Oklahoma Criminal Defense Blog

News stories report that Tiger Woods had a traffic accident backing out of his home in Florida, an estate in Isleworth, outside Orlando.   According to the Florida Highway Patrol accident report, Woods had just pulled out of his driveway when he struck a fire hydrant and then a tree, and Woods said he had cuts, bruising and “right now, I’m a little sore.”

A 911 caller reported an accident in the middle of the night.  “I have a neighbor, he hit the tree.  And we came out here just to see what was going on.  I see him and he’s laying down,” the neighbor reported without naming Tiger Woods.  When the caller was asked by the dispatcher if the “victim” was unconscious, the neighbor stated, “Yes.”  The 911 call goes on with the voice of a woman shouting, “What happened?”  “We’re just trying to get the police here right now, “ the caller says to the woman. “We don’t know what happened.  We’re figuring that out right now.  I’m on the phone with the police right now.”

The Florida Highway Patrol has been asking to interview Woods about the accident.  Woods has just published a statement on his website.  “The situation is my fault, and it’s obviously embarrassing to my family and me.  I’m human and I’m not perfect. I will certainly make sure this doesn’t happen.”

Woods’ statement went on: “Although I understand there is curiosity, the manly false, unfounded and malicious rumors that are currently circulating about my family and me are irresponsible.  The only person responsible for the acccident is me.  My wife, Elin, acted courageously when she saw I was hurt and in trouble she was the first person to help me.  Any other assertion is absolutely false.”  This was published about an hour after Woods’ attorney told the Highway Patrol that for the third straight day Woods would be unavailable to talk to troopers.  Woods said this was a private matter, and he intended to keep it that way.

The Highway Patrol went to Woods’ estate nevertheless. They were met there by Woods’ attorney, who gave then Woods’ driver’s license, registration and insurance as required for such accidents.  The Highway Patrol still does not know where Woods was headed at that time of night, how he lost control of his SUV at such a speed that the air bags did not deploy, and why both rear windows of this Cadillac Escalade were smashed out.  Perhaps the biggest question is if was just a careless mistake, why not speak to state troopers to complete their investigation?

A spokesman for the highway patrol was towed away from the gated community in which Woods lives “for safekeeping.”  Why would the police take Woods’ vehicle from its resting place, which was apparently feet from Woods’ garage?

Besides not wanting to make public what Woods said is a “private matter,” Woods has another reason not to speak to the police about his matter.  Every criminal defense lawyer knows why Woods was well advised to have his lawyer speak for him when the police arrived at his home for a “friendly chat.”  Anything Woods says can and will be used against him in a court of law.  So why should he help the police make a criminal case against him?

Such a case does not have to appear likely.  Certainly, no criminal case appears likely from the sparse facts known.  But who knows how creative the police may become?  Such things have happened before, and that is why Woods’ attorney, informed any interview was optional, exercised the option that excluded any interview.  Why take any other option, why give up one’s Fifth Amendment Rights, just so as to appear one is “not guilty?”

Rumors are circulating that Tiger Woods is seeing some cocktail waitress in New York, and that may be related somehow to this accident.  The waitress is now represented by a Hollywood attorney.  Regardless, if a police interview took place, whatever would be said, would be front page news in 12 hours.  That is another reason Tiger Woods could understandably not want to talk to the police about this accident.  But the first reason is the reason that applies to every citizen who has available Constitutional Rights.

William Jefferson, former Congressman from New Orleans, was sentenced to 13 years in federal prison for using his office to enrich himself and his family.  His sentence was less than the 27 years recommended by the U.S. Attorney.  He was convicted by a jury last August for bribery, racketeering and money laundering.  Some of his schemes involved business ventures in Africa.

Since Jefferson is 62 years old, his sentence could be a life sentence, since there is no parole in the federal prison system, although he could get 15 per cent of his sentence off for good behavior.

Jefferson was convicted after a six-week trial in Alexandria, Virginia. He was found guilty of 11 of 16 counts after he was indicted in June, 2007.  But his indictment followed highly publicized activity in the case.  Jefferson was videotaped by the FBI in July, 2005, receiving $100,000 of $100 bills in a briefcase in Arlington, Virginia.  Captured by a wire on one of the participants, Jefferson allegedly advised an informant to give Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar $500,000 to make sure their business interests obtained contracts for their companies in Nigeria.

A few days later the FBI raided Jefferson’s home in Washington, D.C. and claimed to have found $90,000 of the cash in the freezer in $10,000 increments, wrapped in aluminum foil and stuffed inside frozen-food containers.”  The FBI claimed the serial numbers found on the bills in Jefferson’s home matched serial numbers of the money the FBI had given to their informant.

It was nine months later that the really big raid took place.  FBI agents executed a search warrant on Jefferson’s office in the House of Representatives, the Rayburn House Office Building.  Jefferson was a sitting Congressman at the time, and the FBI raid is believed to be the first time a raid was ever conducted on the office of member of Congress.

The separation of powers implications raised great concerns.  Members of Congress feared the precedent of law enforcement officers raiding legislators’ offices.   If legislators’ offices could be raided whenever agents of the executive branch claimed they were on the trail of criminal evidence, the legislative branch of government could be at the mercy of the executive branch.  These are the kinds of raids Russia’s Premier Putin has conducted to crush the formerly free press and private businessmen who challenged Putin.  These are the kinds of raids governments around the world have used as a pretext to force legislators to follow the command of the executive.

