Betty Freauf -- Bully District Attorney's Gone Wild, Part 2

BULLY DISTRICT ATTORNEYS GONE WILD
PART 2 of 2

By Betty Freauf

August 11, 2007

NewsWithViews.com

Dean Tong, a forensic trial consultant, asked in Part I what brainy legislator sponsored a bill that would put two very young boys in jail for butt whacking? Perhaps readers would like to ask Attorney Kevin Mannix if he is that legislator? In a February 1994 article, Salem, Oregon attorney Kevin Mannix is quoted as saying he wanted to put every felon in prison and pro-life Democrat Mannix sponsored many bills against crime in the 1990s and gained the reputation of a �get tough on crime� state legislator. In addition, he was a plebiscite-writing machine. Voters passed an initiative on 11/8/1994 requiring mandatory sentences for certain felonies and covered persons age 15 and up. It seems as though his �Get Tough On Crime� bills were putting people in jail where there were no victims. More prisons were built. One sits vacant in Multnomah County (Portland), Oregon that was built several years ago to the tune of millions because they do not have the money to operate it. Maybe it is time to dust off an old idea of a former mayor.

Back in the spring of 1982 former Portland Mayor, Frank Ivancie, supposedly as an April Fool�s joke to combat the city�s mounting crime rate suggested putting criminals on public display in the town square in old-fashioned stocks with their crimes noted. These were commonly used in American Colonial days and before the left-wing American Civil Liberties Union (a misnomer) ever ready to defend flag burners, rioters, terrorists, pornographers, perverts, drug pushers, abortionists, Communists, thugs, illegal aliens, prostitutes, spies and imprisoned felons and equally ready to oppose private ownership of firearms, public prayer, public displays of religious symbols, capital punishment, and investigation of subversives and security risks.[1] Unfortunately, many communities in America find it safer to go with the ACLU interpretation of the law than that of the U.S. Supreme Court.[2] Today Portland, Oregon is one of 32 sanctuary cities protecting illegals.

The stock was constructed of wood: standing prisoners� heads and hands were secured in holes by locks � prohibiting escape. With �tongue in cheek� the mayor called for the construction off 50 stocks to be placed in Portland�s soon-to-be built Pioneer Square and to pay for them he recommended each of the stocks be sold and named after the donor as a new fund-raising tool for the square. His idea took off. He had telephone calls � letters- and people coming to him saying, �Something has to be done.� This crime thing is out of control.� �Our revolving door punishment is counter-productive � it encourages crime.� These people were serious. Was anything done about the stocks? No! They chose other alternatives and Portlanders began to put bars over their windows and became prisoners in their own homes.

Necessity has always been the mother of invention and it was then as it is still today. Our humanistic and compassionate methods of punishment have not worked. Many criminals hide their faces because they are ashamed when the TV cameras are on them. I think Ivancie had the right idea. Proverbs 20:28 says, �If a king (mayor/governor/president) is kind, honest and fair, his kingdom (city/state/country) stands secure.� Proverbs 19:25 says, �Punish a mocker and others will learn from his example. Reprove a wise man and he will be the wiser.� In America we have a heart problem and Proverbs 20:30 says punishment that hurts chases evil from the heart.� Please notice: IF the king is kind, honest and fair�

By June 1988 Portland was ranked in a tie for third place for high drug-crimes. About six months later Portland, would you believe, was named to the most livable list and about a month after that, former bartender elected mayor, Bud Clark, declared that date �Condom Awareness Day� so Portland became a �safe sex city.� In April 2005, the Portland city council OK�d pulling out of anti-terrorism team. I predict Portland, Oregon is a catastrophe waiting to happen.

In the case of the alleged victims in this McMinnville case, investigators learned that the girls were saying they were all butt whacked. Cory and his attorney were on Hannity & Colmes on 7/27/2007 (FOX) and Cory said it was like �shaking hands.� He indicated it was a game they played and the teachers were well aware of it. When asked at the end if he learned anything, he said, �Yes, keep my hands to myself� and shared how scared he was. His attorney said it was a case of Zero Tolerance gone crazy. [Read] In today�s legal system, truth is often evasive. The attorney said if the felony charge had not been withdrawn and if they were a little older, the boys were facing 375 months in prison. Is this because of the voter-passed legislation back in November 1994 written about above?

