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Monday's most intriguing people
Judy Clarke
The federal public defender known for handling high-profile cases has been appointed to represent Jared Lee Loughner, the 22-year-old charged with murder and attempted assassination of a member of Congress in the Tucson shootings that killed six and wounded 14, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.
Clarke defended "Unabomber" Ted Kaczynski and assisted in the case of confessed al Qaeda operative Zacarias Moussaoui. Clarke has a private practice but works with the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel, according to National Public Radio.
Luis Posada Carriles
The 82-year-old CIA-trained explosives expert has been accused of some major crimes, including plotting to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro and a series of blasts that killed a tourist in Havana. Posada, an anti-Castro Cuban militant, is now being tried in the U.S. In a trial scheduled to begin Monday in El Paso, Texas, Posada, whom Castro has called "the most dangerous terrorist in the Western Hemisphere," faces 11 counts of lying to officials about how he entered the United States in 2005 and his alleged involvement in attacks on Cuba. He faces five to eight years in prison if convicted.
Alex Villec
The 19-year-old sophomore at Georgetown University has known U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords for years, having worked door to door with her during Giffords' re-election campaign in 2008, according to Time magazine. Villec told Time he was approached by a fidgety young man Saturday at the political meet-and-greet in Tucson where Giffords and 19 others were shot. "I told him, 'She is meeting with a constituent right now, but you are welcome to get in line and wait,' " Villec is quoted as saying. "The eerie thing now is how he dismissed me. As the rest of my words were trailing off, he abruptly turned and left," Villec told Time.
Later, Villec said, "I saw him raise his shooting arm. Then he opened fire."
Zach Parker
The senior at Searsport High School in Maine has drafted a bill that would ban people across the United States from protesting at military funerals, according to CNN affiliate WABI. He presented his proposal, which originated as a school project, at a forum last week, where about 200 former members of the military expressed support. Parker was motivated by the controversial actions of members of Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas.
According to WABI, a representative from the church sent Parker an e-mail that said, in part, "You must be living in a painful Spiderman movie." Parker planned to solicit revisions from the public and send the bill to Maine Sens. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe.
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HOORAY for Zach Parker. you have my 100% support for your bill. i hope it passes. that westboro bunch are all lunatics! every last one of them!
Every citizen of this country has the right to protest, whether you deem the subject matter appropriate or not.
Protest yes.. You are absolutely right; however Protest shall be express respecting the privacy of the grieving families, is absolutely offensive to see an old crow disturbing the most painful moment of a family. I bet he would approved the same treatment to his family..
That guy has no decency.
Good job, Mr Parker. However, I think your bill should not limit the ban to just service members' funerals. To be fair, their are a lot of others that those d-bags from WBC have/will protest at that should also be protected. I think an across-the-board ban on protesting at ANY funeral is more in order. I don't care if it's a military hero (I am retire Air Force with 22 1/2 years of service), a little girl caught in a crazy person's cross-fire, a member of the Senate or even the crazed gunman himself. All of those people have families who loved them, and funerals are for them. The service is an intimate, private time of mourning for mothers who've lost children, wives who've lost husbands, etc. Their should be no protesting by any group at any funeral service....period.
Forgive the typos. I started that last sentence saying something different, starting with "Their" but then re-wrote it and forgot to change the first word to "There." My bad.
Cemetaries, whether public or private, are hallowed ground. Persons not exhibiting proper decorum and respect for the dead and mourners of the dead should be removed. We don't need a law for that.
To greg: you are correct. We have the right to protest and speak our minds. However, doing so at a private event where parents are morning is not the right forum. Going to the Pentegon, maybe dislplaying the images of the fallen (not that I agree wiht that either) is the right place for their message... not that I agree with their message either.
Good for this young man! This is true demacracy at work.
They are planning on protesting at the funeral for the 9 year old girl killed in the Tucson shooting this weekend.
Why didn't this Jared guy shoot one of them instead?
Any protest at any funeral should be illegal. Protest before, protest after, but jeez people don't protest at someone's funeral. For the sake of the mourners at least.
