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Townhall
Abusing
Due Process
by Mike Adams
Mar 11, 2013
Totalitarianism
is brewing in the
heartland. An Indiana inmate is now serving two years for voicing his
online
opinions against a judge who took away his child-custody rights during
a
divorce case. I know the custody case pretty well having written about
it in
2009. But I'm convinced that the free speech case that is brewing in
its
aftermath heaps an even greater injustice upon an existing one. And I'm
convinced it is showing the darker side of a dangerous man who needs to
be
stopped.
Dan
Brewington is justifiably angry
because James Humphrey took his kids away from him based on a report by
an
unlicensed psychologist. During the custody battle, Judge Humphrey also
failed
to provide adequate justification for his decisions as mandated by
Indiana law.
But that just makes him a bad judge. What he allowed to happen in the
wake of
Brewington's reaction makes Humphrey downright dangerous.
Dan
Brewington was convicted in
2011 of intimidating a judge and attempting to obstruct justice. The
Indiana
attorney general’s office successfully argued that he exposed the judge
to
“hatred, contempt, disgrace or ridicule." There is no question that Dan
Brewington broke the law when he went online and criticized Judge
Humphrey for
denying him the right to visit his own children. But the law
criminalizing
Brewington's criticism of the judge is patently unconstitutional. And
Humphrey's complicity in the prosecution is simply unconscionable.
The
Indiana Supreme Court will
decide after this week's filing deadline on whether to hear a second
appeal of
this conviction. I hope they do take up the case in order to address
some
arguments by the Indiana appeals court, which affirmed Brewington's
conviction.
The appeals court argued that some of Brewington’s claims against Judge
Humphrey were false. I do not concede that point. But, regardless,
there is
obviously a great danger in making alleged defamation of judges into a
criminal
offense - much less a felony...
Read
the rest of the article at Townhall
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