Is this going too far to the "safety" side of the spectrum? One might say that the only thing this fellow did was send some nasty emails. He didn't say he had a real plan did he? He didn't name any names, did he? Others might say that he was a proto-killer and it's good that he's locked up.
When I was in Louisville, the court system was very sensitive to domestic violence. There was a lot of what I considered abuse of this staute, K.R.S. 508.080:
508.080 Terroristic threatening in the third degree. (1) Except as provided in KRS 508.075 or 508.078, a person is guilty of terroristic threatening in the third degree when:(a) He threatens to commit any crime likely to result in death or serious physical injury to another person or likely to result in substantial property damage to another person; or (b) He intentionally makes false statements for the purpose of causing evacuation of a building, place of assembly, or facility of public transportation.
(2) Terroristic threatening in the third degree is a Class A misdemeanor.
Lots of people were prosecuted for the threat, "I'm gonna kill you for that." I even saw some people prosecuted for "I'm gonna get you." It was generally not thought of as very important, since it was a misdemeanor, but many defendants ended up with a sentence of 365 days probated for a period of 2 years. If they messed up before the 2 year period was up, the Comonwealth could move to have the probation revoked. That motion was most often granted. Then the legislature changed the rules for concurrent/consecutive time a bit, and prosecutors started moving to have the probated time revoked and served consecutive to any new time. A defendant could end up with more than a year in the county jail for misdemeanor charges that had once before all run concurrently (a defendant could have been sentenced to 365 days on any number of misdemeanor charges and, since by statute they all ran concurrently, the TOTAL sentence was 365 days). Many people were shocked and dismayed when they realized this, because their expectation was that they had "gotten out of" the TT charge. Since the act was so trivial, it was kind of a reasonable expectation. Of course they were warned on the record about the probated time and they had to sign a form stating that they knew what it meant, but I don't think they really understood.
What do you think?
*Edit* This is definitely too far on the other side.
Comments
When I was in Louisville, the court system was very sensitive to domestic violence. There was a lot of what I considered abuse of this staute, K.R.S. 508.080:
508.080 Terroristic threatening in the third degree.
(1) Except as provided in KRS 508.075 or 508.078, a person is guilty of terroristic threatening in the third degree when:(a) He threatens to commit any crime likely to result in death or serious physical injury to another person or likely to result in substantial property damage to another person; or
(b) He intentionally makes false statements for the purpose of causing evacuation of a building, place of assembly, or facility of public transportation.
(2) Terroristic threatening in the third degree is a Class A misdemeanor.
Lots of people were prosecuted for the threat, "I'm gonna kill you for that." I even saw some people prosecuted for "I'm gonna get you." It was generally not thought of as very important, since it was a misdemeanor, but many defendants ended up with a sentence of 365 days probated for a period of 2 years. If they messed up before the 2 year period was up, the Comonwealth could move to have the probation revoked. That motion was most often granted. Then the legislature changed the rules for concurrent/consecutive time a bit, and prosecutors started moving to have the probated time revoked and served consecutive to any new time. A defendant could end up with more than a year in the county jail for misdemeanor charges that had once before all run concurrently (a defendant could have been sentenced to 365 days on any number of misdemeanor charges and, since by statute they all ran concurrently, the TOTAL sentence was 365 days). Many people were shocked and dismayed when they realized this, because their expectation was that they had "gotten out of" the TT charge. Since the act was so trivial, it was kind of a reasonable expectation. Of course they were warned on the record about the probated time and they had to sign a form stating that they knew what it meant, but I don't think they really understood.
What do you think?
*Edit* This is definitely too far on the other side.