According to the US Attorney's office, they had wire taps which allegedly recorded phone calls wherein, they claim, Blagojevich tried to illegally profit from his sole ability as Governor to appoint a senate replacement.
Immediately after the arrest, there was a firestorm of criticism and demands for the Governor to resign. He refused.
Later, there was talk that the Illinois state legislature would Impeach Blagojevich. Sources told me the Governor sent word to the legislature that if they tried to Impeach him, he would "rat them all out for the things he knows they've done."
No one ever publicly confirmed that threat, but strangely, we haven't seen any effort to impeach Blagojevich, have we? HMMMMMMM.
The Process
In order for law enforcement to arrest someone, one of two things MUST take place:
1) Law Enforcement actually witnesses a crime being committed, OR;
2) A Grand Jury Indicts a person and a Judge issues an Arrest Warrant.
If law enforcement neither witnesses a crime nor has an arrest warrant, they can still arrest someone and hold them on "suspicion" but for only 24 hours under state laws or up to 72 hours under federal laws. After 24 or 72 hours elapses, authorities MUST either charge or release the person. This protection is known as Habeas Corpus and the protection is rooted in our Constitution.
In the Blagojevich case, law enforcement claims to have witnessed (via wiretap) the commission of a crime. They made the arrest. They turned their evidence over to the US attorney and it is now up to that office to obtain an Indictment. Simple enough, right? Straight forward enough, right? Welllllllllll, not so fast. . . . .
Under our system, the government MUST obtain an indictment within a certain, limited period of time. This has to do with the Constitutional requirement which guarantees each American a "speedy and public trial." If an accused person is denied a speedy trial, the courts can, and do, dismiss cases because government violated the Constitutional guarantee of such speedy trials.
If the Indictment doesn't come in a speedy time frame, then the trial cannot come in a speedy time frame and . . . . . . case dismissed for lack of a speedy trial.
Here's where "the fix" has now been put in to make certain Blagojevich walks away scott-free.
The US Attorneys office has requested and has now been granted a 3 month extension to obtain an Indictment.
Chief Judge James Holderman granted the extension Monday, saying the case against Blagojevich is "too complex to expect prosecutors to obtain an indictment by a Jan. 7 deadline." He set an April 7 deadline instead.
Too complex? Who is he kidding? The FBI has a tape recording of the Governor trying to sell the US Senate seat. How complex is that? How hard is that to explain to a Grand Jury? Play the tape, the Grand Jury Indicts, a trial date is set. It's as simple as that.
The truth is, the case is not complex at all and it wouldn't be hard at all to explain it to a grand jury. Any rational person knows this to be true on its face. So what's really going on?
We get a better idea of what's really going on from the Judges additional remarks when he said: "the ends of justice served by the extension, outweigh the best interests of the public and the defendants to a speedy trial." WHOAAAAAAAAAAA!
Justice outweighs the best interests of the public? Since when? Justice outweighs the defendant's speedy trial? Since when? Holy shit! If I hadn't read this with my own eyes from the Chicago Affiliate of FOX NEWS, I wouldn't have believed a judge would have balls enough to say such a thing.
Then, it hit me. The Judge has just guaranteed a violation of Blagojevich right to a speedy trial! Making matters even worse for the prosecution, the Judge openly, publicly announced his absolute DEFIANCE of the Constitution by claiming that some never-defined "ends of justice" somehow, some way, that nobody ever heard of, OUTWEIGHS the "best interests of the public. . . and the defendant!"
That statement is, in and of itself, "reversible error" which adds yet another reason to throw the whole case out. As a result of what this judge just did, I suspect we will watch Blago walk away scott-free.
You have just witnessed the slick, sleazy, in-our-face usurpation of the Constitution and the rule of law. You gotta hand it to these politicians and Judges; when they stick their finger in our eye, they do it in public, for all of us to see.
Looks like the people of Illinois, who have been working with me on our plans for a national "cleansing" of the corruption and filth in the federal government, need to buy more rope. It appears we have yet another federal Judge to add to the list of people who need to "swing."
