On my way to work each morning, I walk past the Attorney General’s office on South Main Street, and I never tire of giggling at the building’s inscription:
With great power comes great responsibility. — Stan Lee
Yesterday, it seems, this motto received more than mere lip service when special assistant AG Molly K. Cote managed to prove two ACI guards—Former Capt. Gualter Botas and former Lt. Kenneth Viveiros—guilty on charges of assaulting four inmates.
Yesterday’s verdicts, which culminated an 18-day trial before Superior Court Judge Daniel A. Procaccini, came after jurors had deliberated for less than four hours over the course of two days.
Afterward, state corrections Director A.T. Wall issued a statement that began with a quote from former President Theodore Roosevelt: “No man is above the law and no man is beneath it.”
“These two former correctional officers have now been held accountable in a court of law for their abuse of inmates entrusted to their custody,” Wall said. “They do not represent the staff of this department. In fact, through their actions, they have dishonored the 1,500 men and women who perform their jobs with pride, professionalism and integrity every day. These men and women do a very difficult job, and they do it without breaking the law.”
Their charges are misdemeanors, carrying a maximum sentence of up to one year in prison. Can you imagine the fate of an inmate convicted of beating inmates? Botas and Viveiros have yet to be sentenced, but each, rightly, has been fired by the Department of Corrections.
How do you blow a .49 on a breathalyzer? Does that mean that half of your blood is alcohol?
For the answers to these questions and more, we turn to 34 year old North Providence resident and former Brown University presidential chef Stanley Kobierowski, who recently crashed into an electronic message board on I-95 near the mall in what turns out to be the drunkest attempt to drive, or do anything except die, in the history of Rhode Island.
In fact, according to variousw booze-ologists unearthed by the
ProJo, this dude should not have been concious:
“For the average individual, there is a very severe risk of death when you start to approach a reading of .4,” said James Harasymiw, director of Alcohol Detection Services in Big Bend, Wis….
“He is in a very small class of people because most people — even heavy drinkers — would be unconscious or approaching death to get up to .5. The danger with this guy is that with that kind of tolerance, you may appear to be fine one moment and unconscious the next.”
Harasymiw calculated… that the man would have had to have had roughly 24 drinks — defined as a 12-ounce glass of beer or a shot and a half of whiskey — over six hours.
For those of you keeping score, that translates out into a whiskey shot every ten minutes for six hours straight.
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Trial begins this week in Superior Court for Capt. Gualter Botas, 39, of Pawtucket, and Lt. Kenneth J. Viveiros, 56, of North Providence. The two ACI Correctional Officers face seven counts and four counts, respectively, of simple assault involving four inmates.
Edward Fitzpatrick reports for the ProJo:
During Superior Court testimony on Wednesday and Thursday, former inmate Matthew S. Gumkowski testified that Botas “sucker-punched” him after he made a vulgar suggestion to the captain on June 8, 2005.
At the time, Gumkowski, 27, of East Greenwich, was serving sentences on drug delivery and weapon possession charges, and he was caught with a $20 bill at the minimum-security facility. Paper currency is prohibited at the prison unless inmates are on work release. […] Gumkowski said the punch landed near his right eye and cheek bone and he began bleeding. “It was split open,” he said. “He threw some napkins at me and said, ‘Go ahead and do something and I’ll call a code.’ […]
In February 2007, District Court Judge Madeline Quirk found Botas, Viveiros and correctional officer Ernest Spaziano guilty of assaulting Gonzalez, an inmate who was serving a sentence on a drug conviction. The three officers appealed their convictions to Superior Court. Spaziano, 40, of Burrillville, was the first to go to trial in Superior Court, and earlier this year he was found not guilty of assaulting Gonzalez. Now, Botas and Viveiros are receiving a Superior Court trial. Originally, the trial was to include allegations that Botas forced inmate Michael Walsh to taste his own feces.
But Michael J. Healey, a spokesman for the attorney general’s office, said Procaccini granted a defense motion to sever that allegation from the others. He said the judge told prosecutors they could either try all the allegations at once while not using evidence that Walsh was “allegedly made to eat his own feces” — or they could use that evidence and try the Walsh allegation separately. Prosecutors chose to have a separate trial.
So, yeah. COs, meet my friend, Justice. Play nice, boys.
The New York Times has
a piece today on a
RI Training School program that puts juvenile offenders to work restoring old New England diners through the
New Hope Diner Project. The youths restore the diners’ decrepit buildings, work the griddles and cash registers, and will (eventually, hopefully) manage the actual businesses sometime in the future. Pam Belluck writes:
“The whole poetry behind it is that these are kids who have been pretty much cast away emotionally and criminally, getting a chance to restore beloved eateries that have been cast off from society, too,” said Daniel Zilka, the acting director of the American Diner Museum, who rescues decrepit diners and helps run the project. “If they continue on the path that they’ve been moving upon they would end up in an adult correctional facility. This is probably their last opportunity.”
