Solicitor’s Protection Act Renewed
Every time we call out Paul Thurmond for something we get angry notes from police officers who claim he has done so much for the profession. Well, if you are a single issue voter and willing to overlook what he’s doing to hurt you in exchange for what you say he’s done to help you, then you are part of the problem. You know all those people who voted for Obama just because he has dark skin? Yep, you’re just like them.
Last year we reported on the legislation we came to refer to as the Solicitors Protection Act. It is actually a combination of legislation proposed by Republican lawyer Paul Thurmond. We have also referred to it as the Criminal Protection Act and the Lawyer Funding and Protection Act.
The basic goal of the legislation Thurmond keeps trying to pass is two-fold. First, he wants to keep the public (you) from being able to discover what a horrible job your elected prosecutor might be doing by requiring the immediate concealment and expungement of all charges dismissed by a prosecutor. The only information available to the public (read: the voter) would be convictions, in effect, giving every prosecutor a 100 percent conviction rate when you tried to access charges and data on the public clerk of court sites. The impetus for this portion of the legislation is Thurmond’s prior employment with his friend, 9th Circuit Solicitor Scarlett Wilson. Thurmond came up with the bright idea for this legislation after this site started pointing out the many failures of the 9th Circuit Solicitor which contributes directly to the crime problem here in the Lowcountry. We all know lawyers and politicians look out for one another and this is a prime example.
If it was up to folks like Thurmond you people would not even be able to type in a name and search for criminal offenses. It really is none of your business, after all. Right? The only people who need to know what is going on in the criminal justice system are those who work in it. In Thurmond’s zeal to protect his friends from a public evaluation of their performance he will ultimately prevent you from having access to public information which could protect your family.
What if your kid came home from school excited about his or her new friend and wanted to spend the night at that friend’s home? What if the father of that new friend was a guy like the now deceased Glendell Gladden? For the time being, you can punch his name into a website and find out he’s had three murder charges (and participation in a 4th) dismissed by the 9th Circuit Solicitor. Would you let your kid spend the night with that new friend?
Thurmond doesn’t want you to have that information. He doesn’t care about your rights as a taxpayer to have access to public information to keep track of what your elected prosecutor is doing or your desire to do a little investigating while protecting your family. He only cares about protecting his people. The rest of you can go to hell.
You know who else can go to hell on that issue? All those police officers who tell us they use the clerk of court sites in their county to find out just who they are dealing with out there on the street. You see, most officers don’t have NCIC in their cars, and even if they did there are strict rules about how and when it can be used to view someone’s criminal history. Thurmond’s bills would also hide that information from officers on the street who use every available resource in the course of their work. Do you know how many officers who don’t have computers in their car use their smartphones to access inmate databases to compare mugshots to the person with no ID in order to verify that person is telling the truth? A lot.
Thurmond spends a lot of time coming up with legislation to make criminal charges disappear in S 236. We suppose he’s hoping everyone will concentrate instead on the harsher penalties proposed in the same bill for failure to stop for blue lights and commend him for being a law and order Republican. Oh, and don’t pay any attention to all those ways for criminals to have their DNA removed from the state’s DNA database.
The second aspect of Thurmond’s legislation has to do with mugshots (S 255). He was hoping to fast-track this bill this year before anyone noticed. Once again he is trying to call you and your Facebook or Twitter feeds a “business” if you post the mugshot of the guy who stole your car, raped your daughter, killed your spouse while driving under the influence or broke into your house and stole your possessions. We can’t help but wonder if your municipality, county and state will then come after you with charges and fines for not having a business license. You know they will…..it’s all about the money. Your money.
Of course, Thurmond is a lawyer, first and foremost, and is using his current position as a legislator to facilitate his continued cash flow when he leaves office. Looking out for number one, as it were. In his desire to look out for himself and his fellow legal beagles he makes you and your social media feeds a business so the state can make money by fining and imprisoning you for posting that mugshot and he can make a few bucks for his law office by suing you in civil court.
The last time Thurmond tried to push this through we were the first to notice and write about it. The regular “news” folks didn’t bother with it too much. That has now changed. The folks over at the P & C are up in arms over some wording in this new version of the bill.
