Archive for September, 2010

Last week I blogged about a teacher in Spokane who had been put on leave for passing out lyrics to a Blue Scholars song.  See post.   Since that time, a Facebook site sprung up in his defense.  See here.  The site announced that teacher Brad Read would be back to work soon, and this is confirmed by a story posted this morning in the Spokesman-Review.  His return to work was heralded by some, but when you read the details, the way the school treated him is pretty discouraging.  In order to be rejoin his students, Brad Read had to forfeit 19 days pay, and sign a “last chance agreement”.   Such an agreement makes it very easy for the school district to get rid of him even for a minor error.  Additionally, Brad Read had to admit wrongdoing, and agree not to make any public statements in his own defense contrary to that admission.  In other words, he had to agree to a gag order. 

I wondered in my earlier blog post who it was exactly that was imposing the discipline.  That question is answered by the disciplinary letter that Shadle Park School District provided to the Spokesman-Review.  The school official is Assistant Superintendent Staci Vesneske.  You can see why Staci Vesneske would have a problem with what Brad Read did.   Look again at the lyrics of the song he distributed.  The song is very critical of the public school system, a system in which  Staci Vesneske has thrived.  When the Spokane school district was under fire for having too many high paid administrators (rather than teachers), Staci Vesneske spoke in defense of the $175,000 salaries.  See source.   Why are the administrators getting paid so much when they are doing such a bad job of keeping kids in school?

When news came out that Brad Read was placed on leave, many people wondered why a teacher would be suspended just for distributing song lyrics that contained the word “fuck”.    People didn’t understand because the same word is in books in the current curriculum such as  “A Separate Peace”.  The truth is that the disciplinary action against Brad Read has less to do with the word fuck, and more to do with the criticism of Staci Vesneske’s school system.  I have never met or spoken to Brad Read, but you have to feel a little bad for a teacher who was forced to choose between the students that he loved and his first amendment rights.

I always like to hear what someone has to say when they are leaving a job.  Leaving a job definitely allows people to be pretty candid about their experience. When I stepped down from my position as the GMA lawyer for Ferry County, I took the opportunity to criticize the groups Riparian Owners of Ferry County and the Stevens County Farm Bureau for their frivolous suits against Ferry County.  See post. Well this week was Michael Haas’ turn to tell us what he thinks.  The Omak-Chronicle reporter Al Camp interviewed Haas about his departure and his planned move back to Port Townsend.  At first the article explained that he was leaving for family reasons, and then Haas went on to lavish compliments on many of the court house staff. He is quoted as saying:  “Overall, your judicial system works well. Your judges are thoughtful, respectful and take their jobs seriously… The same is true for your prosecutor’s office and the county commissioners.”  Just when I was getting ready to think this was a fluff piece that Al Camp wrote, I saw what Haas had to say about law enforcement in Okanogan County.  “…[T]he overall quality of investigations in Okanogan County is abysmal.”   Al Camp explains that Haas said that part of the problem is all the small police departments, though he said the sheriff’s office left much to be desired as well.  Haas questioned the decision of every municipality to set up their own police force, and added that the police could benefit by better and regular training.

So what sort of letters to the editor is this article going to provoke?   I guess we will see when the new paper comes out tomorrow.  Though Haas would certainly know better than me about Okanogan, I am not sure Okanogan police investigations are really that much worse than other rural areas.    In all rural areas, it seems like unproductive officers are allowed to stay on working because it is too hard to get rid of them.  Then you have some inexperienced officers who are totally gung-ho, but really don’t know what they are doing and don’t have the patience to listen and learn from the prosecutors.  A lot of the really good cops end up getting lured away by bigger departments that can afford to pay more.  When I used to work as a prosecutor, the police definitely used to drive me crazy.  Some of the police I worked with often turned in lackluster work, but would expect superhuman results from me as a prosecutor.

Although I didn’t get to know him real well, I always liked Michael Haas.  He knew a lot of about the law, kept up-to-date with new changes in the law, and was always pretty collegial.  I blogged about case he was involved in when he first came to town.  See post.

What do you think?  Is Haas right that there is room for improvement in Okanogan County law enforcement?  Is he simply saying what others are too timid to mention?  In the article Haas mentions that more funding should be spent on drug recovery programs than drug enforcement?  What do you think of that?

You have to wonder about those students at Shadle Park High School.

The Blue Scholars

Their popular English teacher Brad Read was placed on leave the other day for passing out the lyrics to a rap song, and the students have not come out publicly in his defense.  Apparently some parents complained about the song that contained foul language.  Here are a sample of the lyrics by Seattle hip-hop artists Blue Scholars:

With the grade point average hanging over head,
Brother sister please don’t believe the bullshit they said.
Fuck the pledge of allegiance and arrogant teachers
But peace to the people who don’t ever preach in the front of a classroom
All day long, planting seeds of revolution,
We dedicate this song.
It goes one for the student who refuses to submit
And two for the teachers who are underpaid as shit
It’s the next generation of miseducated youth
Who demonstrate the truth and manage to make it through

If you want to check out the Blue Scholars video, click here.  Looking at the lyrics you can kind of see that the problem may have less about the word “fuck” and more about the the irreverence of the song.  The latest word on the subject was that the teacher Brad Read was on leave pending an ” investigation.”  See article in the Spokesman-Review.  What is there to investigate?  He passed out some lyrics – give him an oral warning and put him back to work.  Why are the students at Shadle Park High School putting up with this baloney?  Are they content to have to deal with a substitute while the school administrators meet to make sure that the students are exposed to only the blandest, most non-controversial curriculum?  Isn’t it an insult to the students’ intelligence for the school to think that Shadle Park kids need to be sheltered from the words “fuck” and “bullshit”?  I blogged earlier this year about students of the past demonstrating with black armbands.  (See post.)  Maybe armbands aren’t the way for the students of today. But what about starting a Facebook page in the defense of this aptly-named English teacher?