The offenders at the detention center, some as young as 13, have been convicted of crimes like sexual assault, armed robbery, breaking and entering, and drug offenses, and sentenced to serve 6 to 18 months. The center, the Rhode Island Training School, also has maximum security for offenders including murderers, but offenders qualify for the project only if they behave well enough to move to the regular detention population. They must also have, or nearly have, a high school equivalency diploma.
Work release is an important reentry mechanism for many offenders, but should these youths be encouraged to spend their time studying and developing more general skills before jumping into this line of work? Or do programs like this create order, stability, and options for young people with seemingly no way out?
From Chris Barnett at the Secretary of State’s office, w learn that potential candidates best get crackin’:
Today at 4 p.m. is the deadline for candidates to submit the signatures of enough eligible Rhode Island voters to get on the ballot this year, according to Secretary of State A. Ralph Mollis.
Rhode Islanders can track the progress of all of the candidates who are vying for a spot on the ballot by
visiting the Secretary of State’s web site.
.
Every morning Mollis will update the number of signatures that have been certified for every candidate in their quest to appear on the ballot.
Signature papers already have started to trickle in to local boards of canvassers, according to Mollis. Among the candidates who appear to already have made the cut are House Majority Leader Gordon Fox and House
Finance Committee Chairman Steve Costantino, both Providence Democrats. [As we know, Daily Dose Maven
David Segal will too].
The Secretary of State has until July 18 to finish certifying the names in order for candidates to officially be placed on the ballot for the September 9 primary or November 4 election.
Ericka J. Atwell, a senior at Rhode Island College, was
impeached from her position as the school’s Student Community Government Deputy Speaker in March, but she’s decided to give politics another go…with more on the line. After having been found guilty of circulating candidacy petitions on behalf of other students—an action forbidden by RIC SCG bylaws—the 22-year-old
has filed to run for District 27 State Representative as a Republican against incumbent
Representative Patricia A. Serpa.
Atwell’s Republican primary challenger, Thomas K. Jones, questions the wisdom of his party in endorsing this controversial young woman. “If the Republican Party is going to be taken seriously in Rhode Island,” he told
the ProJo, “We need to run serious candidates with a track record of being involved in their communities.”
Atwell, who learned a great deal about political integrity during her internship with Governor Carcieri, explains, “I’ve moved on to bigger and better things. I loved serving the students and working with the administration, but I learned that sometimes you have to cut your losses and move forward.”
In an earlier version of this post, I alluded to an inside rumor about Ericka J. Atwell campaigning in a mini-dress and heels. I apologize for including this piece of gossip, although it did come from a fairly credible source. As a young woman active in politics, I often resent the extent to which I must dress more formally and frigidly than my male counterparts in order to be taken seriously, and it would be a shame to propagate rumors about a young female candidate—rumors that very well might be aimed at discrediting her based on her age and appearance—when I myself am so familiar with this struggle. I apologize for including that tidbit. If it’s true, however, it’s still hilarious, not to mention totally inappropriate.
The honorable Matt Jerzyk has a post to this effect over at
RIFuture, as does Sir Ian McKellen Donnis
at N4N, but I feel the need to reiterate: what’s up with the AG? While 42 other attorneys general signed on to support the Free Flow of Information Act, which would create a qualified federal shield law for reporters, Patrick Lynch did not. Lynch, who on June 19 was elected president of the
National Association of Attorneys General, does justice (no pun intended) to that organization’s alias: the
National Association of Aspiring Governors.
I think a lot of Rhode Islanders take for granted an important lil’ Rhody anomaly: most states have
district attorneys and
attorneys general, these being two distinct positions and offices. We’re small enough that the two positions are lumped into one office. Our attorneys general, therefore, spend the majority of their time and energy prosecuting criminals and upholding severe criminal justice policies rather than representing the larger interests of all our citizens.
In March, I was privileged to attend the
11th Annual Liman Public Interest Colloquium at the Yale Law School. In keeping with the topic of the conference—”Liman at the Local Level: Public Interest Advocacy and American Federalism”—we had the opportunity to hear from Connecticut Attorney General
Richard Blumenthal, Ohio Solicitor General
William Marshall, San Francisco City Attorney
Dennis Herrera, and
James Tierney, Director of the National State Attorneys General Program. These four fellows have used their positions as state and city attorneys to compensate for the failings, negligence, and misguided decisions of the federal government and judiciary.