All these �stop crime� initiatives helped Mannix gain much name recognition and media coverage throughout the state. Up until then he was little known outside of his Salem district when he was in the Oregon legislature as a Democrat from 1989-1995. Claiming the Democrat leadership had pushed the party too far to the left in Oregon, in January 1997 the Republican Party welcomed him with open arms and Mannix switched parties. He became the GOP�s �fiscal social conservative� chairman, ran for Governor and was defeated by the Democrat. In May 2001 when President Bush was looking to replace the state�s U.S. Attorney General, Mannix was a candidate and that year he also ran for Attorney General. But this current perennial candidate as early as 1982, who was a hearings referee for Workers Compensation, had his eye on something bigger when he threw an old-fashioned political picnic to get his name put on the November ballot for Marion County Circuit Court judge. Three hundred guests attended.

As I was drafting this article on 8/7/2007, a letter to the editor of our local newspaper was published about Kevin Mannix: MANNIX�S REASONING ON CRIMES FLAWED.

�Back in the early 1990s, Mr. Mannix jumped on the �tough on crime� bandwagon by sponsoring Measure 11, which lengthened prison terms for violent crimes. This was a time when mandatory minimum and lengthened sentences were popular.

�Time has thoroughly discredited this approach to crime fighting. Crime rates did not diminish, but building new prisons became a booming business � one that states found they could not afford.

�Now Mr. Mannix wants to apply the same flawed reasoning to fighting property crimes, which he says is largely driven by drug use, especially methamphetamine. He states that we won�t have a problem housing these new prison inmates because they will go to minimum, security prisons and work camps.

�Oregon already has more than 13,500 inmates in state prisons, leaving few empty cells for property-crime offenders. Once again, the root cause is not being addressed.

�If meth is driving our high property-crime, then let�s go all out to combat meth sale and use. Get the drugs off the street by targeting dealers and manufacturers and those who transport 80 percent of it from superlabs in Mexico. When a meth addict is identified, put that individual through effective treatment to get him off it.�

Signed by Ron Parks, in Independence, Oregon. Regarding Ron�s remark about the superlabs in Mexico, it should be noted that Portland, Oregon � the tail that wags the dog in Oregon politics � has been declared a sanctuary city along with about 32 other major populated cities in the U.S. Sanctuary cities bar police from enforcing immigration laws. Our city police and county sheriffs, working with immigration officials, should be the first line of defense against the current invasion of America not only from Mexico but also from other countries who have people here with expired Visas (i.e. 9/11 attackers)

And now you know the rest of the story as reported from the taped radio interview Dennis Prager had with the two attorneys for the boys as well as a number of newspaper articles. The trial is scheduled for August 20th. Prager asked his listeners to help defray legal expenses for the parents of Cory and Ryan and the last I heard they�d raised $11,000. I hope people reading this story would also consider contributing. This is certainly a story made for Hollywood and by the grace of God there go I. We must all hang together or we could surely find ourselves hanging separately. I called the Wells Fargo bank in McMinnville where a Legal Defense Fund has been established and the young lady who gave me the ACCOUNT NUMBER 8785915359 (UNDER THE NAME OF TRACY MASHBURN) indicated there are two sides to every story suggesting that just maybe these boys aren�t as innocent as we think. I wonder if she�s a mother.

But now the readers have heard both sides of the story with a little extra about Mercer so you be the judge and decide whether you�d like to help these families. The attorneys applied for funds from the state to pay the costs but they were denied. The prosecutors have unlimited taxpayer resources in which to �persecute� these hard working families who are above the �poverty� line so they aren�t eligible for aid. The phone number for Wells Fargo is 503-472-3773. The address is 1335 N.E. Baker St., McMinnville, Oregon 97128.

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And after all the serious reporting above, allow me to finish with a little humor: There ain�t no justice in this here land, the judge gave the kids to my old man but he�s going to be in a real tizzy when he finds out those kids ain�t hizzy.

Sometimes I feel as though I�m living in the twilight zone but then I remember, �Though the mills of God grind slowly, they grind exceedingly small. With patience stands He waiting, with exactness grinds He all."[3] For part 1 click below.

Click here for part -----> 1,

Footnotes:

1, 1/27/2003 New American
2, Book: The War on Christians � 2005 by John Gibson
3, From Retribution

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Betty is a former Oregon Republican party activist having served as state party secretary, county chairman, 5th congressional vice chairman and then elected chairman, and a precinct worker for many years but Betty gave up on the two-party system in 2004 and joined the Constitutional Party.

Betty is a researcher specializing in education, a freelance journalist and a regular contributor to www.NewsWithViews.com

E-Mail: bettyboot@wvi.com

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He indicated it was a game they played and the teachers were well aware of it. When asked at the end if he learned anything, he said, �Yes, keep my hands to myself� and shared how scared he was. His attorney said it was a case of Zero Tolerance gone crazy.