I guess it is a school’s job to build character. And I suppose one virtue the school is supposed to instill is courage. It doesn’t show a lot of courage for school officials to overreact and put a teacher on leave simply because one person complains about something that might be controversial. Couldn’t this have been handled short of putting teacher Brad Read on paid leave? It does not show a lot of courage for Shadle Park to kowtow to the person or people who complained. It is a waste of the school district’s money to be paying a substitute and having a teacher sit at home. I would kind of like to know the name of this school official who freaked out about these lyrics. He or she should be named in the paper. So far all I have seen in the paper is the name of the spokesperson for Shadle Park High School.

(Note from 9/24/10: To see the outcome of this case, see the recent post here.)

Before we turn to Anne Bremner, who remembers Randy Dorn’s DUI?  Randy Dorn is the State’s School Superintendent who avoided a publicity circus surrounding his DUI earlier this year by simply marching in as soon as he could and pleading guilty.  See earlier blog post. It appeared at the time that Randy Dorn plead guilty straight-up to the DUI rather than hold out for a reduced charge, simply to avoid the appearance that he was receiving any special deal.  In contrast, look at the media storm that Seattle Lawyer Ann Bremner has caused by her DUI. She initially blamed her erratic behavior on a concussion, then raced to court to attempt to prevent release of the police reports.   This was the subject of the Seattle Weekly Blog this week.

Lawyer Anne Bremner often serves as a guest on the evening news to discuss high-profile legal cases.

Rick Anderson writes: “It would subject her to embarrassment and ridicule if police records are released to the press about her arrest for drunk driving, says popular Seattle attorney Anne Bremner. Instead, she has chosen to be embarrassed and ridiculed for not releasing those records. For such a media-savvy attorney with an impressive legal background, it appears she has already lost in the court of public opinion.”

You really have to wonder what Anne was thinking in trying to go to court to stop the release of her police reports and 911 calls.  Washington has some of the toughest public disclosure laws in the U.S.  Rick Anderson goes on to write: “For a smart and creative lawyer whose client list includes cops and other public officials, the brain-damage excuse – while an oldie and a goodie – isn’t much of a defense. It’s a sure-fire headline maker, in fact. Of course, we’re assuming that wasn’t her intention.”  I guess I am not sure I agree with Rick Anderson that we can assume that that was not her intention.  You often hear the expression that “there is no such thing as bad publicity.”  I am sure this is true for hip-hop artists, but is it true for high-profile defense attorneys?  In this day and age, negative publicity seems to dominate the media’s interest. I really doubt if Anne Bremner gives a hoot about her name in the paper for a DUI arrest. While she may not be a rap star, she certainly is not the elected school superintendent, and I doubt if her clientele would really care about a DUI conviction.   Let’s face it, defense attorneys are not always the most adored members of society.  The public associates us too much with the clients we represent.  Our work might be viewed as a constitutional necessity, but we do not hold ourselves out as roll models.    I thought of this today when I read in the Seattle-Times that the police had released the police reports of her DUI arrest. (The Seattle-Times posted the reports online here.)  As police reports go, the arrest is pretty run of the mill.  You can tell she is a criminal defense lawyer because she knows enough to refuse to take the field sobriety tests or to waive her right to remain silent.  And like most people who are arrested for DUI, she sounds as if she was a real pill for the police to have to deal with.  The police attempt to portray her as throwing her weight around, and boasting that she is “famous”.  But I half wonder if the police don’t sometimes embellish these sort of statements.

If you work in the field of criminal justice, it is hard to look at the prosecution of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito as anything but an injustice.  As a former prosecutor, that was my experience blogging about the subject last year.  (See earlier posts here, here, here, here, and here.)  But now, other criminal justice professionals are joining the chorus of Americans concerned about the fairness of the trial of Amanda Knox and Raffaele Sollecito.  Case in point Steve Moore, retired F.B.I. agent.   Moore has 25 years investigating some of the most serious crimes imaginable for the F.B.I.  Steve Moore was not connected at all with the Knox supporters, but he found it hard to be silent after he took a look at Amanda’s case.   Steve Moore’s statement about the case is online at the blog Injustice in Perugia.  Check out the below media interview in which he is interviewed on MSNBC.

I like his point that this crime does not fit Amanda Knox’s character.

MSNBC: You also made the point that this crime does not fit Amanda Knox’s personality profile.

Steve Moore: Amanda Knox is not a violent person. The problem with this is if a person is violent enough…. What they are alleging is that she [Amanda Knox] came in on her roommate who was being sexually assaulted and sided with the assaulter, and not only helped him assault her roommate, but stabbed her in the throat. That kind of deviant violent behavior does not go unnoticed for 18, 19, 20 years. Some things leak out. You see some episodes. You see some indications that the person has some issues. Amanda Knox never had an issue.

As a former prosecutor, that is one of the problems I have never understood, what motive would Amanda Knox have to stab her roommate to death?  A violent stabbing is just not an “entry-level” crime.  A person works their way up to such an offense with a long history of other crimes such as assaults and threats to kill.  The prosecutor Giuliano Mignini just was never able to establish a credible motive for why an average American  college student would rape and murder her roommate.