Demonstration of support on Capitol steps imminent!
There will be bullhorns!
We do not know if poor old Hannah Dugan will be bunking with Ghislaine, but we are guessing that Rachel Maddow’s producers are booking the disgraced Milwaukee circuit court judge for a worshipful chin wag on primetime TV.
Hannah (but not her sisters) will be feted as a modern-day Rosa Parks, a Sojourner Judge. Problem is, instead of helping a runaway slave escape to freedom, as the good people of Milwaukee did in 1854, Judge Dugan helped a twice-over criminal evade justice through her own, personal underground stairway.
If you’re gonna risk your career, at least choose a sympathetic victim!
Eduardo Flores-Ruiz is a woman beater, a domestic abuser. That’s why he was due in court that day in front of the injudicious judge — after having already been once deported and re-entering the country, again illegally. Say what one will about Trump’s deportation program, slippery characters like Eduardo are what defeated Joe Biden/Kamala Harris.
Like most partisan Democrats
Judge Dugan’s sympathies lay with the criminal. She went out into the hallway in her official judicial robes, gulled a fellow judge to join her in bolstering the intended intimidation, falsely told immigration agents their warrant was no good, then directed them to the chief judge’s office. With the coast (so to speak) now clear, she returned to her courtroom and moved up the illegal immigrant’s case to the top of the docket. With his victims in the courtroom expecting justice, Judge Dugan nixed the hearing and directed the criminal and his public defender out the secret back entrance. Unfamiliar with that exit, the criminal and his attorney failed to notice the private stairway and re-emerged into the hallway. All facts entered into evidence.
“Don’t worry,” the wayward judge told her clerk, “I’ll take the heat.” A clear admission that the judge knew she was breaking the law.
Dugan’s refusal to testify on her own behalf could not have helped. (Why add perjury?) More damning was the testimony of her fellow judge. Convincingly, a jury in blue Milwaukee convicted Judge Dugan of felony obstruction despite a high-powered defense team in a case presided over by a former Democrat(ic) state senator.
Intimidated into obeying the law
Given that Blaska is prone to blogging, we must find some outrage in this affair, even though justice was ultimately served. And there it is: our casus belli, in the personage of Howard Schweber, political scientist and law professor at the University of Wisconsin.
“The case is a shot across the bow to state judges everywhere meant to intimidate them. It is unthinkable that this prosecution would have been brought in a prior administration. … I have never seen anything like it. And professionally it’s quite shocking.” — Howard Schweber
Blaska’s Bottom Line: We’ll tell you what’s shocking: that this man teaches lawyers.
11 responses to “Obstruct not, lest ye be judged”
This would make a great sit-com !
The split verdict is very curious. She was found not guilty of the misdemeanor charge of “concealing an individual to prevent his discovery and arrest.” Considering the scope of her conduct that day, the only action she took that could have been construed as “concealment” was letting Flores-Ruiz out of the courtroom via the jury door. So if she was found not to have “concealed” him from law enforcement, then it seems that her action vis-a-vis the jury door would not have factored into the guilty verdict for “obstructing or impeding a proceeding before a department or agency of the United States.” I wonder if this means the jury decided that her obstructive behavior was solely confronting the agents in the hallway and telling them to go to the Chief Judge’s office to check the validity of the warrant?
A poor cause for appeal, nonetheless. At least Judge Adelman didn’t secret her out the side door.
After reading and seeing the testimony and videos it blows my mind that there’s any ambiguity in this case. Mr. Schweber needs a reality check.
You’re shocked to hear that someone like Howie teaches lawyers? Really? UW-Madison’s faculty is chock full of Howies who teach not only in the Law School but in every other department. It’s likely that in some departments (e.g., political science, sociology, history, education) students are taught solely by clones of Howie.
When Hannah confidently declared she’d take the heat for her illegal actions, she not only admitted to breaking the law, she assumed she’d never be held to account. Pride goeth before a fall. Pride also deserveth the harshest of punishments, though something tells me she get a very mild slap on the wrist. Meanwhile, expect the UW Law School to establish the Hannah Dugan Distinguished Chair of Jurisprudence.
Justice served; Must find outrage. bullhorns, demonstration imminent. All we need now is Bondi and a ranting Dementia Don.
In the future everyone will be a convicted felon for 15 minutes.
This is one for the Innocent Project, Steven Avery’s defense team.
If the current DOJ prosecutes, everyone walks. Bumbling fools that they are. That slip and fall idiot from Virginia can’t even use spellcheck.
Followed by a fawning documentary declaring her innocence. Where’s Rob Reiner now that we really need him?
Remember the saying “No One Is Above The Law”