What? A politician who wants to subvert the 1st Amendment and tell the press and blog writers and private citizens what to write, what to do with what they write and when to do it? That is usually the bailiwick of those liberal progressives, but here we have Paul Thurmond, supposedly a conservative law and order Republican, trying to regulate what people can write about. The Constitution apparently goes right out the window when politicians like Thurmond see a way to line their own pockets.
The folks in the press are concerned about that requirement and they want a special exemption in the law just for them. Thurmond tells them other states have passed similar laws (he initially copied his from Georgia) and there have been no constitutional issues. The regular “news” media doesn’t really care about that. They just want to be granted special dispensation so they can go back to being the sole arbiters of what crime related news is published. They don’t like competition from sites like CTL who give you more detailed crime news for free.
The P & C even gives the impression they would like to see inmate databases like the one at the SACDC disappear. That way, only THEY would have access to mugshots, just like the old days. Those liberals on Columbus Street are all twisted up over this. They don’t mind criminals being able to hide from the public, but they shouldn’t be able to hide from the media. They don’t mind laws that limit freedom of speech and access to public records for you, and us and other non-conventional media, but want a special exemption built in to guarantee their own. It would be fun watching them writhe about in their confusion if the matter wasn’t so serious.
You folks might remember just a few short weeks ago when Thurmond defended the sad state of the DUI laws in South Carolina. Yeah, he gets paid thousands for making those charges go away. Why would he want to tighten things up and do away with all the loopholes? That might cut into his cash flow.
And don’t forget about how your elected representatives and the judges they put on the bench want to throw you in jail and sue you for filing complaints on them. Are you folks taking note of how quickly your elected representatives turn against you once they get what they want? You should be.
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These are official records that are and must remain open to the public. All this hiding is not something that should happen in an open and free society.
In all fairness part of the problem here is the inability of a “victim” of an improper arrest charge is even if the perp is incorrectly charged with committing a crime that charge cannot be expunged if a plea bargain is entered.
Don’t get me wrong, the officers are pushing the most serious charges and as many subsequent charges as they can, even if it means some overzealous overreach. They are likely doing this because they know the system will generally dismiss the serious charges in exchange for the easy guilty plea for the lesser charge.
The current system works well for the repeat and habitual offended but it is very unfair to a person who has a brief encounter with the system and then is impacted from getting a job or even an apartment due to a felony charge that may or may not have been correctly charged.
I don’t know what Thurmond’s intensions are but I do know that the current system imposes an unfair burden on rehabilitated offenders who have serious charges follow them around FOREVER if they don’t meet the strict criteria for expungement.
Unfortunately, officers on the streets can’t just bring the charge to fit the crime because they know they have to “stack the deck” when the prosecutors and lawyers systematically get murder charges reduced to jaywalking and all related charges dismissed.
Thurmond and his fellow legislators may be responding to the outcry from citizens who’s lives and ability to move on past a single series of criminal activities to return to the mainstream of society with a job, housing and other basic societal needs due to the justice system that is manipulated by defense council as well as the solicitors.
An unaware kid who is approached by the prosecutor with a deal that reflects the seriousness of the charge but plea bargains away the overreach still impacts that kid with an indelible “Scarlett letter”
Truth in sentencing equals truth in charges but the system is irreparably broken and patchwork legislation is not going to help.
We opine that the entire expungement law needs a detailed rewrite that protects the charging officers and the citizens from the failures of the solicitors and judges.
A kid caught with a baggy of pot but charged with felony trafficking can get an education, home or job because the system is broken.
Uh Oh I meant to say can’t “A kid caught with a baggy of pot but charged with felony trafficking can’t get an education, home or job because the system is broken.”
There’s a lot more than that last sentence that needs to be changed. What, exactly, is “a single series of criminal activities”? Here is a thought… Don’t commit crime, whether it’s a single one, a series of them, or a single series of them.
Blah, blah, blah. You lost me after the first fourteen sentences.
