It's not just me and Firefly anymore...
The Tribune ran a piece today about some local attorneys calling for Justice of the Peace Harris's resignation. I know all of the attorneys interviewed for the story except Theresa Diekhans. I can tell you that Messrs. Hartelius, Thompson, and Blewett are all respected attorneys in this state. I can also tell you that, in my dealings with these three and their firms, I never once have had any inkling of a problem with their integrity or honesty.
There are some other, random thoughts on the Tribune's piece:
I'm sure there's more to come."When the prosecutor [Brant Light] thinks a judge is too harsh on criminals, that's enough said." Told to me by a friend this afternoon when discussing the article.
When is the last time you have heard of the County having to pay damages for something a judge did? I cannot remember any such thing happening before in my entire career.
Judge Harris's Political Glossary: Political Enemy: noun, "anyone who disagrees with Sam Harris" (Apparently a very large group...)
Sam Harris threw a man into jail for a parking ticket. A parking ticket!
Debtor's Prisons are unconstitutional. Judge Harris's interpretation of the contempt statutes to allow him to jail people for civil debts is irrelevant. No statute is superior to the Constitution. No statute can be interpreted to supercede the Constitution.
4 comments:
I was just reading the Trib online and read the article in question, plus the one they did on Steven Fagenstrom.
First I liked the way that Sam Harris ended his statements "My political enemies are trying to tear me down because I hold people accountable,"
Why would Sam's political enemies tear him down because he holds people accountable?
To me this is like saying - butter is made from cream, because bears hibernate in the winter. Basically it makes little to no sense.
I had the honor of being a juror in justice court some time ago. We received our instructions, stood up as JP Harris walked out and we reached our verdict in less than 3 minutes. But we had to wait for JP Harris to return . . . I wonder if he went home to play a game of Gore! Wonder if that would be considered playing a game on his own time?
Mr. Harris, if by chance you read these blogs, I am neither your political enemy, nor have I ever been in trouble with the law, I don't think I've even had a parking ticket. I would classify myself as a very typical person. That said, I believe that you would be doing Cascade County a favor by resigning your position. A couple of us saw your(Sam Harris) billboard ad, and it struck all of us as quite ironic & hypocritical.
About the article on Steven Fagenstrom . . . now that has all the smell of something done by a political enemy.
Anon32 (just for a-fire-fly :)
I thought the Sam Harris quote in the Tribune was telling. He feels picked on because he has held parties "accountable".
What a hypocrite. Sam admits to mistakes-yet we are supposed to overlook those mistakes and re-elect him to another term. Yet- a mistake as minor as a parking ticket brought jail time in his Court. He never “overlooked” any “mistakes” in his Courtroom-yet now we are all supposed to overlook his ”mistakes”.
We are doing nothing more than holding him accountable–and in a much more reasonable fashion than he ever utilized in his Courtroom. We are not asking for jail time for his mistakes–we just want him to go away.......
I realize that I find humor where I shouldn't sometimes. And I may read too much into what people say, since they are often imprecise. However, given Judge Harris' intellect, I have to wonder if he was being ironic, coy, or insensitive, while feigning regret.
After all (and this made me LOL), part of his trouble arose from refusing to marry a deaf couple. Ones who could not wed without a sign language interpreter for the Judge to understand them. So, did he really mean to say that "I should have taken the time to listen to them?"
At least I do appreciate that he recognized that perhaps he could be fallible. He should recognize other problems with his practices, but at least that was a start.
I decided mere comments were not enough on this topic, and posted a full weblog on the subject, at http://mountainfront.blogspot.com/2006/10/everything-interesting-happens-at.html. Now you and Firefly are even less alone on this topic.
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