There is only one problem in trying to prevent demonstrations at funerals. What if your son was a soldier, and 2000 people with American Flags wanted to line the route of the procession? Would it be considered protesting? Would they be prevented from showing their apprciation? Demonstration is demonstration. I only hope that when the members of the Westboro Baptist Church hold their funerals that they are shown more pity than they give others. Why is it "Judge Not" only counts if it's not them doing the judging?
Actually, every person is not in fact guaranteed the right to protest if that protest is perceived as hostile and harassing, which is exactly the way in which these people "protest". We are granted the right to "peaceably assemble" not harass people like maniacs!
Greg, What are you protesting. You are going to someone's funeral uninvited and invade their personal tragedy. I don't think that is a right.
@Greg – Yes, everyone has a right to protest. But if I had a son or daughter who died fighting for this country, only to have Westboro come to the funeral and express joy at my kids death, while I was acknowledging their right to protest, I'd probably be blowing their brains out. In fact, I sure wish someone would bomb that church and kill ever last one of those people, AND their children. In fact, it'd be best if the children were put to death first – in front of the parents – adn in a horrific way. I mean, full on torture while the parents watched. THEN we'd see just how committed to Christ these folks really are.
@Greg
Protest and hate speech are two different things. Westboro deliberately pushes their message to extremes for the sheer reason of shock value and counter action. Most would disapprove of their message still, but few (compared to how it currently is) would hear what they have to say if they took conventional routes of displaying what they wish to convey.
To say they have a right to protest the way they do is just as ignorant and dangerous as those saying this shooting was caused by Palin's supposed "list."
I find Fred Phelps and his brood as disgusting and misguided as anyone... but I cannot approve of removing the right to protest at military funerals. I, personally, want to see people protesting his role in the My Lai massacre coverup and getting us into the war in Iraq with his lying to the UN and the American people at Colin Powell's funeral when he eventually dies.
I ask people what do people think about what musilms was killed at fort hood in texas
Im belived that untied state amercian need keep away from musilim and plot terroist and gangster
Huh?
Its OK... calm down and take your pill... easy boy...!!
I believe you need to wrap your brain around a basic understanding of the language spoken before you try to iterate some form of coherent thought
Illiterate? Write for free help!
you sound like an inbred anti-American twit who needs to return to your own country and stay there!
Amen, could not said have better it selfmy.
Watcha you talkn about Willis
Willard sounds like someone who doesn't have a good command of the English language and seems to want to stir up muslim hated.... I'lll bet he is a muslim himself...... ugh
What? Learn our language before you try to say something, then at least try to sound inteligent. Good luck with that, by the way.
@Paul..another spell checker?.Try to replace March's word "iterate" with yours "illiterate". Then read it again and translate or convert it into thoughts. The difficulties of doing so may bring you back to your senses. Go ahead help yourself, GENIUS!
Say thay again, but in English this time.
Um, what does your jibberish mean? I can't decipher an actual statement out of what you wrote...
People of the United States of America and Judy Clarke,
Dear Ms.Clarke.
Please convince your client to plead guilty and spare everyone the pain of a trial.
The state will probably want to try him on this one. They are going to go for the death penalty, there will be no plea deals available to this guy. Ms. Clark will just simply be there to make sure everything is done properly and walk this guy through the process. He'll be convicted and most probably be sentenced to die.
Frank,
I rather doubt he'll be convicted. Everything out about him so far says that an insanity defense is in the making. Locked away for the rest of his life, sure. But not executed.
is it true rumors that Jared Lee Loughner is muslim convert?
Actualy no... he is in the same church as Timothy mcveigh.
He is not Muslim. He is not Mexican. He is not an illegal immigrant. He is not Black. He's just a terrorist - and terrorists come in all shapes, colors, races, religions, backgrounds....you name it.
Other terrorist come from the Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka, Kansas
Church of Sarah Palin!
Nor is he, as the Teabaggers are suggesting in their e-mail chains, a "liberal".
He is a mentally disturbed individual, who was apparently attracted to various white-supremacist / anti-immigration causes. (And I'll note, those causes are actively attempting to disassociate themselves from him.)
something is wrong with our society to produce such monsters, perhaps the young ones should experience life outside and not just in america for a different view.
Our young should not be allowed to watch Fox
I find it hard to blame society as a whole for the actions of one, completely insane individual out of a couple hundred million people that live here. I hear what your saying, if this were happening all over the place I would agree, but this is one guy, a single lost soul who obviously has some very serious problems. Who knows, you could be right, but Im going to keep my faith in our country and future generations.