“Baggy of Pot” getting felony weight? Get real. Do you know how much pot has to be present for a felony charge, or how many different packages? It would have to be heavily compacted to fit into your single “baggy”, and when a Cop has to take an oath as to what he is swearing to in a warrant, he is staking his professional career.
When the drugs are discovered, they are weighed. At some point before trial, they are analyzed and a more accurate weight is obtained by Officers who have been SLED Certified and Trained. These Officers then generate a report and they also swear a signed oath, that report is Notarized, which then becomes part of the case file.
Little Johnny is “fibbing” to you, and he wasn’t just “holding it for a friend”, either… and it was more like a gallon freezer bag.
Silly people pick at the HYPOTHETICAL example…
I am not a cop but I do hire people and often do a background check and I am SURE no cop has ever “run the flag up” on a citizen in hopes of making something stick in a court full of jesters. RIGHT???
That is the point so try to focus on the facts and understand that I am only saying the system is unfair when people have charges that they are NOT convicted of that screws up their lives when they don’t happen to be perfect like Creeker and Divergent.
Once again the point is that sometimes the evidence does not support the charge but the unproven charge is still reported as a fact in the SLED background check. If the perp has a rap sheet that weighs 5 pounds that is altogether different.
The legislature is trying to fix this and they are likely to undermine the entire reporting system to right the wrong to very few one time offender. The right thing to do is to develop a better reporting system that reports only convictions and not unproven charges. We don’t need another kneejerk law!
See, I’m not the one “not getting it”. A Cop who signs or is the Affiant on a bad or “run the flag up” Warrant is placing his credibility on the line, for which there is a record and his later Testimony in Court can be easily rendered useless by any competent Defense Attorney.
That is not to say that a Cop who believes he has an ounce of anything is “running the flag up” when the dope he seized dries out and later becomes 27 grams is lying or falsifying.
I am far from perfect and I will be the first to admit it, but no Cop or Solicitor worth his salt should allow a whole profession to be tarred with the same brush.
There are Attorneys who already deal with getting all charges expunged from records, both convictions and non-convictions. Whats more, with a little effort, those people who are eligible for expungement can get it done on their own.
I have trouble understanding the expungement of convictions. As an employer, it would seem to me it would behoove you to know what is IN the book rather than judging the cover.
For more info: http://www.scsolicitor9.org/expungement.htm
Exactly my point it behooves the cop to go for the most serious charge so they can hope for a plea that in some degree reflects the perps record.
I understand that and having worked in enforcement in the past I know this happens.
Whether we like it or not a vocal minority that are impacted by overzealous charging cops deserve IN ALL FAIRNESS to be reported for only their convictions only.
As for hiring attorneys to manage your expungement…isn’t that the grease that keeps the judicial industry alive and well. Why should someone need to hire an attorney to preserve himself from a record based on the arresting officer’s perception and not the decision of a jury of our peers?
As much as we would like to bash Mr. Thurmond and other legislators we must not relinquish our insistence that one is innocent until adjucated guilty by a court of law.
That is the difference between the USA and every banana republic in the world.
Love it when the pseudo-lawyers comment on sites like this as if they know all there is to know about legal issues.
I can tell you how much has too be present for a felony charge. And that is not much. It’s not always weight. It’s how it’s “possessed”. My son got a felony charge for three small amounts in those corners of a baggie. That got him possession with the intent to distribute. I won’t go into the details but he went through a period of wandering off the path but is back on track now.
You can pontificate with moralistic witticisms and make comments like “don’t commit a crime”, but life happens and kids don’t always do the things we would like.
Thanks for calling me perfect, that was very nice of you. So it’s the “overzealous cops” fault… Good to know, because we don’t want anyone thinking it was just that the officer knew his/her job and charged appropriately. If someone commits a crime, and the elements are there to charge them with charge A, B and C, do Ya do it? You’re damn skippy, Skippy. That’s not being overzealous, that’s doing the job they swore to do. But you keep wearing your Hands Up, Don’t Charge T-Shirt, I’ll just stick with my don’t commit the crime in the first place BS.
