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Understanding How and Why Our Judges Become Corrupt.
See how we can virtually eliminate judicial corruption now
Learn about common forms of judicial misconduct
Using statistics to reclaim our justice system
Judicial Corruption Exists Because Public Trials Are Almost Never Heard By The Public:
The public can watch our lawmakers (on CSPAN and in the papers) because there are so few of them. We uncover their corruption all the time. Why do we carefully watch the people who make our laws, but never check on the people who administrate them? It's because there are hundreds of judges for every law maker. In the past it has simply been impossible to keep an eye on them all. This is no longer the case. All courtrooms are wired for sound and all courtrooms are wired to the Internet. The infrastructure to stop judicial corruption is in place right now. The only thing required is legislation mandating that the courts post all voice recordings of court proceedings on the Internet. There are no legal reasons why this can not be done now. All court proceedings are public and anyone can purchase a cassette tape of any court proceeding. There are also no technological barriers preventing this. You can get millions of sound recordings over the Internet. To see what I'm talking about, click here and experience how New York Public Radio publishes their audio content. This is only a matter of public will. Imagine being able to write an email to someone in authority and inserting a link to the exact point in the trial recording where a judge does something to obstruct justice. This will virtually eliminate all unfair trials. Can you imagine what this will mean for all of us?
Seclusion and Lack of Accountability Breed Corruption.
Judges become corrupt because no one, except the victims, know what goes on in their court rooms. And none of the victims know about each other, so they can't create petitions. The lawyers aren't going to say anything because they will likely be in front of the same judge next week. There is an appeal process, but after a judge takes all your money and property, and then garnishes your wages or puts you in jail, there's usually no money left to mount an appeal. Transcripts alone are extremely expensive. So with unlimited power and no feedback from the public, judges come to understand that they can do anything they want and they start to believe that whatever they do is justified. Anyone will come to have this attitude when there is no one to provide a reality check. Anyone from office managers to heads of state are likely to become evil dictators if they can not be held accountable for their actions. This is summed up in the adage "absolute power corrupts absolutely" To make matters worse; lawyers who seek judgeships are motivated by power not money. We know this because practicing lawyers in general earn much more than judges. The point is that, the people most likely to become corrupted by absolute power are the very people who seek judgeships. Judges aren't bad people, they are just people and people are likely to become corrupt if there is no incentive to stay honest. We all know this. Our whole system of checks and balances was set up to provide this incentive. The problem is that the appeals process is the only check we have against judicial corruption but only the very rich can appeal. If we want a fair justice system, we need to provide judges with more incentive to be honest. Posting trial audio on the Internet will accomplish this in two ways. First it will eliminate the need for transcripts which will make it possible for poor and middle class people to appeal. Second an more importantly, it will make public proceedings truly public. And in the same way that people are much less likely to shoplift in a store that has cameras, judges will be much less likely to promote their own agendas at our expense and more likely to administrate our laws if they know that everyone is watching. And now with more honest and careful judges, we are likely to have fewer appeals, a more just society, and happier citizens.
Judges Become Corrupt When Strong Personal Agendas Enjoy Absolute Power:
Judges are our public servants. We hire them to administrate our laws. But all too often judges make decisions that are contrary to the law or against the weight of evidence. While money can be the motivation for judicial corruption, we find that judges are most often corrupted by their own ideology and personal affiliations. Don't forget, judges are appointed by politicians, not elected. In fact, Judges are often failed politicians that were never able to convince their communities to make laws consistent with their own agendas. So these frustrated law makers take jobs as judges and make rulings on cases to fit their own world view, while ignoring the evidence and the law.
When a family court judge is a militant feminist for instance, then that judge is quite likely find that the men brought before her are guilty of domestic violence; even when presented with no more evidence than a complaint from a woman who wants an unfair advantage in a pending divorce. If a criminal court judge is a bigot, then he may be likely to find that a black man is guilty of robbery or rape even if there is no reliable evidence to support his verdict. A study conducted by the FBI with subjects already in jail for rape used DNA findings to show that 30% of the convicted men were innocent according to the DNA evidence [Newsweek 11-Jan-93].
There is nothing wrong with feminism; women deserve all the choices they can possibly have. There is nothing wrong with Christian Fundamentalists either; the babies they save may now choose to become feminists. As for man hating lesbians, male supremacists and racists; they have just as much right to exist and lawfully move their agendas forward as anyone else. But if you are a judge and you are giving more consideration to your personal agenda than you are to the evidence or the law, then we need to remove you from office. Our representatives make laws and you judges administrate them. That was the deal.