From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Tue, 11 Nov 1997 08:57:08 +0800
To: cypherpunks@Algebra.COM
Subject: RE: Bell vs. Woodward--justice?
In-Reply-To: <82E14F2F282AD11180330000010380310367B6@mallory.stallion.oz.au>
Message-ID: <v03102802b08d4a594185@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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At 4:47 PM -0700 11/10/97, rab@stallion.oz.au wrote:

>Here in Australia the media has been giving this trial regular coverage
>with the spin "Innocent English Person Wrongly Found Guilty by US Jury".
>The coverage led me to believe that despite scientific evidence to  the
>contrary the jury found Woodward guilty.  One other point from the
>coverage was that Woodward represented herself for at least some part of
>the trial, did Jim Bell do this too?
>
>Obviously Tim you have been exposed to very different media coverage.

Whatever. I've been exposed to entirely too much media coverage, that's for
sure.

I happen to believe Woodward was probably overcharged, in that I doubt she
had the requisite malice for a murder rap, though I think she did in fact
shake the baby.  So, manslaughter seems like an appropriate charge. From
what I've seen. But I wasn't on the jury. And those who _were_ on the jury
concluded she was guilty.

My main point was that James Dalton Bell has already spent nearly 7 months
in jail, and has yet to even be sentenced.  This seems out of whack. Where
I come from, sentence is part of a speedy trial.

Legally-trained Greg Broiles tells us that this is part of the Fed's
process of "determining" a sentence (my quotes, not necessarily Greg's).

Well, I call it "letting him twist slowly in the wind." Probably in the
hopes that he'll roll over on some of us who communicated with him, or
whose writings influenced him, on his Assassination Politics ideas. A kind
of psychological torture, designed to dangle a lighter sentence at the same
time a heavier sentence is threatened. Not my idea of a fair justice system.

>From Bell's notes to the outside world, reposted by John Young, it appears
the half-year of indeterminate sentence, as Bell awaits his "real"
sentence, has had the effect of breaking him, of causing him to recant his
views, and (speculating) perhaps rolling over on some of us.

When Bell is finally sentenced, supposedly on November 20th, it'll be
interesting to see what else happens.

I stand by my point that a convicted baby killer--whether the fickle media
thinks a nice girl like her did it or not--will end up serving less time in
jail than Jim Bell will. And Bell didn't kill a baby. Or anyone else. Nor
was anyone physically harmed by his crimes.

As for Australia, your countrymen acted like sheep in giving up their guns.
If they try that kind of shit here in this country, a *lot* of cops are
going to get killed.

(Not necessarily by me, though I'll defend my property and my
constitutional rights as best I can. But the militia and patriot and
anti-New World Order movements are preparing for war.)

--Tim May


The Feds have shown their hand: they want a ban on domestic cryptography
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Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
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