Did anyone else experience a surge of frustration and anger when they read a recent Herald article concerning the sentencing of Jeffrey Scott Barth? Barth is 22 years of age and could easily be back on our streets before his 30th birthday, despite his role in the murder of Rachel Rose Burkheimer. Barth was a recipient of a plea bargain agreement, by which he was allowed to avoid much of his deserved time in prison by providing evidence against others who were involved in this horrible crime.
The plea bargain is a frequently used method in our court system. Statistics indicate that 90 percent of the cases that come to completion are the result of plea bargains. Consequently, a judge and jury determine only 1 in 10 cases.
Some cases of considerable notoriety have been completed through forms of plea-bargaining. Perhaps the most famous, or infamous, is the case of the Manson Family killings. Following the bloody killings at the Tate-Polanski and LoBianca residences, the authorities were stymied. They were sure that Charles Manson and his followers were guilty of these crimes, but were faced with a difficult prosecution highly dependent on circumstantial evidence. A successful prosecution cried out for an eyewitness.
Enter Linda Kasabian. By her account, Kasabian had accompanied the Manson group to the site of the murders, but had not participated directly. By other accounts, she was fully involved. Wherever the truth lies, at least one thing is certain: Linda Kasabian became prosecutor Vincent Bugliosi’s star witness. Her testimony put Manson and his whole cabal behind bars, ostensibly for the rest of their lives.
And Linda Kasabian went free, serving no time at all.
In Bugliosi’s summation, he said that “out of the hell-hole of Spahn Ranch” came “three heartless, bloodthirsty robots” and “one human being, the hippie girl, Linda Kasabian.” Interestingly, Kasabian was not Bugliosi’s first choice. One of the “heartless, bloodthirsty robots,” Susan Atkins, was originally set to testify, but demurred prior to the trial, so Kasabian, “the one human being,” took her place. If not, Kasabian would have gone to prison and Atkins would have been set free.
Closer to home and more recently, another type of plea bargain unfolded. This time the criminal testified against himself. In exchange for avoiding the death penalty, Gary Leon Ridgeway admitted to the brutal murder of 48 women in King County. Prosecutor Norm Maleng emphasized that he had not agreed to this deal out of mercy for Ridgeway, but rather to help bring closure to the pain of many families by finding the bodies of Ridgeway’s victims through the killer’s cooperation with the Green River Task Force. This decision has opened up a can of worms in other cases involving the vicious taking of life, with defense attorneys claiming that if Gary Ridgeway doesn’t deserve the death penalty, then who, by matter of precedent, would?
One of my favorite homilies during my teaching and coaching years was the statement that “Sometimes your best characteristic is your worst characteristic.” For example, a person who is extremely energetic can sometimes wear everyone out with this same energy. So it is, at times, with our system of justice. We Americans try very hard to be fair, and as a result, we end up with indeterminate sentencing, plea bargaining and other aberrations of justice such as insanity pleas. I mean, what sane person takes a life?
Crimes against “things” or policy often result in greater punishment than crimes against people. Speaking as someone who abhors illegal drugs, I still wonder how a person can serve a longer sentence for having a proscribed amount of illegal narcotics than one who has taken a life. But it happens, and more often than one might suspect.
Arson affecting only property, while abhorrent and endangering to both everyday citizens and valiant firefighters, should not carry a greater sentence than for beating a child to death in anger, but it usually does. I am hard-pressed to remember a case where a child who has been killed after being shaken, struck or thrown in anger has resulted in a sentence much different from that given the aforementioned Jeffrey Barth. I suppose there are some, but the new rulings on deaths that have resulted from assault will probably overturn these court decisions.
Our courts are packed, our prosecutors understaffed, our police frustrated by the system. It is easy to see why we need such tools as plea bargaining to cut court glut, allow successful prosecution through whatever means, help keep people who are arrested behind bars, even to protect certain victims from the trauma of testifying, but at what price? The legal justice system is based on precedent, and some of the precedents we are setting could come back to haunt us, if, in fact, they haven’t already done so.
Freelance writer Bruce W. Burns, a retired teacher and coach, lives in Marysville. Comments can be sent to crookedelbow1@msn.com.
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