"Do letters from the public — often or ever — influence sentencing judges?"

That's the question raised by sentencing guru Doug Berman. In his post, he discusses the Mary McCarty case and the "flood" of letters being filed with Judge Middlebrooks. Here's the Palm Beach Post coverage:

They're hailing Mary McCarty and flailing her.

With the fallen county commissioner set to be sentenced Thursday, U.S. District Judge Donald Middlebrooks is receiving a welter of missives from the public - some urging the maximum five-year sentence spelled out in her plea deal, some advocating no more than community service.

McCarty, 54, a Delray Beach commissioner and then an 18-year county commissioner, pleaded guilty in March to misdeeds that included votes on bond deals that benefited herself and her underwriter husband, Kevin. That made her the third county commissioner to fall since 2006 in a federal probe of what a state grand jury recently dubbed "Corruption County."

Dozens of people have written to Middlebrooks to weigh in on McCarty's fate, with many expressing anger at the extent of public officials' crimes.

"Once a power couple, Kevin and Mary McCarty pay for ill-gotten gains"

That's the headline from the strong coverage of the McCarty case - she was a Palm Beach Commissioner - from the Palm Beach Post. Here's the link:

She pleaded guilty in the morning (before judge Middlebrooks) and her husband was sentenced in the afternoon. I thought the sentencing of Kevin McCarty was interesting: Judge Ryskamp varied down from the agreed on sentence. From the article:

Ryskamp handed down a sentence shorter than prosecutors and defense had settled on in Kevin McCarty's plea agreement.

Citing a recent argument by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, Ryskamp also expressed skepticism about whether the federal law against honest-services fraud should be used to take criminal action against ethics breaches that would be considered civil violations under state law.

Federal prosecutors filed an honest-services fraud charge against Mary McCarty, and they used the same law to prosecute former County Commissioners Tony Masilotti and Warren Newell.

"I am concerned about the federal court taking over violations of state ethics code and criminalizing them," Ryskamp said.

Ryskamp also called the charge against Kevin McCarty, technically known as misprision of a felony, "a seldom-used statute." But the judge added: "It is what it is: ... not only failure to speak up but active participation" in a crime.

BTW, this is the case that led to Chief Judge Moreno's recent Order on cell phones. It was the PBP that had requested permission to bring phones into the courthouse so that their reporters could blog and twitter live from inside the courtrooms. They got the phones approved. But now none of us can email, etc from inside the courtrooms.

UPDATE -- I've been told that the other reporters -- Curt Anderson, Vanessa Blum, and Jay Weaver -- have been talking to Moreno for months about being permitted to bring cell phones in. Well done guys.

I'll never understand...

...why people don't move their stalled cars out of the center lane of rush hour traffic on US1. ARRRRRGHHHHHH!!!!!!$^!%$(&!%(!*&^%($

Anyway, some interesting stories this morning:

1. Jay Weaver covers the sentencing before Judge Lenard on the Frank Duran Venezuelan suitcase trial. Here's the intro:

A rich businessman convicted of working as an illegal Venezuelan agent in the United States says he should be sent to prison for no more than three years, asserting that the judge in the case said he and his co-defendants had done no harm to this country.
Franklin Duran, who will be sentenced Monday, was the only defendant among five Latin American men indicted in 2007 to fight charges at trial that they had come to South Florida to cover up a hemispheric political scandal.
The men were charged with working on behalf of Venezuela's spy agency to silence a colleague who had been caught with a suitcase stuffed with $800,000. Prosecutors say the money was a gift from Venezuelan President Hugo Chavéz to Argentina's new president.
In November, a federal jury found Duran, 41, guilty of conspiring and operating as an illegal foreign agent who failed to register with the U.S. government -- a pair of offenses that carry up to 15 years in prison.

2. Vanessa Blum discusses the "honest services" statute here in connection with the Palm Beach Commissioner Mary McCarty. Milton Hirsch has this funny quote:

But some defense lawyers complain the law is too vague and public officials have no warning what conduct might land them behind bars."When someone is accused of stealing a box of apples, we know what that is," said Milton Hirsch, a Miami defense attorney. "When someone is accused of stealing the public's right to honest services, what does that even mean?"

3. Speaking of Milton Hirsch, he is running for Circuit Court judge in state court. First fundraiser is February 3 at my office. Email me off-line if you are interested in helping Milt out.

4. And for our out-of-district news, check out this very disturbing NY Times article about a sheriff in Alabama who kept inmates in jail starving so he could make a few extra bucks. And the law may have allowed for it!! Here's the intro:

The prisoners in the Morgan County jail here were always hungry. The sheriff, meanwhile, was getting a little richer. Alabama law allowed it: the chief lawman could go light on prisoners’ meals and pocket the leftover change.
And that is just what the sheriff, Greg Bartlett, did, to the tune of $212,000 over the last three years, despite a state food allowance of only $1.75 per prisoner per day.
In the view of a federal judge, who heard testimony from the hungry inmates, the sheriff was in “blatant” violation of past agreements that his prisoners be properly cared for.
“There was undisputed evidence that most of the inmates had lost significant weight,” the judge, U. W. Clemon of Federal District Court in Birmingham, said Thursday in an interview. “I could not ignore them.”
So this week, Judge Clemon ordered Sheriff Bartlett himself jailed until he came up with a plan to adequately feed prisoners more, anyway, than a few spoonfuls of grits, part of an egg and a piece of toast at breakfast, and bits of undercooked, bloody chicken at supper.

You gotta read the whole article. Crazy.

Today I have a sense of déjà vu. I wish I could say this is the last corruption case, but I fear it is not."

That was Alex Acosta during his press conference re Palm Beach County Commissioner Mary McCarty and her husband, Kevin, accusing them of a "wide-ranging and long-running" conspiracy to enrich themselves through the misuse of her political position. Here is Vanessa Blum's article on the case:

Mary McCarty, 54, an influential Republican powerbroker and longtime commissioner, is charged with conspiring to deprive the citizens of Palm Beach County of their "intangible right to her honest services," federal prosecutors said. She faces up to five years in prison.Prosecutors charged Kevin McCarty, 59, with taking part in and failing to report his wife's crime. He faces a maximum penalty of three years in prison.The new details emerged one day after McCarty resigned and said she would plead guilty to honest services fraud, making her the third county commissioner in recent years to leave office under the cloud of federal corruption charges.

McCarty could plead guilty as soon as next week. She is being prosecuted under the same statute that landed former commissioners Tony Masilotti and Warren Newell five year prison terms.