Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Mexican Murderer And Rapist To Fry As Bush Spanked By Supreme Court

Justice, at last....even with the current occupant of the White House trying his best to stifle it.

You may remember a piece I did about an amazing assault on US law and sovereignty spearheaded by President Bush. I'm referring of course to the case of ,Jose Medellin, a Mexican national living illegally in the US who was found guilty beyond any reasonable presumption of participating in a particularly hideous kidnap, gang rape and torture murder of two underage girls in Houston, Texas back in 1993, when he was 18 years old.

Jennifer Ertman was only 14, and friend, Elizabeth Pena was only 16 when they were abducted,gang raped and then strangled with their own shoelaces.












Medellin has been gaming the justice system and enjoying himself on death row for longer than the entire life span of one of his victims. This case went to the Supreme Court not over any question about whether he had committed the crime, but over the fact that as a Mexican national, he was not told he could contact the Mexican Consulate for assistance...even though he'd been living illegally in the US since he was nine years old.

Mexico actually sued the United States on behalf of this creature in 2003 over the consular issue in the International Court of Justice at The Hague, and won the case a year later.

In response, President Bush actually announced that the U.S. would comply, and he would order courts in Texas and elsewhere to review the cases of Medellin and about fifty other illegal aliens on death row for murder.

The Texas Courts re-examined Medellin's conviction and confirmed the death sentences, as did the appellate courts.The Texas courts also made the point that Medellin and his attorneys failed to mention or complain at his original trial about any violation of his consular rights and had therefore waived them.

The Bush Administration intervened at that point, actually filing a brief in federal court on behalf of Jose Medellin to overturn his conviction!

When the courts in Texas refused, the Bush Administration had the temerity to take this to the Supreme Court,pushing for a decision that would have subordinated our laws to the whims of U.N. resolutions and regulations, and cut a substantial hole in our country's sovereignty.


Happily, this egregious assault on our liberty and on simple decency failed:

The justices held 6 to 3 that judgments of the International Court of Justice, as the court is formally known, are not binding on U.S. courts and that Bush's 2005 executive order that courts in Texas comply anyway does not change that.

The decision, written by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., was a rebuke to the government in a case that involved the powers of all three branches of government, the intricacies of treaties and the international debate over the death penalty.

It placed the president on the side of Ernesto Medellin, a brutal murderer, and the rulings of the World Court, and against the authority of his home state's courts.


It's beyond grotesque that our president, sworn to uphold the law would try and shove this down our nation's collective throat.

I've disagreed with our president on many things but I always felt that at his core he was an essentially decent man. Shilling for a vicious murderer and rapist who should never have been allowed to pollute our Republic with his presence in the first place goes beyond the pale.

For his part in this foul drama, he deserves to be shunned on the streets by his fellow citizens, and especially by the proud denizens of his native state.

2 comments:

RememberSekhmet said...

This may be along the lines of the Sheinbein case in Israel. The point is not whether or not the men in question were murderous scum. The point is whether a nation is capable of defending its citizens who are abroad.

Much as I'd like to see this guy fry, I won't be surprised if in turn an American accused of crimes abroad is denied contact with the US embassy.

Just playing Devil's Advocate.

Freedom Fighter said...

Hi Remembers...you should read up on some of the horror stories Americans tell of their encounters with Mexican 'justice'...the bribes, the incarcerations incognito until `bail' is paid in cash, the shakedowns by the police..

I assure you, retaliation of the kind you're talking about is the least worry an American has in dealing with the so-called authorities in Mexico.

Another point to consider, and something I've mentioned before in connection with the Palestinians - what kind of society would want someone like Jose Medillin walking around free after what he did?

ff