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From the Police Blotter: I Got Nothing
Five adults involved in the New Mexico compound arrest have been granted a signature bond release by a New Mexico judge. This means that they do not have put any money up front to walk out of jail unless they fail to appear for trial.
Backus said that New Mexico state prosecutors were unable to show that the five defendants should have their bail denied because they posed a threat to the community. Backus said that the defendants will be required to wear GPS tracking devices through the duration of their court case.
“The state alleges there was a big plan afoot but the state has not shown to my satisfaction by clear and convincing evidence what in fact that plan was,” Backus said at Monday’s hearing, according to CNN.
“The state wants me to make a leap and it’s a large leap and that would be to hold people in jail without bond based on — again — troubling facts but I didn’t hear any choate plan that was being alleged by the state.”
They disappeared once, and a GPS bracelet is virtually worthless in preventing someone from fleeing.
The four-year-old son of the younger Siraj Wahhaj was found buried near the compound. Prosecutors say that the boy, Abdul-Ghani Wahhaj, died during an exorcism ritual conducted by his father.
Abdul-Ghanni had been reported missing from his home in George in December. Wahhaj has not been charged in his son’s death.
As far as I know a death that results from a home exorcism ritual is not protected by the First Amendment. The State also believes that they were training the surviving children to act as school shooters. It is true that the State must prove the case at trial, but we have one dead child, and a disappearing act. I would consider them a flight risk. I suppose we all have to hope that they don’t see martyrdom as an option while awaiting trial. Martyrdom would save each of them $20,000.
Published in Policing
They’re just going to walk out, cut off their tracking devices, and disappear, aren’t they?
Seems to me that’d save us all a bunch of trouble.
They disappeared for awhile once before.
Yes.
Unless they rent a van and decide to drive down a sidewalk.
That, or the cops will be able to track them right up until they decide to hold an impromptu Grand Prix on the sidewalks of Albuquerque.
Which would all be on Judge Sarah Backus, then. Elected position, or appointed?
Depends on how many they take with them to the afterlife while trying to become a martyr superstar.
Well, yeah. I didn’t think about that.
Doesn’t matter, in her world her intentions where good and she virtue signaled accordingly.
District judges are appointed by the governor and then have to be relected to retain their position after their term is over. She was initially appointed in 2011 by Susana Martinez, and has apparently “grown” in office.
No one here is happy about this. All the comments on the ABQ Journal website are universally opposed to this decision, whereas the normal comments skew very left.
From Wikipedia:
Sarah Backus is a district court judge in the Eighth Judicial District of New Mexico. She was appointed to the court by Governor Susana Martinez on June 17, 2011, and elected in 2012.[2] She was retained in 2014 for a term that expires on December 31, 2020.[3]
I once gave a statement for a longer sentence than was agreed to (plea bargain) by prosecution and defense against a defendant in a Federal Court case. In my statement I suggested that the defendant was a recalcitrant criminal. I said to the judge, as soon as they were released the defendant would resume their criminal behavior and would destroy even more lives than they had already. I said, Judge, your honor, you have a heavy burden to bear. If you allow this deal the defendant will be young enough upon their release to commit more crimes. If they do, it will be on you. It was a Federal case, so there is no parole. The judge shook his head in agreement with me and doubled the sentence. Plea bargains are not a guarantee. The judge can over rule, but your already expressed guilty plea stands.
This judge will bear the onus of despair caused by any of these vile individuals should they cause any further harm to society.
You mean, possibly not be elected again, and will have to console herself with her excellent retirement benefits?
So sad.
When you put it like that…
What is wrong with the Left? They are so blinded by their ideology they are stupid.
New Mexico district court judicial terms are six years, so she’s got until November 2020 for people to forget about this and re-elect her. She’d be in a ton of trouble if she only had a four-year term right now.
They FTA’d or jumped bail before? When / where was that? In NM?
I would like to know something about the case the State made re: the flight risk, etc. I hope the State didn’t assume that the bail hearing would go their way. It sure sounds to me like there was plenty basis, but I would like to have some assurance that the prosecution did their job. (This is part of not trusting the MSM in anything.)
Blind, deaf and certainly dumb.
The father of the boy that died at the compound was not granted bail according to the latest article due to the fact that the State of Georgia issued a warrant for his arrest for taking his son out of the state. I find it hard to believe the other five weren’t aware of this fact. My concern would be they went off the grid in December, and weren’t located again until late July, or August, and would be capable of doing that again.
And in other news, the Antifa professor who was caught on camera committing vicious assaults with a deadly weapon on multiple people peacefully protesting just received three years of probation.
I would think that this is a national security issue and the feds should be able to pick up and hold these terrorists despite any leniency and freedom they’ve been granted by a court in New Mexico. Considering there is compelling and credible evidence (despite what the judge determined) that these children were being trained to carry out terrorist acts, it appears the adult suspects pose an immediate threat to the public and that there is an extremely high degree of a potentially lethal and catastrophic attack. A national security threat should trump any local court decision. It would be interesting to get a legal opinion on this from John Yoo (@johnyoo).
Certainly if getting on a plane is one, then holing up and teaching your kids to shoot up schools is one.
Well, that’s something. What I’m really looking for is evidence that we’re dealing with a politically stupefied judge (not that that’s good), or a politically corrupted prosecutor’s office. I don’t know which I fear more.
After asking my best friend (who’s a lefty) about this story on Monday he said, “I haven’t heard anything about this. It’d be a big story if true. Sounds like fake news to me.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NNOrp_83RU
Says it all.