Congressional leaders immediately demanded the FBI return documents seized from the raid of Congressman Jefferson’s House office.  House Speaker Dennis Hastert and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi spoke out together.  Reportedly Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and FBI Director Robert Mueller threatened to quit if the Justice Department had to return the documents.  Meanwhile, the House of Representatives was threatening to axe the Justice Department’s budget.  President Bush ultimately directed the Justice Department to seal all seized evidence for 45 days.

At the time, an ABC News poll in June, 2006 found 86% in the United States supported the FBI’s right to search congressional offices when they obtain a warrant.  This should be no surprise. The public’s support of law enforcement always outweighs support of Constitutional restraints.  At least the poll dealt with a search warrant.

As any criminal defense lawyer will tell you, members of the general public for the most part always will see the justification of unconstitutional actions in the results.  If the police acted without probable cause or a trumped up justification, the public does not often question the action.  There are significant exceptions, but for the most part, the safeguards of the Constitution are not appreciated by the general public when weighed against the value of “getting bad guys.”.

The public wants crimes solved, and the restraints on government placed by the Constitution are seen as speed bumps to be ignored only “a case at a time.”  The “case at a time,” of course, becomes the rule rather than the exception because in every case there is a “good reason” to go ahead with ignoring the restraints, to go ahead and get this guy because “this guy really needs getting” or “this crime really needs solving.”  The Constitution remains on the sidelines from little use until that member of the public or this person has an experience when they are surprised at how easy the rules have made it to convict someone innocent of a crime.

William Jefferson challenged the raid on his office to the District Court of the District of Columbia.  The Court held that the broad protections of the Speech or Debate Clause, which give absolute immunity from prosecution for legislative acts does not shield members of Congress from the execution of valid search warrants.  For those who fear executive overreach, it is noteworthy that search warrants would necessarily require approval from the judicial branch of government.  Oddly, Chief Hogan, who made this finding was the one who had approved the original search.

The decision of the District Court was appealed to a three-judge panel held that Department of Justice could not review Jefferson’s filed until Jefferson had seen what files had been taken from his office and which pertained to his legislative duties.

Thereafter the House of Representatives stripped Jefferson of his committee assignment in the House.  Jefferson was reelected in 2006, but after being indicted in 2007, he lost election in 2008, upset by a Republican in an overwhelmingly Democratic district.  Jefferson went to trial as an ex-Congressman.

An inmate in the Oklahoma County Jail has a good chance of dying.  In 2006, the Oklahoma County jail had a mortality rate higher per 100,000 inmates than Los Angeles County Jail, Cook County Illinois, among many others.  Three inmates have died there this year.  Fourteen inmates died in the jail in 2007 and 2008.

The U.S. Justice Department keeps track of the facilities with which it does business, including the business of housing federal inmates.  There is no federal jail in Oklahoma City, so the Justice Department contracted to place its inmates in the Oklahoma County Jail.  Until last year, that is, when a D.O.J.  report found so many serious deficiencies that the federal inmates were all moved out.  They were sent to the Grady County Jail, which was very happy to be paid the higher per-prisoner rate.

The D.O.J. report found high instances of violence between detainees, lax supervision of inmates, poor suicide prevention, and poor health care.  Any local criminal defense attorney can verify especially the latter: poor health care. Whenever one of my clients with a medical condition has to spend any time in the jail, either pretrial or post-trial, I cringe.  The greater the medical needs of an inmate, the less likely those needs will be met.  Send all the letters you want, communicate on a daily basis with the authorities as needed, it still may not be enough to get the attention of the medical personnel to get the right medication or treatment as needed.

The jail’s spin on all this?  “…[A] natural death is a part of life,” Mark Myers, spokesman of the Oklahoma County sheriff’s office said.  He said this year’s deaths have been from natural causes.  He said the “majority” of deaths from the previous two years have also been from natural causes.  He further said the jail calculates that .01 percent of the 44,000 inmates who come to the jail annually will die while in custody.  Many inmates are in poor health when they come to the jail, he correctly points out.  If it weren’t for the federal government’s study, such a statistical approach might make you think all those deaths were just statistical inevitable.  Are the inmates in Los Angeles or Chicago just that much healthier?

Jail administrator Major Jack Herron said a new company is overseeing the jail’s health care now, and about 10 additional staff and a full-time physician have been added in the last few months for inmate’s health.

My suggestion is that one check back in a year, and one will notice the same problems, and one will hear the same responses from the jail, something like, “we just added a new wing to really improve things, and we just gave most of the walls a nice new coat of pain, etc., etc.” This has been going on for years, so every time the latest study comes out, sudden improvements are announced just in time to respond to the latest criticisms.  Then things return to normal.

In May, 2007, Christopher Beckman died after a struggle with jail guards.  Two Oklahoma County jail guards, Mark Isch and Gavin Littlejohn, were indicted in February for that death.

The three who died this year did, indeed, die of natural causes.  The medical examiner made that determination, not the jail.