Category Archives: crime news

crime news, national news

Trump Fatigue sets in

You may choose to believe or disbelieve what I am about to say, but it’s true … which is that I am getting weary of all things Donald John Trump.

Yes! I want this to end! I want to stop thinking about what this idiot might do next to call attention to himself. I want to get on with serious policy discussions about serious policy differences between serious political leaders.

Trump offers nothing serious or sober to any of this. He offers only drama, chaos, narcissism, threats against democracy.

He is in the middle of multiple legal battles, none of which is likely to end well for him. If he’s convicted, say, of violating the Espionage Act in hiding those documents at his joint in Florida, he’ll fight the prison sentence that awaits him.

People such as me will comment on it, as we must. I don’t want to do it, but I will.

Just to be crystal clear: I do not believe Donald Trump will be elected POTUS. I remain dubious as to whether he will remain in the campaign for the White House.

He will remain on center stage, though, as an ex-POTUS and rabble rouser extraordinaire.

I just want him to vanish. Forever.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Judge to go ‘on trial’?

The relationship between a federal judge and a former U.S. president is far too complicated for my feeble mind to comprehend.

I’ll try to sort it out anyway.

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon is presiding over the pending trial involving Donald Trump’s pilfering of classified documents from the White House. Trump nominated Cannon to her federal judicial seat. That’s one element.

Trump has filed a petition asking that Cannon delay the trial until after the November 2024 presidential election. His filing in the court actually declares that the judge should do his bidding, which by itself isn’t necessarily Earth-shattering. What gives the declaration its heft is that it comes from an ex-POTUS who has been indicted for the first time in history by the very same Justice Department he once took an oath to protect.

OK, what does Judge Cannon do? Does she go along with Trump’s demand for an indefinite postponement? Or does she set a trial date and hold firm?

Cannon is under no specific obligation to do as Trump demands. However, she is a human being who — just like the rest of us — doesn’t like the barrage of criticism she is sure to face if she grants Trump’s demand for a postponement.

Cannon set an Aug. 14 trial date after Trump was indicted. Special counsel Jack Smith asked for a delay until December; Cannon granted that request.

Trump is certain to play the delay game as a ploy to cast doubt on witnesses’ memory. The longer we wait, the foggier those memories become. Smith, on the other hand, is vowing a “speedy trial.”

I want a speedy trial. I do not want Trump to delay this proceeding into oblivion. I also want Judge Cannon to set a firm trial date and stand her ground.

This case has made history already in ways we haven’t yet been able to calculate.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

How about some A/C relief for convicts?

Allow me to stipulate that I am acutely aware that convicted felons serving time in Texas’s vast prison system aren’t exactly a crop of model citizens.

Still, do they deserve to die in prison from heat-related causes? No!

What’s more, the Texas Department of Criminal Justice appears stubbornly to refuse to acknowledge the deaths of inmates — when they involve the oppressive heat — are in fact the result of what we all are feeling at this moment.

Summer in Texas always produces this kind of reporting. The Texas Tribune reports that at least nine TDJ inmates have succumbed from the current heat wave, but that the agency is reluctant to identify heat as the cause of death.

What the hell?

Most of the TDC units have no internal air conditioning. TDCJ officials rely on nature’s remedy to give inmates some relief. The Legislature, which is battling over property tax reform, seems to treat the health of the state’s inmate population as, well … no big deal.

Yeah, it’s a huge deal, man.

Legislators entered this year’s session with a budget surplus of more than $32 billion. Did they peel off some of that money to equip or prison system with A/C units? Hah! Hardly!

This isn’t a matter of “getting tough on crime and those who commit them.” It’s a matter of human decency.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Hits just keep coming for Paxton

Ken Paxton, the impeached Texas attorney general, just can’t stop making “hits” that cause state House of Representatives investigators to keep dancing.

Now the House is examining some potentially dicey real estate purchases Paxton made with his wife, state Sen. Angela Paxton. They total more than $3 million. Paxton’s lawyer said the couple merely was looking into purchasing the property while interest rates were low.

But wait! Is this the kind of thing we can expect from our state’s chief law enforcement officer? Good grief!

He is set to stand trial beginning Sept. 5 in the Senate on allegations that he has abused his office. The House has until early August to determine whether to add to the impeachment articles already on the Senate’s trial agenda.

The Texas Tribune reports: The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that Paxton, his wife and a family trust doled out nearly $3.5 million on six properties from July 2021 to April 2022 in Oklahoma, Florida, Utah and Hawaii. The timing and amount of money drew the attention of House investigators, according to the newspaper.

In late September 2020, several of Paxton’s top aides reported to the FBI that they believed he was misusing his office to help a wealthy campaign donor, Austin real estate investor Nate Paul. Those allegations are tied to most of the 20 articles of impeachment that the House approved last month.

Texas House looking into Ken Paxton real estate buys, report says | The Texas Tribune

If it isn’t securities fraud allegations, or the accusations of bribery and corruption, or reports of doing favors for political donors … it’s this.

This guy is a joke!

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, Donald Trump

I told you so …

As a general rule I am not one to say “I told you so” when matters turn out as I have predicted they would. For one thing, I am so rarely correct, which kind of makes me gun-shy about making such predictions in the first place.

However, when it comes to the presidency of one Donald J. Trump, not only was I correct about what would happen to the office and to democracy, I believe he has done even more damage than I expected.

This individual’s refusal to surrender power peacefully to the man who defeated him in the 2020 election provides all the proof I need to stand on the existential danger this guy presents to the nation.

He is running for the office once again. Trump is the prohibitive favorite to be the Republican nominee in 2024. How that can be is one of the great political mysteries of this age. He was impeached twice, indicted twice for felony crimes and might be facing a prison sentence by the time of the next election.

He is running on a platform of revenge and retribution. Indeed, he has declared to his moronic cultists that “I am your retribution.” This idiot wants to strike back at those who have concluded that he might have committed crimes while taking up space in the Oval Office.

What in the world has become of the rule of law, of putting personal bias and hatred aside, of assuming office (which I pray each day never will happen) without anger?

I stated repeatedly while this guy ran for POTUS in 2016 that his entire professional life was geared toward fluffing up his own brand. He has concept of public service, what it means and how one conducts oneself in the pursuit of the public interest.

To think now that he wants back simply makes me jittery beyond measure. As bad as his term in office was, I only can conjecture that a second Trump term would be worse in ways we cannot calculate.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, local news

This cop is a true hero

The Allen Police Department has released a body-cam video of the tragedy that stunned the nation at the Allen Premium Outlet Mall a few weeks ago.

I watched it last night at the start of the 10 p.m. newscast and was, to put it bluntly, blown away by the heroism that unfolded in the span of about five minutes.

The officer is heard talking to a young woman and her daughter when shots rang out. He instructed them to seek shelter. Then he took off running … toward the gunshots.

He shouted at bystanders to “get out of there!” and kept running. You can hear the sound of gunfire on the video. Then the officer saw the lunatic and fired his weapon, killing him instantly.

He told police headquarters that he believed the shooter was down — and was dead — adding that he didn’t “hear any more gunfire.”

I watched the video and then tried to catch my breath. This is what effective police work looks like.

Of course, the officer couldn’t get to the shooter in time to stop the carnage that took eight lives that day. A Collin County grand jury cleared the officer of any wrongdoing; the grand jury heard the case as a standard practice.

The Allen PD officer doesn’t want his name released. He chooses to keep his ID a secret and no one on Earth could possibly dispute his decision.

I just want to take this opportunity to thank him publicly for demonstrating absolute and unqualified heroism.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news, national news

Will a competent jury be found?

One of the mysteries of this nation’s criminal justice system has to be the selection of competent jury panels to try cases that are on the top of everyone’s mind.

Hence, it is with a significant degree of confidence that I will assert that the federal government will be able to try its case against Donald J. Trump in front of a competent panel of jurors, whether it’s in Florida or New Jersey or in Timbuktu.

The burden for convicting Trump of any of the various crimes he has been charged with committing is high. The Justice Department team led by special counsel Jack Smith has to prove guilt “beyond a reasonable doubt.” The verdict must be unanimous. If a single juror holds out, we have a mistrial on our hands.

The only possible glitch that could occur — as I see it through my untrained, non-lawyer’s eyes — is a juror who is so wedded to Donald Trump that he or she cannot be persuaded to follow the evidence.

Then again … during the jury selection process, it seems unfathomable to me that such a juror would be seated to hear the trial in the first place.

The legal teams have to agree on a panel comprising individuals who truly are neutral, who have no bias, who can hear the evidence as if they are hearing it for the first time … and then deliver a verdict.

That all said, I must declare that I never in a million years could clear the jury selection process. My own bias is so abundantly clear that any lawyer worth a damn would disqualify me the moment I opened my trap.

That leaves the door open to anyone else who might not have read a single thing about Trump’s alleged crime of squirreling classified documents from the White House and blabbing to visitors about having these sensitive papers.

The beauty of our system of criminal justice is that such a jury panel can — and likely will — be found. Yeah, it’s a mystery … which makes it all the more remarkable.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

Prosecutor seeks postponement … good!

If you thought that special counsel Jack Smith was going to railroad a trial through to its conclusion by accepting a judge’s way-too-early court date, well, guess again.

Smith has asked the judge in the case involving Donald Trump and those classified documents to push the trial back to Dec. 14.

You know what it tells me? It tells me that Smith is so confident in the evidence he has gathered that he is willing to wait an extra few months to put his case before the people.

He also is exhibiting an extraordinary level of fairness to Trump and his legal team. There can be no doubt that Smith is playing his strategy out by the book. That he is leaving no room for appeal on any sort of “technicality” that Trump’s team might construe in the event Smith is able to get a conviction on any of the counts on which Donald Trump stands indicted.

As a cheap-seat witness to all of this, I am willing to wait until December to see what the federal government has in its first-ever indictment of a former POTUS.

Let’s allow the judicial process to do its work.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

There’s no ‘there’ to Biden probe

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Republicans in Congress have begun their expected yammering over the plea deal struck by Hunter Biden with the Department of Justice.

Biden, the son of the president, pleaded guilty to tax charges and to illegally purchasing a firearm. He won’t go to jail, assuming that a federal judge approves the agreement.

The GOP caucus in Congress is now alleging that Biden got away with something. I am forced to ask: What precisely did he escape?

Republicans vow to continue their witch hunt against Biden until they find something they can hang around his neck.

Let’s understand something about this whole matter. Republicans have been “investigating” Biden for many years, dating back to before his dad became vice president. Have they found anything on which to file charges? Any criminality discovered?

The answer: No! Nothin’, man.

They will come up with actionable accusations the same way they promised to do so with Hillary Clinton and the alleged crimes she committed while serving as secretary of state.

As Gertrude Stein once said of Oakland, Calif.: There is no “there” there.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

crime news

That’s what I call ‘speedy’

You want Donald J. Trump to go through a “speedy trial” in connection with the document pilfering for which he has been indicted?

U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon said “OK” to one, setting a tentative trial date of Aug. 14 — that’s this coming Aug. 14! — for Trump to seek to fend off allegations that he put our national security at risk by squirreling away classified documents in his mansion as he left the White House.

To be sure, Cannon’s trial date is sure to get pushed back, as both sides likely will want more time to prepare for trial.

But … holy fast-track, Batman! This is what I call speedy in the truest sense of the term.

What makes it so remarkable is that Judge Cannon is seen as a Trump ally, given that the ex-POTUS nominated her to the federal bench. She also had been rebuked sternly by the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals over some rulings she handed down in the handling of those documents right after the FBI seized them.

I have to hand it to Cannon, though, for placing this matter on the fastest track … ever!

I just hope the expected delays won’t keep us from reaching a verdict fairly soon in what looks for all the world like a slam-dunk case compiled by the special counsel and his team.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com