What is wrong with executing Muslim Terrorists, The go directly to 'paradise with 70 black eyed virgins'. Lest help the ALL get to the promised land as soon as possible. Now THAT is a plan.
How is Fox to blame "busted" ? DId you mother drop you at birth?
You sell your point short when you result to childish things like calling yourself 'Osama Barrack'. You're implying a terrorist connection to the President of the United States while simulatenously making sure that everyone who reads your comment is instantly aware of your ignorance and hatred.
Send him to the gallows. Save us the expenses of a trial and appeals
i undestand your sentiment, but this is not North Korea or Iran. Everybody, even lunatics like this guy, deserves a fair trial.
@adam. You are right of course. Unfortunately, it is Arizona, which is the new Texas vis-a-vis the criminal justice system.
That is the reason the government will clamp on to him first. No death penalty in federal court.By the time Arizona gets their hands on him it might be part of Mexico again.
Judy,
Maternal instincts are for your kids, not monsters. Jared can't be rehabbed and euthanasia is painless, much more humane than locking up a deranged person for life. It also saves tax dollars.
Maternal instincts? Are you suggesting that because she's a woman she has maternal instincts toward this guy? Nice. Welcome to the 1800s. I'm pretty sure she has a backbone of steel and her heart plays no role in this by now.
And 1 bullet is even cheaper.
It is the job of a defender to ensure that their client's rights are observed and the legal system does not "railroad" the defendant. In doing so, it is the job of the defender to point out plausible alternatives for the jury to consider. It is not, strictly speaking, the job of the defender to get their client off at (nearly) all costs. Although it can be easily argued that making such an attempt is the best way to ensure the defender did his/her job to the upmost.
It should never be assumed that a defender, and particularly one assigned to the case, automatically believes their client to be innocent. In most public defense situations, the defender is simply protecting our system of justice which is based on "innocent until proven guilty". A publicly assigned defender should never be accused of condoning the actions their client has ALLEGEDLY (in a pure legal sense) performed. In many instances, the public defender is really defending our legal system from being subverted.
Note that I have attempted to make a clear distinction between publicly assigned defenders, and the high dollar big guns who get paid to get their wealthy white collar clients off at any cost.
yeah he could have had a mind control chip in his head from the cia . lmao
Bravo
Yes its true he's a muslim. They're troublemakers. And Barack obama once said u attack us with a knife we will attack u with a gun. This is his fault
Oh no you are back..!!!
did you take your pill today?
Look at me! I'm on a message board! I can type anything I want to get attention. Look at me! Look at me!
I forget, who did Rep. Giffords attack with a knife again?
'It's true he's a Muslim'? Maybe, since you are privvy to information the cops don't have, you should let them in on it. Call them and show them your proof; they'd be VERY interested, I promise! If on the other hand you're just making it all up then you're only a sad reminder of what has caused this trauma in the first place.
Good luck with your bill, Zach – <3
Why not ban protest at all funerals? Or none at all.
I agree. But military funerals are the only ones i've heard of protesters attending.
The Westboro Baptist miscreants also protested at Elizabeth Edwards' funeral.
Suspect liked to ice cream. This could be a lead as society likes ice cream
Everyone has the right to protest and the right to bear arms. For me, that's quite simple. If the Westboro Baptist loonies exercised their right to protest at my loved one's funeral, I would feel compelled to exercise my right to bear(and use)arms...............There, how easy is that? Fight on Zach!!!!!!
Brad: Obviously, you have been under a rock since at least 10:10 a.m. PDT on Saturday. Could you dial down the stupid 2nd Amendment crap? We know you're tough. Why don't you put your money where your mouth is and sign up for the Marine Corps? The USMC will assist you in building your self-esteem so that you need not embarass yourself with stupid, over-the-top gun drivel.
Good for you, Brad. You keep that gun close to you; you never know when some crazy is going to tear the bars off your windows and come in and get you! Do you have a strong room where you can hole up when the commies come? Yes, this is vitriol - aimed at a social malignancy!
Society ( me) gets the blame again? How about his parents?"Oh no not my little johnny. "
Easy now.
@Steve: I want to slap you