Mangino discusses 'Med Student Goes Missing In Bar' on Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

 To watch the interview CLICK HERE

Creators: Susan Smith, Infamous Killer of Her Children, Is Where She Belongs

Matthew T. Mangino
Creators Syndicate
July 23, 2024

In the summer of 1994, O.J. Simpson engaged in his infamous low-speed chase with a parade of Los Angeles squad cars loaded with police officers who wanted to take him into custody for the alleged murder of his wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman. Three months later, on the other side of the country, Susan Smith put her children in a vehicle, strapped them into their car seats and started them on a slow roll to the bottom of John D. Long Lake.

Although Smith's case started after and ended before O.J.'s case, it certainly didn't live in the shadow of the so-called trial of the century. When Smith let her car roll into a lake in Union County, South Carolina, she kicked off a media frenzy that has served as a harbinger of things to come. A throng of media descended on Union County and didn't leave until Smith was shipped down state to prison.

Smith was 22 years old when she told investigators that a Black man had carjacked her while the two boys were still inside the car. The man let her out and sped off with her children. The man who prosecuted Smith, Tommy Pope, is now a member of the South Carolina legislature. He recently told Angenette Levy of the Law and Crime Network that Smith's first assertion that "a Black man carjacked the vehicle with her sons inside" stirred international interest in the case.

She wept on national television, pleading for the children's safe return. "Your mama loves you so much," she said during one news conference, according to Fox News.

Smith was convicted of murdering her children. She has been behind bars for nearly three decades and now has a parole hearing scheduled for Nov. 4.

Her adjustment in prison has been anything but stellar. According to ABC News, Capt. Alfred R. Rowe Jr., a supervisor at the Women's Correctional Institution, was terminated and charged with having sex with Smith while she was incarcerated. A second guard, Lt. Houston Cagle, admitted to also having sex with Smith.

More recently, Smith has been hard at work courting her admirers — according to recorded phone calls from Leath Correctional Institution reviewed by the New York Post, Smith carried on romantic and sexual conversations with at least 12 men over the past three years.

"It's time for me to get out," Smith told one of her admirers over the phone earlier this year. "I've done my time. I'm ready to go."

How will her conduct impact her chances at parole?

Some state parole decision-makers use various assessments including risk, sex offending, mental health and drug and alcohol. Risk assessment tools coupled with parole criteria are thought to provide uniformity to a board's decision-making process.

The South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services has a list of criteria it considers when an individual is eligible for parole. Although the board has absolute discretion with regard to parole, there are 16 factors that the board may consider.

Three of those factors weigh heavily against Smith's parole. First, the seriousness of the offense. It is difficult to think of a more callous act than drowning your children. Second, the inmates conduct while in prison. Sex with guards and phone sex with potential financial supporters is not a good look for someone who wants the board's mercy. Finally, a fact that will play a significant role in the board's decision is the position of the judge, prosecutor and victim's family with regard to parole. Pope, Smith's prosecutor, has already said that he believes in truth in sentencing, "life should mean life."

Parole in South Carolina is a privilege, not a right. Smith may be ready to go, but she is likely to remain behind bars for the foreseeable future.

Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. His book "The Executioner's Toll, 2010" was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino.

To visit Creators CLICK HERE

The Supreme Court is on the ballot this fall

America is facing an assault on our democracy, carried out by the Court’s supermajority, led by Chief Justice John Roberts, and lower court judges, reported the Washington Monthly. Democrats must respond to this attack, no matter their nominee, even if the Court is out of the headlines with its term concluded earlier this month. We’re glad to see reports that President Biden will soon propose term limits and a binding ethics code for Supreme Court justices.

It’s time. In February 2017, shortly after Trump took office, The Washington Post, which first reported the Biden-Harris looming reforms, adopted its slogan: “Democracy dies in darkness.” But democracy can die in broad daylight. Witness Federal District Court Judge Aileen Cannon casting aside long-standing precedents this week to rule that the appointment of Special Counsel Jack Smith is unconstitutional in the Mar-a-Lago documents case over which she’s presiding in Florida. Then there’s the Supreme Court’s stunning decision this month finding the president virtually immune from prosecution. The opinion, authored by Roberts, may scuttle the remaining federal and state cases against Trump, even if Trump loses the election. In New York State, where Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts related to his hush money and election interference scheme, sentencing has been delayed because of the Court’s ruling and may never be carried out.

It’s a familiar but still trenchant observation: There is nothing “conservative” about the Court’s supermajority. It is radical and untethered by conservative respect for precedent or the historic prerogatives of branches besides the executive.

While the Court issued questionable decisions when Chief Justices Warren Burger and William Rehnquist led it—Bush v. Gore—it never strayed so far from respecting constitutional consensus as it has under Roberts, despite his posture as an institutionalist only interested in “calling balls and strikes.”  

