Pundit Country

I’m almost tempted to make a joke about this considering Bruce’s side gig, but this is obviously a disturbed individual who has listened to so much right-wing radio and television that he’s now seeing enemies everywhere.

This also illustrates why it’s important for more consistent, legitimate pushback against the fact-free stories that getting foisted on the public and contaminate the discourse. There are still far too many people who treat the likes of Beck, Limbaugh, O’Reilly, et al as actual journalists rather than propagandists and apologists for authoritarianism.

TAMPA — A Marine reservist armed with a tire iron beat and chased a man he thought was an Arab terrorist and even called 911 to say he was detaining the man, police said.

But the man he assaulted was actually a Greek Orthodox priest visiting from overseas who spoke limited English, police said.

That’s why police arrested reservist Jasen D. Bruce on a charge of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon.

Police said they’re also investigating whether Bruce, 28, committed a hate crime.

The incident took place around 6:35 p.m. Monday, police said. The priest, Alexios Marakis, 29, is from Crete, Greece. He is visiting St. Nicholas Greek Cathedral at 17 E Tarpon Ave. but police said he was in the Westshore area to bless another retired Greek priest.

But Marakis apparently got lost and exited northbound Interstate 275 into downtown Tampa, police said.

The priest followed several cars into the Seaport Channelside Apartments on Twiggs Street. He got out of his car and asked Bruce for help.

Instead of offering help, Bruce struck the priest on the head with a tire iron, police said.

He then chased the priest for three blocks to the Madison Avenue and Meridian Avenue, police said, and even called 911 to say that an Arabic man tried to rob him.

Bruce said he was going to take the Arab into custody. When police arrived, Bruce told them the victim was a terrorist.

The priest was taken to Tampa General Hospital. There, a translator helped Marakis speak to police.

Then officers went to Bruce’s apartment to speak to the reservist again. But he already had an attorney with him and refused to speak, police said.

The priest was treated and released from the hospital.

Records show Bruce was released from the Hillsborough County jail at 8 a.m. Tuesday on $7,500 bond. His occupation is listed as sales manager of a Palm Harbor pharmacy.

from TPM:

The Associated Press updated the story of Cameron Todd Willingham over the weekend to include some new information from The Innocence Project which has taken up his cause some five years after his execution by the state of Texas for the death of his two daughters.

The Willingham story, which received national notoriety due, in part, to a story in the New Yorker last month, may be the case that many death penalty opponents can point to as definitive proof that an innocent person has been put to death, which would bring a face to the charge that the death penalty is an unjust and inhumane punishment and should be abolished nationally (currently its use is administered on a state-by-state basis).

As I noted in an earlier post, Willingham was convicted for the death of his two girls via arson based largely on a report filed by the area’s fire commissioners which stated that there is ample evidence that Willingham set the fire to his house for the sole purpose of killing his daughters and making it look like an accident. Willingham was sentenced to die and was executed in 2004.

According to the New Yorker piece, an amatuer scientist was able to prove that the commissioners relied on junk scince to prove their allegation, something that was easily debunked in the lab, but too late to help Willingham. The commissioners, however, stand by their report claiming that while their methods may have been flawed, they reached the right conclusion.

The A.P. update, which includes a report filed by the Porject and its founder and co-director, Barry Scheck, believes otherwise. Scheck released a statement and a report which claims,

“There can no longer be any doubt that an innocent person has been executed.”

In 2006, Scheck’s group gave its review of the case to the state commission, which later hired Baltimore-based arson expert Craig Beyler to study. Beyler concluded the arson finding was scientifically unsupported and investigators at the scene had “poor understandings of fire science.”

Scheck is strongly urging the Texas Forensic Science Commission to formally consider the report and include in its investigation into the Willingham case. A report is due sometime next year.

What I found interesting about the A.P. update, authored by Michael Graczyk, though, had to do with the manner in which Willingham’s last moments were portrayed in the article and how it’s a stark contrast to how the New Yorker’s piece, authored by David Grann.

