many New Yorkers. However, Trump still managed to pull in 3.6 million New York votes, or 42.7%, in the 2024 election. …
…
Many polls showed that the public saw the Manhattan criminal case for what it was: raw lawfare targeting a leading political opponent. The election itself felt like the largest verdict in history as citizens rejected the political, legal, and media establishments in one of our nation’s most historic elections.
…
… With this appeal, this peddler’s wagon of reversible errors will finally pull up in front of the Supreme Court itself.
That was also a nice bouquet Turley tossed in Trump’s direction for his comeback to the White House: “the largest verdict in history as citizens rejected the political, legal, and media establishments in one of our nation’s most historic elections.”
The very fact that this legal circus was allowed to continue unchallenged and unchecked speaks volumes about the state of the “legal” system in this country.
Even the Robert’s Court punted because of a lack of fortitude and a fear of appearing “political”. I’d like to remind the Justices that when good men do nothing evil will surely triumph! From a citizens perspective, I have to say that a display of courage, and damn the fallout, would be a welcome and refreshing change from the moral posturing that currently passes for legal and political valor leaves me with nothing but contempt for the High Court.
I’m fully convinced that the Robert’s court rendering of Patrick Henry’s “give me liberty or give me death” declaration would have been more along the lines of
“give me liberty, or, hey maybe we can work something out”. I mean after all, that death part seems awfully political and divisive.
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'Twas a time when New York was the Leading Court of Precedent
Not Just Nationwide but Worldwide Considered the Top Jurists
Valued Rulings
1st go to for Legal Research - What did NY Court of Appeals have to say ?
While They still maintain their world wide ranking and While I am not sure if Hochul or Schumer realizes it
I am pretty sure the Justices do
It's a shameful humiliation and perhaps a large step down that slippery slope of lost esteem
Political Ambition meant Millions of dollars and resources and time wasted when civil and criminal victims suffered and could not be heard or have to wait years to be heard due to an overwhelmed and underfunded docket among other reasons.
There is an embarrasing appearance that Everyone involved wanted to be a hero prosecuting Trump so if Biden won re election they could cash in their chips.
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