Things changed in 2005 when President George W. Bush nominated, and the Senate confirmed Roberts and Samuel Alito to the Court. It created a 5-4 precedent-smashing majority that discovered a Second Amendment right to private ownership of guns (District of Columbia v. Heller, 2008), equated money and speech in extremis (Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, 2010), and invalidated the pre-clearance requirements of the Voting Rights Act which Congress had almost unanimously extended. (Shelby County v. Holder, 2013) Thanks to Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell’s manipulation of the confirmation process to confirm Trump’s three nominees—Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett—the 5-4 Court wielding a sledgehammer became the 6-3 radical court swinging a wrecking ball.

Although the Trumpified Court’s abortion and presidential immunity decisions received the most attention, equally radical are its evisceration of the ability of states and localities to regulate guns, elimination of affirmative action in university admissions, and reversal of the 40-year precedent requiring deference to administrative agencies when statutes are ambiguous. So, too, were its decisions breaching the wall between church and state where even the flimsiest claim of religious liberty sent the justices running to grant a license to discriminate.

“The least dangerous branch,”—Alexander Hamilton’s famous description of the courts—has become the most dangerous, even without the sword or purse.

Trump and McConnell gave us this Supreme Court supermajority to change our country in ways that would be difficult to undo. Taking a victory lap when Barrett was confirmed days before the 2020 presidential election, McConnell boasted: “A lot of what we have done over the last four years will be undone sooner or later by the next election. They won’t be able to do much about this for a long time.”

He’s right. The Constitutional five-alarm fire lit by the Supreme Court supermajority illuminates the only way to respond to this attack on democracy. Whoever the Democrats nominate in Chicago must fiercely counterattack the Supreme Court, putting it front and center in their presidential campaign. They must detail the damage done and offer a clear response. The voters must know that if they elect a Democratic president and a Democratic Congress—very big “if”s, to be sure—the chief executive will fight to enlarge the Supreme Court from nine to 13 members, impose term limits on the justices, and pass a binding ethics code.

The case for these changes has been compelling for many years. Of the advanced democracies, America has the smallest number of jurists on its high court. We also have the only high court whose members are not constrained by age or term limits. Their replacement is a matter of the vicissitudes of death and resignation rather than any predictable timetable, leaving some one-term presidents like Trump with three nominations and others, like Jimmy Carter, with none.

Ignoring this antiquated and arbitrary system was possible when the Court commanded widespread respect. That is no longer the case, and “we the people” need not stand by while six justices remake our country, some while enriching themselves. When the Civil Rights Act neared passage in the summer of 1964, a very different Senate Republican leader, Everett Dirksen, who backed Lyndon Johnson’s historic legislation, quoted the French novelist Victor Hugo: “Nothing is more powerful than an idea whose time has come.” The next Democratic president needs to act on that truth.

To read more CLICK HERE

Law & Crime: These cases will go away faster than you can say ‘President Trump’: For Trump’s legal team, it’s all about delay

Matthew T. Mangino
Special for Law and Crime News
July 8, 2024

The U.S. Supreme Court decision on presidential immunity is already having an impact on the pending criminal cases against Donald Trump. The former president’s lawyers are trying to apply the ruling in Trump v. United States to the Mar-a-Lago classified documents case. In a 10-page motion, lawyers have asked U.S. District Judge Aileen M. Cannon to allow them to file additional briefings on immunity and to freeze nearly all pretrial activity until she resolves the issue.

“Resolution of these threshold questions is necessary to minimize the adverse consequences to the institution of the presidency arising from this unconstitutional investigation and prosecution,” Trump’s lawyers wrote in the July 5 filing.

The second look proposed by Trump’s legal team was made possible by the Supreme Court’s recent ruling. The high court found “at least a presumptive immunity from criminal prosecution for a President’s acts within the outer perimeter of his official responsibility.” The Court ruled that the former president has absolute immunity with regard to his discussions with the Department of Justice about leveraging power to have states replace their legitimate electors and investigating sham allegations of election fraud.

The court found that the president is presumptively immune for allegedly “attempt[ing] to pressure the Vice President to take particular acts in connection with his role at the certification proceeding.”

What’s more, the majority of the justices found that Trump’s communication by tweet and public address on Jan. 6 may be protected.

“The president possesses ‘extraordinary power to speak to his fellow citizens and on their behalf,” the decision said. “[T]he President’s] communications are likely to fall comfortably with the outer perimeter of his official responsibilities.”

Trump’s lawyers will likely seek to toss all of the federal charges for subversion of the 2020 election. The Supreme Court has remanded the case to U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan to determine which allegations in Smith’s indictment would be barred under the decision, and the justices said that additional briefing will be needed for the trial court to do so.

The portion of Smith’s prosecution dealing with scheming with the Department of Justice to pressure Georgia to investigate the election is dead in the water. Trump’s team will use the court’s opinion to fight evidence in the case still standing after Chutkan completes her analysis — like meetings Trump had with his top advisers and Vice President Mike Pence.