From the A.P. (via HuffPo)

More than five years after his final act from the Texas death chamber gurney was a profanity-filled tirade, the murder case of executed inmate Cameron Todd Willingham refuses to die.

Willingham was executed in February 2004 – proclaiming his innocence and hoping aloud that his wife would “rot in hell” – for the deaths of his three young daughters in a fire at their Corsicana home on Dec. 23, 1991.

From the New Yorker article:

The warden told Willingham that it was time. Willingham, refusing to assist the process, lay down; he was carried into a chamber eight feet wide and ten feet long. The walls were painted green, and in the center of the room, where an electric chair used to be, was a sheeted gurney.

…After his death, his parents were allowed to touch his face for the first time in more than a decade. Later, at Willingham’s request, they cremated his body and secretly spread some of his ashes over his children’s graves. He had told his parents, “Please don’t ever stop fighting to vindicate me.”

…Just before Willingham received the lethal injection, he was asked if he had any last words. He said, “The only statement I want to make is that I am an innocent man convicted of a crime I did not commit. I have been persecuted for twelve years for something I did not do. From God’s dust I came and to dust I will return, so the Earth shall become my throne.”

If you didn’t know both articles were describing the same person, would you recognize it? It seems they are describing one person was a hellion determined to go down fighting, while the other was a fighter who had largely excepted his final fate.

I want to be clear on this one point, I am not accusing the A.P. of doctoring the story or making up facts, but how these cases are perceived by the public can largely determine how much support or pressure public officials will get when determining if they are going to address the situation. By framing Willingham as a crazed psycho rather than as a person caught up in what might have been an unjust execution, people on the fence about either Willingham or the death penalty issue in general may be swayed to support further investigation or ignore it altogether, based on their emotional response to the article. That may seem a cold way to phrase it, but history shows us that many great social causes have been stymied to supported based on the general population’s emotional reaction to them.

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20090926/us-texas-execution-arson/

Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20090926/us-texas-execution-arson/

Related articles

• Texas reviews ruling that led to execution (msnbc.msn.com)
• Texas panel reviews ruling that led to execution (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
• Did Texas execute an innocent man? (kottke.org)
• Cameron Todd Willingham: Texas Panel Reviews Ruling That Led To Execution (huffingtonpost.com)
• Texas: The Kinder, Gentler Hang ‘Em High State (time.com)

Of all the articles I’ve read about the torture issue and the prospect of investigating and prosecuting those responsible, i don’t think I’ve ever thought of going over to a legal sight to see what the thoughts were there.

Steve Shepard, though, has been writing on the issue and doing it in well reasoned layman’s language. It doesn’t hurt that he’s also right. he hits the nail on the head in regard to Cheney’s admonition that investigating a prior administration in a purely partisan thing to do:

The answer is that when other scandals arose, the administrations involved – and the Congress that was then in session – did not wait for the next administration. They investigated allegations and prosecuted their malefactors themselves. From Abraham Lincoln’s dismissal of Simon Cameron, to Ulysses Grant and the Crédit Mobilier scandal of 1872 or the Whiskey Ring of 1875, to the Veterans Bureau scandal of 1923, to the IRS scandal of the 1950s, allegations of wrongdoing were taken seriously by both the Congress and the President serving in the administration that was in office when the allegations were made. In these and many other cases, there was no need for the later administration to investigate, because, as with Watergate, the investigation was either already concluded or in full swing when the next administration took office.

True, not all claims of illegal official conduct are investigated. Yet the serious crimes that become known to the public often are. Only if one administration refuses to start an investigation, must its successor do so. So it is not the Obama administration’s action, but the second Bush administration’s omission, that should be the focus of criticism here.

It’s a great and short little piece and you can read it here.

Related articles

• Cheney vs. Obama: CIA Abuse Probe ‘Political’ (abcnews.go.com)
• Countdown: Jeremy Scahill on Why There Need to Be Prosecutions from Top to Bottom for Torture (videocafe.crooksandliars.com)
• Cheney: Torturers Can Do No Wrong (emptywheel.firedoglake.com)

and quite relevant now that Washington state is facing R-71 in a couple of months.