I understand one of his many vetoes this legislative session: the courthouse construction bill, a piece of legislation pledging $88 million to the construction of a new Blackstone Valley courthouse.
According to the ProJo, Carcieri said in his veto message, “Never, not even once, has any Rhode Islander — save a legislator or a judge — ever spoke to me of the pressing need to build a court-house in the Blackstone Valley.”
On the urgency of the project, however, Supreme Court Chief Justice Frank Williams declared in an April speech:
The need to better serve our citizens in northern Rhode Island and to decongest a severely overcrowded Garrahy Judicial Complex in Providence by building a Blackstone Valley Courthouse is not going to go away.
As a legal intern with the
RI Office of the Public Defender, I may not be privy to every aspect of life at the Garrahy complex. I do, however, work there 4 days a week from 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., and I’m a bit perplexed by the congestion with which the Chief is concerned. In fact, things can get pretty slow around there, and I’ve taken to reading
The New Yorker in between Judge Higgins’ arraignments in Courtroom 4C, where I am usually stationed.
Indian-giver [sorry, couldn’t resist] Judge Susan McGuirl gave a suspended sentence to three Narragansett tribe members convicted of assaulting state police.
Projo’s got it:
The three Narragansett Indian tribal members convicted of assaulting and scuffing with state police during the 2003 raid on a tribal smoke shop will not have to spend time in jail. Judge Susan McGuirl issued a suspended sentence for one of the defendants and filed the case of Chief Sachem Matthew Thomas and the other tribe member, ordering them to provide community service by talking to school children about tribe history.
HEY SO there’s a poster/print show this FRIDAY @ 5 Traverse Gallery on the corner of wickenden st. and traverse st (a.k.a next to kabloom, across from the utrecht parking lot– have a latte at coffee xxx-change, eat some cous cous). it’s an OPEN SHOW which means ANYONE can show up and put their prints/posters/flyers/p-copies/l-press/litho-graph-y/s-skreens/etchings/openbitez/soft embosses/pulp prints/etc etc etc up on the wall. maybe some dudes will buy some stuff!
as jay z (local jay z, not beyonce’s jay-z) would say: “IT IS WHAT U MAKE IT”. some come through and MAKE IT GOOD!!!!!
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I’m getting pretty amp’d for
The Steelyard is Burning tonight. I know because I woke up jittery and anxious at like 6:30 this morning and began compulsively adding my favorite jammies to my already ample playlist. Just imagine the vibes and wonderful people at a normal
Providence is Burning (the next installment of which is coming on May 31, 2008 at Firehouse 13) and crank them up about four gagillion times.
Jackson and I,
Certified Max and a bevy of artists and industrialists of all stripes will be holding it down in a rainproof tent with a battery of subs by our sides. Come check out dope lights by Power Posse and cold brews by Gansett cuz 27 Sims is gonna get loopy tonight at 10pm.
Does it count as shameless self-promotion to promote my promotion of a friend’s event? Hopefully not. Scope my piece in this week’s Phoenix on the upcoming criminal justice reform festival, Justice or Just Us?, taking place at AS220 real soon.
I have to throw in on this new
Stanley’s Burgers place down on Richmond Street. I had never heard of this Rhode Island institution and I’m not a big hamburger person, particularly when it’s just a gigantic ball of ground meat. For me a sandwich is all about the proportion of the bread to the other stuff — a little bit of this and a little bit of that — not just a huge tower of meat. And it should be easy to eat. I had Stanley’s bacon cheeseburger for lunch today, and at first it doesn’t look like much, it’s a pretty small patty. But it totally works. And the bun is real soft so you can squish it down flat the way I like. I would order two next time I think. According to
Dave they are open until 2AM… good late night food. The decor is a bit much, but I don’t care, I’m going back.
UPDATE: Footage, courtesy of
the Greenwash Gorillas themselves… even as this was a pretty amazing spectacle, the footage kind of makes me want to give Tom a big hug. While I understand the criticisms of Friedman’s work, I wonder if this was an effective way to get the message across, or whether this merely reflects poorly on the University… thoughts? Could the pie-throwers have raised their dissent during the Q&A with as much flair?
New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman had just begun his Earth Day lecture at Brown last night, when Molly Little ‘08.5 and a colleague let him know what they thought of his work.
The Brown Daily Herald reports:
A female audience member ran on stage last night and threw a green pie at New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman […]. The woman had been sitting in the south side of the auditorium’s front row when she pulled the pie out of a Brown Bookstore plastic bag that had been tucked in a red backpack and leapt out of her seat.
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I’m getting pretty amp’d for
