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A man who was found not guilty of armed robbery will still serve up to seven years behind bars after a judge ruled he had breached the rules of his probation sentence for another crime.
Ramad Chatman handed himself in to police when he found out he was a suspect for an armed robbery at a convenience store in his hometown of Georgia in July 2014.
The 24-year-old was already was serving a five year probation term (a court order served outside prison through fines and community service) for his first ever offence, breaking and entering an apartment to steal a television worth $120 in 2012.
The following February, a judge decided it was likely he did commit the robbery and as a result Chatman was re-sentenced for the original crime of stealing a TV and ordered to serve 10-years behind bars, back dated to the day of the crime.
Court documents nonetheless showed he did everything asked of him during his probation, including checking in, paying restitution and finishing his community service. He was also holding down a job.
But when the armed robbery trial came to court in August, he was found not guilty.
It later emerged that ahead of the trial Chapman[sic] tried to enter an Alford plea on the charge of aggravated assault in exchange for the armed robbery charges being dropped.
An Alford plea means the defendant enters a guilty plea, but maintains his innocence. It is often used when a defendant feels like despite his innocence, he will lose at trial.
The judge refused to accept the deal, so the case was heard before a jury - who ruled he was innocent of the crime.
Presiding Judge John Niedrach, disagreed with their verdict however.
So despite the fact police never recovered the weapon, stolen money, or any other evidence connecting him to the robbery, he declined to release Mr Chatman, who remains in prison for violating the terms of his first probation order.
Original Submission[Edit: [sic]'ed the Independent's typo - FP]
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 25 2017, @03:58PM (2 children)
Occam's Razor only applies when the other proposition is ridiculously outlandish. You cannot ignore plausible explanations just because another explanation appeals better to your sensibilities.
The burden of proof lies with the person making the positive assertion.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 25 2017, @07:11PM (1 child)
"Among competing hypotheses, the one with the fewest assumptions should be selected."
So the two hypotheses we have are:
1) Judge is prejudiced for whatever reason and abuses his power to punish the victim even after being cleared by a jury.
2) Judge is... umm, what is the reasonable reason he would send an innocent man to jail for no reason whatsoever? Oh yeah, cause he thinks he did it.
#2 fails the "fewest assumptions" test since the judge himself is making one rather tenuous assumption apparently against all evidence.
(Score: 2) by Spamalope on Friday May 26 2017, @04:02AM
The judge is an 'all suspects are guilty, otherwise they wouldn't be suspects' authoritarian
The judge is in possession of illegally obtained evidence; isn't disclosing it (crime); is using it secretly as a basis for conviction (crime)
The judge considers anyone on probation who comes to his attention to be a violator, without regard to whether any accusations have foundation
The judge is prejudiced against poor people and would have treated 'white trash' the same
The judge gets a kickback from someone who profits by the incarceration
There are lots of ways for the judge to deserve impeachment/removal without needing racism. Of course there doesn't have to be only one reason. Without any reason to infer racism other than the location, you haven't got a reason to rule out the dick moves common everywhere - and you're assuming without basis that racism isn't common in northern courtrooms.