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.....never told to report to prison: http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireS...eks-release-23350869

 

ALL involved in this screw up should be FIRED and Mr. Anderson should be freed. 

'The beauty of the Second Amendment is that it will not be needed until they try to take it.'

'When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty.'

'And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms.'

'An elective despotism was not the government we fought for.' - Thomas Jefferson

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He reversed his life, became a model citizen,, has a family, which he supports. The governor should either commute his sentence, or offer parole as long as he continues on the path he set.

 

I remember a local joined the military and was injured.  He was sent home to heal and await further orders --- nothing unusual in that. However, months passed and he received no orders. Thru the local recruiter and thru the Arsenal, he sent requests for further orders or instructions. He received nothing and worked for his father for several more months. A couple of MPs arrived, arrested him, placed him in the local jail until he was transported to an army base for court-martial.  After complaints from locals and the investigation, he was exonerated.  He was paid for the time he waited and it counted against his required service time.  His commander wrote a letter of apology, which wa printed in this paper.  Not an exact example, but does demonstrate how government should act when it realizes it was their fault. 

 What will making him serve his sentence accomplish?

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I didn't say the entire sentence, I asked why should he should be freed without doing any time. 13 years sounded odd for a robbery using a bb gun. It's possible we don't have all the facts. What would it accomplish? It just might serve to show someone else that you have to pay for the things you do to others. I'm sure the man they robbed didn't know at the time it was a bb gun. Too, who knows for sure how much of a model citizen he's been? Could be he just never got caught again, no one knows for sure. 

I would like to think I am wrong about this, but, if someone is caught breaking the law,  the chain of events should be punishment, restitution to victims, rehab the law breaker.

Punishment is fines, court costs, (which governments balance the budget with) and probation(which in a lot of places is private owned and ran to make a profit for the owner).

Restitution,  all I can say to the victim is good luck.

Rehab, You've got to be kidding.

As for the BB gun robber, what about unsupervised probation (no money  to the owner of the probation service) some community service such as talking to school kids.  That would be far better than locking him up.

Originally Posted by jtdavis:

I would like to think I am wrong about this, but, if someone is caught breaking the law,  the chain of events should be punishment, restitution to victims, rehab the law breaker.

Punishment is fines, court costs, (which governments balance the budget with) and probation(which in a lot of places is private owned and ran to make a profit for the owner).

Restitution,  all I can say to the victim is good luck.

Rehab, You've got to be kidding.

As for the BB gun robber, what about unsupervised probation (no money  to the owner of the probation service) some community service such as talking to school kids.  That would be far better than locking him up.

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The law has become so complicated that we commit felonies daily, even the most honest of us.  That's one of the reasons I became more libertarian. 

Originally Posted by Bestworking:

The article says he didn't report. Again, things are missing from the story, one thing missing, what happened to his cousin?  I may unknowingly break a law, but I'm pretty darn sure I can't stick a gun in someone's face and demand money and get away with it. He fell through the cracks.

"In 2004, Anderson filed another appeal based on inadequate legal representation at his trial.[1] The appeal stated that Anderson was not in prison and it gave his current address at the time, but the Missouri Department of Corrections apparently did not notice this"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...Michael_Anderson_III

I guess I just see things differently. He had a lawyer. Why didn't he call him and say, "they haven't told me when to report". To me that would worry any normal person. I think it was because he was determined to get away with it as long as he could.  Is that turning your life around? Too, turned it around from what? If you believe his story he had never done anything bad up until then. So it's more like he resumed his life without being punished for his crime. Then again, there could be things he's done that no one knows about. I don't know what the law is pertaining to using a bb gun in a robbery. With such few facts 13 years seemed like a long time. But he shouldn't walk either.

Originally Posted by direstraits:
Originally Posted by Bestworking:

The article says he didn't report. Again, things are missing from the story, one thing missing, what happened to his cousin?  I may unknowingly break a law, but I'm pretty darn sure I can't stick a gun in someone's face and demand money and get away with it. He fell through the cracks.

"In 2004, Anderson filed another appeal based on inadequate legal representation at his trial.[1] The appeal stated that Anderson was not in prison and it gave his current address at the time, but the Missouri Department of Corrections apparently did not notice this"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C...Michael_Anderson_III

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Again, that was not in the article.

So, which report is true?

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After he was convicted of armed robbery in 2000, Cornealious Anderson was sentenced to 13 years behind bars and told to await instructions on when and where to report to prison. But those instructions never came.

So Anderson didn't report. He spent the next 13 years turning his life around — getting married, raising three kids, learning a trade. He made no effort to conceal his identity or whereabouts. Anderson paid taxes and traffic tickets, renewed his driver's license and registered his businesses.

Not until last year did the Missouri Department of Corrections discover the clerical error that kept him free. Now he's fighting for release, saying authorities missed their chance to incarcerate him.

In a single day last July, Anderson's life was turned upside-down.

"They sent a SWAT team to his house," Anderson's attorney, Patrick Megaro, said Wednesday. "He was getting his 3-year-old daughter breakfast, and these men with automatic weapons bang on his door."

Anderson, 37, was taken to Southeast Correctional Center in Charleston, Mo., to begin serving the sentence. A court appeal filed in February asks for him to be freed.

Anderson had just one arrest for marijuana possession on his record when he and a cousin robbed an assistant manager for a St. Charles Burger King restaurant on Aug. 15, 1999. The men, wearing masks, showed a gun (it turned out to be a BB gun) and demanded money that was about to be placed in a deposit box.

The worker gave up the bag of cash, and the masked men drove away. The worker turned in the car's license plate number.

Anderson was convicted and sentenced to 13 years in prison and waited for word on what to do next.

"His attorney said, 'Listen, they're going to get you some day, so just wait for the order,'" Megaro said. "As time goes by, the order never comes. What does a normal person believe? Maybe they forgot about it. It's only human nature to hope they just let it go. He really didn't know what to do.

"A year goes by, two years, five years, 10 years. He's thinking, 'I guess they don't care about me anymore,'" Megaro said.

So Anderson went about his life. Megaro said he was not a fugitive, was never on the run. In fact, just the opposite.

Megaro described Anderson as a model citizen — a married father who became a carpenter and started three businesses. He paid income and property taxes and kept a driver's license showing his true name and address. When he was pulled over for a couple of traffic violations, nothing showed up indicating he should be in prison.

 

 

Last edited by Bestworking

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