Maybe the deputies in Broward were doing steroids, but that is a lot less of a problem then the one blowing in the Windy City. Those problems would be the revelations today that a series of top DUI enforcement cops have fabricated charges against innocent defendants. Holy Lawsuit!
Dozens of DUI arrests may be dismissed in Chicago because the officer, Joe Parker, who made them has come under suspicion of falsifying them and framing drivers. He's the second cop to be accused of such wrongdoing.
Blues Singer Vanessa Davis may be one of Parker's victims, after Parker stopped her in 2005."He said, 'I smell liquor on you' and I said, 'You couldn't possibly, because I haven't been drinking,'" Davis said, recalling the night she was arrested.
A judge later threw out the DUI and the city paid Davis $100,000 to settle a lawsuit against Parker. Davis suffers from multiple sclerosis, and she said her anxiety from the arrest caused severe medical complications.
Parker faces a federal lawsuit by another man, Wayne Jackson, who said he was stopped by Parker while driving home from work on Lake Shore Drive in 2006. Jackson said he was given a field-sobriety test, which he said he passed. Parker's arrest report said Jackson was swaying and that his speech was slurred.Jackson said he passed a Breathalyzer test.
Now the Cook County State's Attorney's office is reviewing dozens of Parker's cases. Last year, prosecutors dropped more than 50 cases after accusing Chicago officer John Haleas of perjury. He had been honored as one of the top DUI enforces in the state. The perjury case against Haleas is still pending.
It is the criminal justice system, and some days it seems far more criminal than it does just. Lenny Bruce once said 'In the halls of justice, the only justice is in the halls.' One month of blogging and criss crossing the Internet for legal articles, and day after day you witness corrupt judges, dirty cops, rotten lawyers, and a system so taxed at every level you wonder how anything ever functions. You wonder how you spent your life in a world so seedy; how soiled you have inevitably become being part of that process. The scales of justice are blind. They should be. Lady Justice would be frightened if she could see.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment