Speaking of Judges:
I recently saw a one hour television show about serial killer Larry Eyler.
There is a lot online, just search on that name.
He was pulled over for a routine traffic stop,
and the officer recognized the name as a suspect,
so they searched his truck and found evidence of the murders.
Due to a techicality, a judge threw all that evidence out and
set Larry Eyler free, after which he killed Danny Bridges.
Both the Judge and the lawmakers are guilty of the
murder of Danny Bridges. Eyler should have been in jail.
Judge: from Websters II office Edition, New Riverside Dictionary 1984
"To decide authoritatively after deliberation"
"A public official authorized to decide cases brought before a court."
I see three components to the U.S. 'justice' system;
the lawmakers, the judges and the police.
The lawmakers are clearly the biggest part of the problem.
Long ago, when the laws were not so detailed, the judges were
supposed to rule based upon the 'intent' of the law,
but they abused the privelege,
so lawmakers wrote more detailed laws
so that the judges could not screw it up;
this actually made things worse.
The police are the best part of the 'justice' system;
they are human and make mistakes, but overall,
they do far better than either the lawmakers or judges.
Judges should judge based on the INTENT of the law,
not on the LETTER of the law,
which is often badly written, changed, or wrong.
It was not the INTENT of the law to free Larry Eyler to continue killing people !
New York City Immigration Judges ranked
by Asylum Denial Rates for Chinese
FY 2000 - FY 2005
Number
of cases Percent
Name of Judge Decided Denied
William F. Jankun 421 94.5 1
Sandy K. Hom 785 93.2 2
John Opaciuch 666 91.0 3
Paul L. Johnston 299 86.0 4
William C. Peterson 270 81.9 5
Barbara A. Nelson 719 79.8 6
Adam Opaciuch 966 79.7 7
Joseph Russelburg 204 78.9 8
Gabriel C. Videla 548 74.1 9
Roxanne C. Hladylowycz 1,059 72.4 10
Paul A. Defonzo 701 66.6 11
Miriam K. Mills 337 57.6 12
Jeffrey S. Chase 383 54.3 13
Noel A. Ferris 369 54.2 14
Joanna M. Bukszpan 597 51.9 15
Victoria L. Ghartey 523 51.4 16
Philip L. Morace 1,065 49.4 17
Robert D. Weisel 794 47.9 18
Charles M. Honeyman 148 45.9 19
Helen J. Sichel 624 45.4 20
Douglas B. Schoppert 955 41.9 21
Theresa Holmes-Simmons 824 40.3 22
Sarah M. Burr 876 40.2 23
Matthew T. Adrian 202 38.1 24
Elizabeth A. Lamb 802 34.4 25
Bridgette Laforest 940 32.1 26
George T. Chew 958 29.0 27
Noel A. Brennan 133 27.1 28
Patricia A. Rohan 973 25.2 29
Annette S. Elstein 837 24.9 30
VivienneEGordon-Uruakpa 376 21.8 31
William Van Wyke 335 19.1 32
Terry A. Bain 896 11.8 33
Margaret McManus 929 6.9 34
*Analysis covers judges who made at least 100 decisions
"on the merits" for Chinese asylum seekers represented by an attorney.
Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse, Syracuse University
Copyright 2006
Long ago, there was very little law, and judges became the law.
But as many judges abused their authority,
law makers made more and more laws
to try to curtail the abuses of the judges.
Unfortunately, many of the laws are bad and now even a decent
judge has his hands tied by the law and cannot do the proper thing.