National Roundup

Pennsylvania
Court rules against victims’ rights measure voters supported
HARRISBURG, Pa. (AP) — Pennsylvania’s highest court on Tuesday hammered a final nail into the coffin of a proposed victims’ rights constitutional amendment that has never gone into effect, even though state voters supported it by a large margin in a referendum more than two years ago.

The justices ruled 6-1 that the sprawling proposal violated the Pennsylvania Constitution’s requirement that amendments address a single topic to prevent lawmakers from bundling together items that might not pass on their individual merits.

Unofficial tallies indicate the so-called “Marsy’s Law” amendment question passed by a ratio of 3 to 1 in 2019, but a lower state court put it on hold while litigation played out. A Commonwealth Court judge previously ordered the Department of State to  refrain from certifying those election results.

The amendment would have spelled out 15 rights for victims, including notification about cases and a right to attend and weigh in during plea hearings, sentencings and parole proceedings. It also would have addressed how victims can recover property and given them an ability to reject defense subpoenas.

Jennifer Riley, state director of the national organization advocating for “Marsy’s Law” victims’ rights legislation, said the decision disenfranchises the voters who approved it. The decision was disappointing and the opinion is under review, Riley said.

Reggie Shuford, executive director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania, which represented the voter and state chapter of the League of Women Voters that successfully challenged the referendum, said the Legislature had tried to mislead voters.

“The Legislature attempted to do too much at once, which is prohibited to keep voters from being overwhelmed,” Shuford said. “We are grateful that the court ruled the right way on this important principle.”

Justice Debra Todd wrote in the majority opinion the amendment “was, in actuality, a collection of amendments” that were not sufficiently “interrelated in purpose and function.” She said the proposal would have brought “sweeping and complex changes” to the state’s criminal justice process.

The court majority said it “can easily envision a voter supporting one or more of these rights without approving of all of them,” so voters needed to be able to weigh in on them separately.

“Bail conditions could have been revised without also altering the governor’s pardon power,” Todd wrote. “Likewise, altering the governor’s pardon power does not depend on also altering this court’s authority to promulgate procedural rules for the courts of this commonwealth.”

In a lone dissent, Justice Sallie Mundy said the amendment’s proposed changes were narrowly tailored and had the singular objective of “establishing for victims of crime justice and due process” and did not substantively alter other existing state constitutional provisions.

Washington
Man who joined Capitol melee gets nearly 4 years in prison
 A man who joined a mob in one of the most violent attacks on police during the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol  was sentenced on Monday to nearly four years in prison.

Devlyn Thompson, 28, wrote an apology letter to the officer whom he assaulted during a melee in a tunnel where police battled with dozens of rioters for more than two hours. He also expressed remorse for his actions in a letter to U.S. District Judge Royce Lamberth, who sentenced him to three years and 10 months in prison followed by three years of supervised release.

“The attack on the Capitol that day was an attack on the very rule of law in our country,” Lamberth said.

Justice Department prosecutors recommended a four-year prison sentence for Thompson, a longtime resident of Washington state who moved to Georgia approximately six months before the riot.

Defense attorney Elizabeth Kelley requested a one-year prison sentence for Thompson. He has autism spectrum disorder and “functions in many ways as a young child,” Kelley wrote in a court filing. She said Thompson’s condition influenced his behavior on Jan. 6 and distorted his understanding of what happened that day.

“Autism is not and should not be an excuse for bad behavior, but rather, it should be considered when a person’s individual culpability and degree of social understanding is called into question,” she wrote.

The judge also said autism isn’t an excuse for assaulting a police officer. He noted that Thompson had a job that paid him $90,000 a year before the riot.

Thompson has been jailed since he pleaded guilty in August to assaulting a police officer with a dangerous weapon, a metal baton. The charge carries a maximum of 20 years imprisonment, but sentencing guidelines for Thompson’s case recommended a prison sentence ranging from 46 to 57 months.

Prosecutors say one of the most violent confrontations on Jan. 6 was in the tunnel, where a mob and police fought for control of a Capitol entrance in an area known as the Lower West Terrace. Surveillance video captured Thompson with more than 190 other rioters in the tunnel. He struck a police officer’s hand with a baton that he found in the tunnel. Others assaulted police with poles, sticks and other makeshift weapons.

Metropolitan Police Officer Michael Fanone told a congressional committee in July that the fight in the tunnel was “nothing short of brutal.” He was pulled into the mob, beaten and repeatedly shocked with a stun gun.

“I observed approximately 30 police officers standing shoulder to shoulder, maybe four or five abreast, using the weight of their bodies to hold back the onslaught of violent attackers. Many of these officers were injured, bleeding and fatigued, but they continued to hold the line,” Fanone testified.

Before he assaulted the officer, Thompson helped the mob take riot shields from officers and brought them forward for other rioters to use against police, according to prosecutors. He also joined the mob in pushing together against the front line of officers and threw a large audio speaker that struck another rioter in the head, drawing blood, prosecutors said.

Thompson’s actions on Jan. 6 “show an absolute disregard for the rule of law coupled with a willingness to incite and engage in violence,” prosecutors wrote in a court filing.

Thompson, who worked for a rental property management company, drove to Washington, D.C., from Atlanta. He didn’t enter the Capitol before he left.

In his apology letter to the officer, Thompson said he is still trying to understand his “inexcusable” behavior on Jan. 6.

“You deserve to be treated with respect and I didn’t show you any with my actions that day,” Thompson wrote.

Thompson is the third rioter to be sentenced for assaulting police at the Capitol. The other two, Robert Palmer and Scott Fairlamb, were sentenced to prison terms of 63 months and 41 months, respectively.

More than 700 people have been charged with federal crimes related to the riot. Over 150 of them have pleaded guilty, mostly to misdemeanor offenses punishable by a maximum of six months imprisonment. Nearly 70 defendants have been sentenced.