Kerry Supporters Gone Wild

[NewXD40fun]

Men Get Jail Time In Milwaukee Tire-Slashing Case


(AP) MILWAUKEE A judge admonished a congresswoman's son and three other Democratic campaign workers for interfering with voters' civil rights as he sentenced them to jail Wednesday for puncturing the tires of some Republican vans on Election Day 2004.

Judge Michael B. Brennan exceeded the recommendation of prosecutors in sentencing the four men to jail time ranging from four to six months for misdemeanor property damage.

"Voter suppression has no place in our country," Brennan told the defendants in Milwaukee County Circuit Court. "Your crime took away that right to vote for some citizens."

The Republican Party wanted to use the vans to transport voters to the polls during the presidential election.

The men, including the son of U.S Rep. Gwen Moore, D-Milwaukee, had pleaded no contest in January to misdemeanor property damage in a plea agreement with prosecutors who recommended no jail time.

Brennan told Moore's 26-year-old son, Sowande A. Omokunde, he was impressed by his expression of remorse and gave him the lightest sentence of four months in jail.

The judge cited prior criminal records when sentencing Michael Pratt, the son of former acting Milwaukee Mayor Marvin Pratt, and Lewis Caldwell to six months in jail.

Pratt, 33, was convicted of hazing in Walworth County in 1995 when he was a student at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater. Caldwell, 29, was convicted of causing injury when driving while intoxicated in 1999.

Lavelle Mohammad, a 36-year-old father of four, was given five months in jail. All four men were granted work-release privileges and were each ordered to pay $1,000 in fines. The defendants also paid $5,320 in total restitution for the damage to the 25 GOP vans.

The defendants were originally charged with felony property damage but accepted plea deals on the lesser charge as jurors deliberated following an eight-day trial in January. The jury found a fifth worker who did not accept the plea deal not guilty.

The four men each faced a maximum nine-month jail term and a fine of $10,000 on the misdemeanor.

The state Republican Party had rented more than 100 vehicles that were parked in a lot next to a Bush-Cheney campaign office to transport voters and poll monitors on Nov. 2, 2004. The vandalism caused some delays in the GOP's Election Day work as party workers rounded up other vehicles. Democrat John Kerry won Wisconsin's 10 electoral votes in a close race.

Brennan told the four that "partisanship is not an excuse for breaking the law."

State Republican Party Executive Director Rick Wiley argued for more than probation during the sentencing hearing.

"This was a crime that warrants more punishment than what the plea agreement spells out," Wiley told the judge. After sentencing, Wiley said the jail sentences should deter people from similar crimes.

Moore, who was in the courtroom for her son's trial, commented only briefly when leaving the courthouse.

"I love my son very much. I'm very proud of him. He's accepted responsibility," she said.

The attorneys for the four defendants chronicled their clients' acts of kindness and volunteer efforts when arguing for leniency.

Rodney Cubbie, Pratt's attorney, talked about his client's social work in the foster care system and his desire to earn a second master's degree in order to teach. Cubbie argued for a fine and community service.

Omokunde told the judge that no one has the right to commit a crime in heat of a political battle.

"Your honor, I crossed the line," he said.

Gretchen Ehlke

http://wfrv.com/topstories/local_sto...ml?s=wisconsin




I hear that the Democrats are recruiting illegal aliens to do their dirty work this November...



Tom

[retired]

Where did you hear that Tom; do you have a source about the recruitment. I'm only asking like you do when someone makes a statement. Do you have an answer.

BTW, they should have each received the 9 month sentence and $10K fine as far as I'm concerned for what they did. Thanks for posting it.

[beardman2]

I agree. Messing with voting by either should be punished harshly.

[NewXD40fun]

Originally Posted by retired

Where did you hear that Tom; do you have a source about the recruitment. I'm only asking like you do when someone makes a statement. Do you have an answer.

BTW, they should have each received the 9 month sentence and $10K fine as far as I'm concerned for what they did. Thanks for posting it.

I meant that alien reference as a joke, hence the


Tom

[Mark S.]

I wonder if NewXD has any comment on this one:

2002 N.H. Scandal Shadows GOP Anew

By Thomas B. Edsall and David A Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, April 14, 2006; A06

A three-year-old political scandal in New Hampshire -- where Republican operatives conspired to jam Democratic get-out-the-vote phone lines on Election Day 2002 -- has suddenly become a national headache for GOP leaders, who are being pressed to explain why one author of the scheme was repeatedly calling the White House.

A Democratic activist group, combing through evidence from a trial last year in which the former New England regional director of the Republican National Committee was convicted, uncovered 22 calls from New Hampshire officials to the White House political office on Nov. 5-6, 2002. During the same time, according to prosecutors, state GOP officials started -- and then frantically sought to stop -- a plan to have a telemarketer bombard the phone banks of Democrats and a local firefighters association that was offering voters rides to the polls.

The nuisance calls were blamed for paralyzing part of the Democratic operation during the first hours of a close-fought Senate race that Republican John E. Sununu eventually won against then-Gov. Jeanne Shaheen (D). With the revelation of the calls, a state-level scandal has become a national issue, and a top political hand to President Bush has been pressed for answers.

Ken Mehlman, former director of the White House political office and current chairman of the Republican National Committee is fighting Democratic efforts to force him to testify under oath in a civil suit about the New Hampshire scandal. Mehlman said the calls from James Tobin -- a consultant who in 2002 led the RNC's New England effort -- were for the White House to get the latest information about a close race, which would be unexceptional on election night. He said none of the calls to him or his staff involved the phone-jamming operation.

While under no legal obligation to do so, the RNC has paid more than $2.5 million in legal fees incurred by Tobin, who in 2004 was the New England director for the Bush-Cheney campaign.

In an interview on CNN, Mehlman said the decision to pay Tobin's legal fees was made "before I was chairman -- that in this case that was going to happen based on assurances he made." Mehlman stood by the continuing payments under his chairmanship, saying "it was right to honor that decision."

The court documents describing the calls were only discovered recently by researchers at the Senate Majority Project, a Democratic group based in Washington. In addition to Tobin, two GOP operatives pleaded guilty in the case.

There are no public documents or public sworn testimony concerning the matters that were discussed in the phone calls. "They started calling the White House about 11 a.m., and didn't stop until 2 a.m.," said Christy Setzer, a Senate Majority Project spokeswoman.

Paul Twomey, of Epsom, N.H., an attorney for the Democratic Party in its civil lawsuit, said that he wants to question Mehlman and Davis to determine if the calls dealt with the phone-jamming scheme.

"You have somebody who's committing a felony, and he's calling [the White House] during the planning, the execution and when it's falling apart," Twomey said, adding that he will request records listing what outgoing calls were made from the White House during the same time. Twomey told New Hampshire reporters that the RNC's coverage of the legal fees "raises questions of who they were protecting, how high does this go and who was in on this."

Yesterday, White House spokesman Ken Lisaius declined to comment on the suit, saying "we don't comment about ongoing legal proceedings." Bryan Sierra, a spokesman for the Justice Department, which prosecuted Tobin, said, "The investigation was thorough." Sierra appeared to accept Mehlman's argument, saying that "it would not be unusual for the director of a particular region of the country to be in communication with officials of the Republican Party" on Election Day.

Kathy Sullivan, chairman of the New Hampshire Democratic Party, said she is unwilling to accept Mehlman's assurances. She cited a sequence of events as the phone-jamming case unfolded starting in February 2003, in which Republican officials repeatedly changed their version of events as new evidence emerged.