Unbalanced justice, again

The father of a shooting victim leaped across a courtroom table and tried to strangle the scum-bag who admitted to killing his son.

Antonio Clifford, of Cincinnati, admitted in court that he robbed and shot 28-year-old Joshua Sweat, of Weirton, in a parking lot last year in downtown Steubenville. After the plea, Mike Sweat, the victim's father, leaped and began to choke Clifford. Amid screams from both the victim's and the killer's families, it took dozens of law enforcement officers to control the crowd. Moments later, everyone was ordered out of the courtroom.

Mr. Sweat knew, as do the rest of us, that this scum-bag does not deserve to live any longer. He took a man’s life, he should pay with his own. There are far too many of these scum-bags walking the streets who think a few dollars means more to them than a human life.

Since Antonio Clifford values money over life, he should have no problem understanding why he should die and we should be allowed to keep our money instead of supporting him. This scum-bag is going to cost us a lot of money. Much more than he is worth. He gets three meals a day, a free place to sleep, all the exercise he wants, a support system that will teach him the ‘ins-and-outs’ of dealing with the law and life on the streets (on the wrong side of the law), a new group of drug users and peddlers to ‘deal’ with, and we the taxpayers get to support him through it all.

He doesn’t have the morals required for this current form of punishment to mean anything to him.

Sure prison is not what any of us would consider a quality life, but he doesn’t place much importance on quality of life since he doesn’t respect life.

Why do you judges just sit there presiding over cases where you know the outcome is not going to be what the people want? The court system is supposed to put society’s best interest first and punish those scum-bags who choose to denigrate human life.

This court system does not put society’s best interest first, we see it everyday when perpetrators are allowed to live after their victims died.

This court system is not protecting us, we see it everyday when individuals are released from prison and then go on to repeat the crimes that landed them in prison the first time.

These people do not get ‘rehabilitated’ in prison.

In this particular court case, when the victims family’s were allowed to have their say, the victim’s mother said to Clifford "I truly believe if you are ever set free to live in society, there will be another victim -- another family -- that is shattered."

She is basing her statement on what we in society see every day.

You lawyers are not protecting this society when you let scum-bags like this live. When they get out and kill again, how is that ‘protecting’ us? But you hide behind the ‘spirit’ of the law so you don’t have to have any culpability in it. Well, you are misinterpreting the ‘spirit’ of the people you are supposed to protect, namely society in general, not this latest in a long line of scum-bags.

You judges cannot fight lack of immorality with a bleeding heart mentality, they will take advantage of you every time. And of course your misguided outlook will tell you to believe their ‘on-the-spot’ sad story.

You lawmakers should have learned by now that taking of life is the only thing these scum-bags understand. Not the loss of being able to live free in society. They are obviously fed up with society anyway. They no longer have to work for a living. And they still can get high when they want. Drug use in prisons is no secret.

The defense and prosecution came to a plea agreement after deciding that, based on the evidence from the crime, Clifford did not initiate the robbery that took place. Yet he got the stiffest penalty of the three, which still is the wrong penalty. Did you guys forget the fact that he brought a loaded weapon to the meet with him? This is a basic factor in determining first degree murder! As soon as he pulled that weapon on Sweat he was reinforcing his belief that money was more important to him than this man’s life. If he had brought this gun with him as protection, then it should have stayed in his pocket. He was not threatened with force that caused him to pull that weapon. He pulled that weapon to enforce his group’s intention to rob.

Clifford only got 33 years to ‘life’ (see the injustice here? He gets to live but the victim who only intended to fulfill his end of a purchase lost his life) after he pleaded to aggravated murder, aggravated robbery and tampering with evidence. The only reason a ‘plea’ had been put on the table in the first place was because to ‘prove’ first degree murder there would have had to be a jury trial and that would have taken longer and been more difficult to prove. I propose that could have prevented this lesser sentence that allowed this scum-bag to live, is that the law should be written such that he would have gotten death because he brought the loaded gun to the meet with him.

But, I suppose, then you lawyers would not have been needed, would you?

This scum-bag knew the penalty for taking this man’s life was worth the chance. Obviously, because he took the chance.

All three of these scum-bags are guilty of murder because they were all participated in the events that brought about Sweat’s death. Not one of them tried to prevent it. Not one of them tried to take the gun away and prevent this from happening. Not one of these low-life scum-bags tried to talk him out of it. They all participated in it. These guys clearly did not consider that it was best to just fulfill their end of the deal and walk away. You lousy, slimy lawyers ‘hash out’ some ‘letter’ or ‘spirit’ of the law trying to gain points for your brilliance at interpretation and the end result is this scum-bag gets to live. Where is the justice?

These laws should not be written as if murder has several levels of specialty and therefore should be answered with a specialized sentence. There should not be any differing ‘degrees’ of murder. If someone dies at the hands of another person then that perpetrator should be put to death. Instead the first thing they get is a ‘defense’ lawyer trying to get him off with as little punishment as possible. This tells the rest of us that the legal system is set up for those who stand in front of a judge and not for us. When you have a system that works in your favor starting the from moment your lawyer tells you to lie to the judge by saying ‘not guilty’ when you know you are, then that system is clearly working for you and to hell with the victims family.