Thread: This the story of one of the most remarkable cases in U.S. history, and you’ve probably never heard of it. The story of what the U.S. government did to Ezell Gilbert is important because it explains how our legal system works as well as any case I have ever seen. (1)
In 1997, Ezell Gilbert was sentenced to more than 24 years in federal prison in a crack cocaine case. Because of mandatory sentencing (treating crack 100 times as severely as powder), he was put in a cage for a quarter century, and even the judge said this was too harsh. (2)
At sentencing, Gilbert saw an error that increased his sentence by about **ten years** based on a misclassification of a prior conviction. In 1999, without a lawyer, he filed a petition complaining about the mistake. The Clinton DOJ opposed him, and a court ruled against him. (3)
Ten years later, the Supreme Court issued a ruling in another person’s case, confirming that Gilbert had been correct about the error in his case. A public defender helped him file a new petition for immediate release from prison back to his family. He had served his time. (4)
But Obama/Holder DOJ argued to a federal judge that even if his sentence was illegal, Gilbert must remain in prison. They said the “finality” of criminal cases was too important to allow prisoners to file more than one petition, even if the first one was wrongly denied. (5)
The federal judge sided with Obama/Holder, and Ezell Gilbert remained in a cage even though everyone agreed he was now in prison illegally. He had the audacity to hope that courts would follow the law. (6)
A federal appeals court disagreed with Obama/Holder, and in June 2010, three judges set Gilbert free after more than 14 years in prison. (7)
The judges rejected the DOJ’s argument as a departure from fairness and common sense. They said that it could not be the law in the U.S. that a person had to serve a prison sentence that everyone admitted was illegal. Ezell Gilbert went home and stayed out of trouble. (8)
Here’s where it gets interesting. There are many people like Gilbert in federal prison whose sentences are illegal. Did you know that? Instead of rushing to ensure that thousands of people illegally separated from their families were set free, DOJ decided to fight and appeal. (9)
The Obama/Holder DOJ argued: If prisoners were allowed to file more petitions, the “floodgates” would open and many others — mostly poor, mostly Black — would have to be released. They asked a larger group of judges to reverse Gilbert’s victory. (10)
In 2011, a larger group of judges, led by a Republican majority, agreed with Obama/Holder that the “finality” of sentences was too important to allow prisoners to be released on a second rather than first petition, even if the prisoner was correct all along. (11)
An 87-year-old Republican judge wrote a dissent. Having served in WWII, he called the explicit decision to illegally keep a human being in jail “shocking.” He wrote that a “judicial system that values finality over justice is morally bankrupt.” (13)
Addressing Obama/Holder argument directly, he said: “[T]here are many others in Gilbert’s position — sitting in prison serving sentences that were illegally imposed. We used to call such systems ‘gulags.’ Now, apparently, we call them the United States.” (14)
Major media ignored Ezell Gilbert’s case at the time. (15)
In 2013, two years after sending him back to a cage, Obama granted Gilbert clemency, and the media praised Obama for his leniency. Tens of thousands of other human being remained in prison illegally. You’ve never heard their names. (End.)
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THREAD. Did you know that at about 1/3 of all stranger homicides in the U.S. are perpetrated by police? But there's something hidden here that is important to understand in this authoritarian moment.
First the basics: The vast bulk of physical and sexual violence in our society is *not* perpetrated by strangers, but by people who know each other. Obscuring this fact is a critical feature of copaganda in the news. People are shocked to hear it. Why?
A simple answer is that the news makes people extremely scared of strangers--the person next to you at CVS, the person walking down the street, the unhoused person in a tent, the anonymous burglar, etc. These are the kinds of crimes associated with surveillance, policing, etc.
THREAD. In Trump's speech to an unprecedented gathering of generals, he announced he was preparing to order them to use U.S. "cities as training grounds for our military." I want to highlight a few other bone chilling statements and put them into context that media obscures.
First, although it didn't get as much coverage, Trump also said the U.S. is facing "a war from within" against "the enemy from within." This essentially declared to military leaders--who Hegseth had just essentially told he would be purging of disloyalty--a new civil war.
Second, Trump specifically added that this "war" was something the "people in this room" (i.e. military generals) would "straighten out" in domestic deployments to cities run by Democrats "one by one." He added: "inner cities" are "a big part of war now. It’s a big part of war."
THREAD. I happened to be in Portland yesterday to give a university lecture as Trump called it “war ravaged Portland” while illegally ordering the deployment of the U.S. military to use “full force.”
This kind of outrageous misinformation would not be possible without the culture of fear spread for years by the mainstream media. He is playing on the prodigious ignorance and irrational fear cultivated by the way the news media distorts our sense of safety.
Portland, needless to say, is nothing remotely like what Trump describes. But the mass media has created an entirely delusional public perception of what threats we face and from whom.
THREAD. PBS recently aired a dangerous news segment, full of misinformation. The incident is not only embarrassing for PBS and Democrats, but it portends dark days for the future of our society that it was published. People at PBS should be doing some deep soul searching.
First, the article is a mind-boggling interview with the Democratic New Mexico governor. She validates and increases hysteria about street crime at the same moment such crime (which was and is down) is the precise (and false) pretense of national authoritarian takeover.
Worse, the reporter (cheering along like an AI-bot) lets Governor do it at a time of near-historic crime lows in New Mexico. Even worse, reporter lets her demand more authoritarian repression as a solution to fear, despite the evidence that this is like flat-earth stuff.
THREAD. I don't know what there is left to say about the New York Times and Democrats, but documenting their support for fascism still feels important. If there's any chance to walk back from the fascist cliff, we must see why things like today's article are so dangerous.
The article today is premised on the idea that--while some Dems are uncomfortable with Trump deploying military to cities without consent--they want more federal resources (even military) to flood their cities for surveillance, police, prosecution, and prison.
As with any article, ask yourself: Why is this a news story? Who benefits from it being news, from how it's framed, from what info is included and what is ignored? Always look: who are sources quoted, and which perspectives are ignored? Take a look at the sources in order:
THREAD. For over a decade, I've been working across the country to challenge unconstitutional cash bail. So, why is Trump trying to entrench it?
The for-profit cash bail industry exists only in U.S. and Philippines. Even though you're presumed innocent, you're stuck in a jail cell while you wait for your day in court if your family doesn't have cash to pay a private company to secure your release.
Basing bodily liberty on a person's access to cash destroys millions of lives. It makes us all less safe. It's unconstitutional. But it makes a lot of people a lot of money, and it gives huge leverage to prosecutors and police to force people to plead guilty in low-level cases.