I’m not sure if you were responding to me or not Goosed since your post is above mine, and I was responding to Fairness, but since I’m the only one that said anything about not committing the crime then I’m going to presume you were talking to me. If you weren’t then I apologize for the following; if you were then go suck a dick or a clit, whatever your preference, I don’t judge. I don’t give a damn what your kid did. I didn’t say the first thing about anyone’s kid, so don’t sit there and whine and bitch that “it was felony weight but it shouldn’t have been cuz Ya see my precious baby boo only had…”. I am so sick and tired of people making excuses for stuff. I’m glad he’s back on track, but save your “pontificates” and big old Google thesaurus search words for someone who is willing to listen to it.
Divergent, You should really try improving upon your reading comprehension skills.
You see, I used the situation with my kid as an example that you don’t have to be carrying that much weed to be charged with a felony. That was used to refute your implication that you have to be in possession of some large amount to be charged as a felony. I noticed in your vitriol laced reply that you left that alone. Could that be an acknowledgement that you really don’t know what you’re talking about?
If you could point out where I made any excuse for the behavior of my kid I would really appreciate you pointing that out. I said he did something wrong at some point in his life but had gotten his proverbial “stuff” together and is doing well.
You do seem rather touchy with those whom you don’t agree with. And it appears that you were not only more than willing to “listen” to my comment but also to take the time to eagerly reply with a comment of your own. Sadly, the blustery attacks really don’t add anything to your arguments. Try something that is considerably more well thought out and might actually add to the conversation.
But, I will say this. I do find that your posts are laced with emotion and I think that they are highly entertaining.
I’m not completely convinced yet that I need to say my Hail Mary’s and do Penance, but if I mistook what was said then I’m more than man, woman or child enough to tell you that you just need to be more clear from now on… Ok, maybe we should have just stuck with the appletini’s instead of introducing them to the brown liquor’s, lesson learned. But come on, stop using those big old words like pontificate next to words I’ve said in parentheses, I’m easily confused…
Folks,
Why do we insist upon attacking each other over minutian details concealed within toilet paper legislation authored by lawmakers in the most corrupt and opaque state in this republic? Let’s focus on flushing the good ole boy toilet and return integrity and honor to the state of SC (aka Southern Corruption). Gadsen lives!
I found it interesting that BCSO Law Enforcement is also feeling out their envelope boundaries as related to CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE. In my case, my self proclaimed victim (in reality, the former BCSO deputy / DeWitt family friend, and higHly disturbed individual / opportunist and corrupt pathological liar whose casually drawn up “voluntary statement” submitted to his BCSO “buddys”, obliged said fraternity “buddys” to haul me in for having the balls to defend myself from this sleazeball), with “buddy” DeWitt speaking up in support of said Sleazeballs agenda, secured a “Surety bond” from “buddy” Polk at my bond hearing which allowed Sleazy to seize both my personally paid for homes without my having been convicted of any crime. Had he simply seized them for a week or so, I’d have laughed the corruption off. But he completely trashed both of the homes, while training up his cubscout son in this predatory Scottish Rite tradition.
It’s time that real / truly courageous and free men help our deceived brothers recognize that SC is riddled with Freemasonry Organized Crime, in an earnest effort to sincerely be our brothers keeper.
Gadsden Lives!
I would Highly suggest that any and all patriots (who remain unpurchased / void of secret society vows (deceitfully and innocently termed “obligations” by the slaves / due paying drones of same fraternity) attend below event in support of exposing the Stalinist traitors in this state of Southern Corruption.
“SHHHH… it’s a secret”!
VOTE SPECIAL INTEREST PATHOLOGICAL LIARS WHOSE LOYALTY AND VOWS PROSTITUTE THEIR AUTHORITY TO FINANCIAL GAIN FOR THEIR CORRUPT SLEAZY FAMILY FIENDS.
Please correct me if I’m mistaken Magistrate Polk, Baggett, or disgraced sheriff DeWitt. Heck, I’d even entertain more lies from Deputy Sleazey, who you corrupt public servants are protecting, and as such, complicit in that criminals attacks upon me, my paid for properties, and his liquidation of my retirement savings that supported His swindling mother, and provided his kids a brand new day care center for 5 years.
Sevenfold karma coming your way BC whores.