A report in the Denver Post described a tragedy that occurred in Lakewood, CO three years ago,
“Rogel Aguilera-Mederos, 26, lost his brakes in Colorado’s high country and failed to take a runaway truck ramp before he rammed his speeding semi into stopped traffic under an overpass in Lakewood on April 25, 2019, causing a fiery 28-car pileup that killed four people and wounded six others.”
In October this year, a jury found Aguilera-Mederos guilty of four counts of vehicular homicide, six counts of first-degree assault, 10 counts of attempted first-degree assault, four counts of careless driving causing death, two counts of vehicular assault, and one count of reckless driving. His sentence was 110 years in prison.
The prosecution justified the severity of the charges by claiming the speeding Aguilera-Mederos had several opportunities to take a safety ramp - and he chose not to. On the other hand, there’s no suggestion that he was driving under the influence of drugs or alcohol. And you have to wonder if, under the circumstances, a de facto life sentence is appropriate.
The judge didn’t think so. But he believed his hands were tied by state laws which made the 110-year sentence a mandatory minimum. The District Court Judge, Bruce Jones, offered this:
“I will state that if I had the discretion, it would not be my sentence.” He added, “I would say that perhaps the legislature, in imposing a requirement of consecutive sentences, had in mind that there might be cases where a judge should give it further consideration after hearing from the department of corrections, and this may very well be one of those cases.”
Even the family of the victims, while expressing their sense of loss, and their belief that prison time was appropriate, questioned if the sentence was excessive. Duane Bailey, the brother of victim William Bailey, said the incident was a crime and not an accident. But while he thought a jail term of at least 20 years was called for, he did not personally seek a life sentence for Aguilera-Mederos.
Typically in American jurisprudence, jurors are not told what potential sentence a defendant faces. In this case, I’ll warrant they had no idea their decision would lead to 110 years.
The criminal justice system in the United States is a mess. There are 50 states, the District of Columbia, and the federal government, who all have different rules for what constitutes which crime, and how much time each crime should get. The most obvious disparities are in the death penalty. In many states, It has been banned. In others, it's on the books but is never used. On the other end of the scale, you have Texas, which is number one in raw numbers. And Oklahoma, which leads in the per capita race.
Even within death penalty states, there is a wide disparity between local jurisdictions. In the US, there are 3,136 counties, parishes, census tracks, et al. Fewer than 2% of these entities account for more than half of the nation’s death-row population. And since the Supreme Court re-legalized the death penalty in 1976, fewer than 2% of counties account for more than 50% of the executions carried out. And a mere 15 account for 30%.
Then there is racial bias. Even though most whites are killed by other whites and most blacks are killed by other blacks, the most common scenario for execution is a black man killing a white victim.
And it’s not just in murder cases. Every time you hear a lenient sentence has been handed out for a rape conviction or the like, the beneficiary is almost invariably a rich white guy. Take Brock Turner, the Stanford swimmer convicted of rape. He received a sentence of 6 months (and served 3). While the average sentence for rape, if you are not privileged, is 178 months.
Crystal Mason, a Black Texan woman, was given a 5-year sentence for voting illegally. She claimed it was an honest mistake, but even if it was not, five years? Contrast her case with that of Steven Curtis. The former head of the Colorado GOP knowingly voted twice for Trump in 2016 by forging his wife’s signature on a mail-in ballot. He received no jail time, just four years probation and 300 hours of community service.
And then there are the ‘three strikes and you’re out’ laws. There are some habitual violent criminals who no doubt deserve lengthy sentences for serial offending. But too many people are serving extended sentences for a series of offenses where at least one of the offenses was petty. In one instance stealing a $2.50 pair of socks and in another a slice of pizza.
Stanford law school analyzed people who are serving lengthy sentences under three-strike laws and discovered the fundamental unfairness
“Statistics from the California Department of Corrections show that the law disproportionately affects minority populations. 45% of inmates serving life sentences under the three-strikes law are African-American. The three-strikes law is also applied disproportionately against mentally ill and physically disabled defendants.
The legal system should not be a casino, where the white and wealthy play with a marked deck.