Luis Ramirez Case Demonstrates Criminal Justice System Gone Awry

The highly publicized ongoing "hate crimes" case in the death of Luis Ramirez at the hands of a group of white American football players/teenagers in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania, a mostly blue-color small town northwest of Philadelphia, appears to this writer to demonstrate how the American criminal justice system has truly lost its way.

Primarily also due to the inconsistent reporting also that has occurred throughout the nation on the case.

With the first inconsistency being just whether or not the victim was a 25 year old American citizen of Mexican descent, or an illegal immigrant.

Sources in the news media have portrayed him as both, and his initial trial was in state court in which the teens involved were convicted of criminal assault in the beating death of Mr. Ramirez, who they encountered in a park where the victim was out with his 15 year old girlfriend late one evening.

Apparently, the group of teens had had too much to drink and were spoiling for a fight, and from all reports insults were hurled prior to the eventual encounter in both directions. I wonder if the proprietor of the establishment who sold those kids the alcohol has also been brought up on charges, since they were, after all, 16 and 17 at the time of this incident and apparently it occurred after a football game.

The teens were also charged with "ethnic intimidation" under state laws at the time of their trials, but apparently those charges were either dismissed or they were found not guilty on those counts.

Much, of course, has been made that an "all white" jury was involved in the state action, and apparently there are also charges that local authorities were involved in some cover-up of the investigation then thereafter, some of whom are scheduled to be brought up on those charges at some later point in time (although this incident occurred more than two years ago).

The community, of course, has been adversely impacted as this is a town that is a magnet for the claimed "Hispanic community" due to the draw of jobs in the agricultural and industrial (factory) sectors. Of course, Pennsylvania's major industrues are in the coal/steel/industrial sector, with many during this recession also hard hit and out of work.

The uncertainty of this young man's immigration status as reported in the media does bear scrutiny as the prosecution in the subsequent federal case has also inconsisgtently been reported as under the "hate crimes" bill recently signed by Congress (about the same time as this incident occurred, it appears, but that also bears scrutiny). Even more strange is that the federal case is actually being prosecuted against the teens as a violation in affording the victim fair housing under the "Fair Housing Act."

Say, what?

Apparently, since the state dismissed the charges against the teens under the state provisions for "ethnic intimidation" the federal government is barred from then bringing an action under the "hate crimes" legislation passed in 2008, or it was an ex-post facto law in any event passed after this particular incident. Or to then proceed and charge the teens with violation of the federal Hate Crimes Act would, in effect, be double jeopardy since the state prosecutor or the jury had dismissed those charges at the state level.

But now prosecuting them under the "Fair Housing" Act?

MALDEF, a federally funded "educational" group, of course, is involved in the prosecution of the case. Another group that stands to benefit from any and all actions which can in any way be deemed a "civil rights" matter - apparently whether brought on behalf of an actual American citizen or not, since the status of this man's citizenship has been reported, at least in the Boston papers, as an "illegal immigrant."

Although one of the Washington news sources reports him as an "American, of Mexican descent."

But I guess if MALDEF is involved then he must be a Mexican-American. Or the federal statute providing for those legal fee awards makes no distinction, since the words "civil rights" are being used quite liberally by the federal prosecutors for this now Fair Housing case.

A tragic incident, and while the state has actually got the technicalities correct in at least the fact that "ethnicity" just may have been a factor, the federal government is using the "racial" discrimination label - when Hispanic is not actually a "race" at all any more than being of German, Irish or Russian descent.

I wonder when those cases will be brought under the Fair Housing Act?

Alcohol and teens do not mix, but then neither do hormones and teens.

When I was growing up in Arizona during even the grammar school years, the "big tree" outside the schoolyard was famous as the site where any and all fights between the pre-teen boys occurred. Although they were equally matched in most cases, at least one-on-one.

But instead of charges of "bullying" as would occur in any other such incident due to this young man being outnumbered at the outset, and by a group of high school teen football players at that, we are charging them under the Fair Housing Act, after they were already convicted of criminal assault?

It seems to me this new "hate crimes" legislation is going to result in an increase in our adolescent jail population also progressively, and of course our deficit for all those legal fees to all these special interest groups on the illegal immigrant gravy train, when if our borders were secured and then the immigration process also then simplified and made less costly for all those from poorer countries especially who wish to immigrate such cases as these just might also progressively decrease.

I just wonder also, will the ACLU be there for the next European-American young male who is beaten by some Mexican gang members in one of the border state neighborhoods in order to protect their civil rights?

I guess that question is rather rhetorical, since the Fair Housing Act doesn't apply to that "ethnic" group.

And with all the demonstrations and unrest that the illegal immigrant and border situation has resulted in these past few years, and actually since the Reagan amnesty in the 1980's as reported in the media night after night, and being used by the politicians for political purposes most of all each and every election, and in this ever spiraling economic tsunami with more and more Americans continuing to be homeless and jobless by the month, is it any wonder that such a mentality would filter down to especially the adolescent males in a small mining town in Pennsylvania.

I mean, this does appear to be another case of federal negligence at the eventual cost of the public at large, and increasing the tensions over this issue.

This community, far from the border, it also has been reported has been "at war" ever since this incident took place.

Which does not excuse what obviously occured and the "mix" of the circumstances, alcohol, and hormones which eventually led to the death of this young man, but is it any wonder?

And call me somewhat a formerly "overprotective" mom of teens, but just what was this 25 year old young man doing with a 15 year old girl out in a park late at night anyway who it was reported also was a father and had children?

The Fair Housing Act violations seem a stretch, since I wonder if those teens even knew about the Fair Housing Act.

And I wonder what MALDEF's bill will be eventually for this one, since there is also a "Justice" Department lawyer involved in prosecuting this case?