An Open Letter to the Speaker of the Georgia House of Representatives

First, this post is of little or no interest to anyone outside of the State of Georgia, surf on.

Those of you left, politicians are an odd lot. They make their living talking. Pontificating some would say. Our Georgia pols are talkers and pontificators with the best of ‘em and it doesn't matter much to them that what they are talking about is something they brought upon themselves and that they have no authority over.

A couple of years ago a man named Brian Nichols allegedly shot three people in the Fulton County Court House. He still hasn’t been tried. All of the Fulton County Judges recused themselves, as one of the people he is said to have killed was a Fulton County Judge, another was a court reporter, the third was a Sheriff’s Deputy. He is also accused, after escaping the Court House, to have killed a DEA agent he happened upon. A retired “Senior” Judge, from next door DeKalb County, agreed to serve as the trial judge.

Nichols almost assuredly did the crimes he is accused of. But we have that pesky death penalty here in Georgia.

The point of the judicial exercise in which we are engaged, from the viewpoint of the defense is to avoid him being strapped down and injected with a drug cocktail (to be named later as the result of a pending U.S. Supreme Court case); and from the point of the State, to make sure that the trial he gets is bullet-proof, so to speak, so it doesn’t have to be held a second time after the mandatory appeals. The Fulton County District Attorney has sole discretion on what charges are brought; and, he wants him to suffer the death penalty. So that kicks in laws on the proper defense to be afforded a person facing the death penalty, laws passed by the State of Georgia. Without too much detail, that defense has cost something towards $1.5 million so far. The trial judge stopped jury selection a week or so ago, because the State said it hasn’t got any more money; and, it isn’t going to appropriate any more money to defend Nichols. The Judge ordered the state to “show cause” why someone should not be held in contempt for not paying for the defense.

There’s lots more details; but, today The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported that the Georgia Speaker of the House “Glenn Richardson is setting up a special committee to look into whether the judge in the Brian Nichols murder case has abused his office and can be impeached.”

That out of the way:

Dear Mr. Speaker,

I read with interest the AJC article about your intent to investigate Judge Fuller to determine whether he has abused his office and thus may be impeached.

As a first matter, I assume you have at least passing familiarity with the Georgia Constitution. If that is the case, you should be aware that judges in this state are not subject to impeachment. Further, you might be aware that the Legislature has no involvement in the process of the removal of a Judge. In the event that you’ve not familiarized yourself with the relevant passages of our Constitution, I offer the following for your edification:

"CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA

ARTICLE VI. JUDICIAL BRANCH

SECTION VII. SELECTION, TERM, COMPENSATION, AND DISCIPLINE OF JUDGES

Paragraph VI. Judicial Qualifications Commission; power; composition.

The power to discipline, remove, and cause involuntary retirement of judges shall be vested in the Judicial Qualifications Commission. It shall consist of seven members, as follows: (1) Two judges of any court of record, selected by the Supreme Court; (2) Three members of the State Bar of Georgia who shall have been active status members of the state bar for at least ten years and who shall be elected by the board of governors of the state bar; and (3) Two citizens, neither of whom shall be a member of the state bar, who shall be appointed by the Governor."

To my knowledge, neither you nor any of the members of the Legislature that you have appointed to your investigatory committee are members of the aforementioned Judicial Qualifications Committee. That being the case, it seems to me that you are engaging in political grandstanding with no purpose than to draw attention to yourself. I’d also note that your branch of Georgia’s government brought this mess upon itself when, first, it decided that it wanted the death penalty; and, second, it passed the statute that required a person facing the death penalty to have two lawyers paid for by the state. The statute doesn’t say that those lawyers have to work for below market rates. It says they have to be paid for. The Judge gets to determine their pay. If he makes a wrong decision, the Appellate courts kick in, not the Legislature.

And as to that pay, Nichols has four lawyers. One is working for free. One is being paid by Fulton County. That leaves two that the State is paying for. One is paid either $95 or $125 an hour, the other, the lead attorney, is getting the princely sum of $175 an hour. I’m a schlub, run of the mill, civil lawyer, in no way capable of defending a person’s life, and I make more than that. He and I don’t really make that hourly rate. I assume you’ve heard of overhead.

So, you don’t like the fact that the Judge is bending over backwards, at what even I think is a very high cost, to give the guy a fair trial? You have several choices, none of which include investigating him. You can introduce a bill to abolish the death penalty. As you know, the Nichols defense has been angling since the beginning to plead to life without parole sentence. With no death penalty, Nichols would now be sitting in one of Georgia’s several maximum security prisons for the rest of his uncomfortable life, at considerably less cost than that which you are bitching about. You can also introduce a bill that further limits the defense to be afforded a person facing the death penalty. With the current make up of the U.S. Supreme Court, you have a fair shot at it holding that a minimal defense, one less costly than the one mandated by the Georgia State Government that you are part of, is good enough under the U.S. Constitution.

What you shouldn’t be doing is grandstanding. You planning to run for Governor?

Respectfully,

Dave@ratherthanworking.com