Some portion of the fake electors case might survive the court’s scrutiny and also the classified documents case which occurred after Trump left the White House.

Smith’s prosecutions have taken a blow, but it’s certainly not a knockout. However, Trump’s strategy from the beginning in dealing with the various criminal charges was delay. To that end he has been successful. Smith’s prosecutions will not be tried before Election Day, and if Trump ultimately wins in November these cases will go away faster than you can say “President Trump.”

Matthew T. Mangino is of counsel with Luxenberg, Garbett, Kelly & George P.C. and the former District Attorney of Lawrence County, Pennsylvania, His book “The Executioner’s Toll, 2010” was released by McFarland Publishing. You can reach him at www.mattmangino.com and follow him on Twitter @MatthewTMangino

To read more CLICK HERE

 

Former GOP AG concerned about 'abuse of power'

 As the onetime White House counsel and attorney general under President George W. Bush, Alberto Gonzales was known as an energetic and sometimes controversial supporter of expansive presidential powers, particularly in the realm of national security. He’s also no fan of Donald Trump, reported POLITICO.

So what would he make of the Supreme Court’s recent ruling granting broad immunity to the president, including significant protection to Trump from prosecution in the Justice Department’s case alleging that he tried to steal the 2020 election?

In an interview with POLITICO Magazine conducted over the phone, and in an email follow-up after the assassination attempt on Trump, Gonzales largely sought to square the circle: Even as he suggested the Supreme Court’s ruling largely affirmed the need for a president to make tough decisions, he expressed dismay about how Trump might use the authority for malign purposes if he returns to the White House.

“Why would anyone think, given his record, that he would not abuse the power of the office?” Gonzales said. “I think everyone should have concerns about possible abuse if he becomes president of the United States again.”

To read more CLICK HERE

Mangino talks trials on COURT TV

 To watch CLICK HERE and CLICK HERE

Oklahoma executes man for raping and killing his 7-year-old former stepdaughter

 The 9th Execution of 2024

Oklahoma executed Richard Rojem on June 27, 2024. He was convicted of kidnapping, raping and killing his 7-year-old former stepdaughter in 1984.

Rojem, 66, received a three-drug lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester and was declared dead at 10:16 a.m., prison officials said. Rojem, who had been in prison since 1985, was the longest-serving inmate on Oklahoma’s death row.

When asked if he had any last words, Rojem, who was strapped to a gurney and had an IV in his tattooed left arm, said: “I don’t. I’ve said my goodbyes.”

He looked briefly toward several witnesses who were inside a room next to the death chamber before the first drug, the sedative midazolam, began to flow. He was declared unconscious about 5 minutes later, at 10:08 a.m., and stopped breathing at about 10:10 a.m.

A spiritual adviser was in the death chamber with Rojem during the execution.

Rojem had denied responsibility for killing his former stepdaughter, Layla Cummings. The child’s mutilated and partially clothed body was discovered in a field in rural Washita County near the town of Burns Flat on July 7, 1984. She had been stabbed to death.

Rojem was previously convicted of raping two teenage girls in Michigan, and prosecutors said he was angry at Layla Cummings because she reported that Rojem sexually abused her, leading to his divorce from the girl’s mother and his return to prison for violating his parole.

Rojem’s attorneys argued at a clemency hearing this month that DNA evidence taken from the girl’s fingernails did not link him to the crime.

“If my client’s DNA is not present, he should not be convicted,” attorney Jack Fisher said.

In a statement read by Attorney General Gentner Drummond after the execution, Layla’s mother, Mindy Lynn Cummings, said: “We remember, honor and hold her forever in our hearts as the sweet and precious 7-year-old she was.

“Today marks the final chapter of justice determined by three separate juries for Richard Rojem’s heinous acts nearly 40 years ago when he stole her away like the monster he was.”

Rojem, who testified at the hearing via a video link from prison, said he wasn’t responsible for the girl’s death. The panel voted 5-0 not to recommend to the governor that Rojem’s life be spared.

“I wasn’t a good human being for the first part of my life, and I don’t deny that,” said Rojem, handcuffed and wearing a red prison uniform. “But I went to prison. I learned my lesson and I left all that behind.”

Prosecutors said there was plenty of evidence to convict Rojem, including a fingerprint that was discovered outside the girl’s apartment on a cup from a bar Rojem left just before the girl was kidnapped. A condom wrapper found near the girl’s body also was linked to a used condom found in Rojem’s bedroom, prosecutors said.

A Washita County jury convicted Rojem in 1985 after just 45 minutes of deliberations. His previous death sentences were twice overturned by appellate courts because of trial errors. A Custer County jury ultimately handed him his third death sentence in 2007.

Oklahoma, which has executed more inmates per capita than any other state in the nation since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976, has now carried out 13 executions since resuming lethal injections in October 2021 following a nearly six-year hiatus resulting from problems with executions in 2014 and 2015.

To read more CLICK HERE