She's not just out of control - she's out of her mind.
Or so lawyers for the so-called "Lady al Qaeda" claimed Tuesday as asked a judge to bar their client from taking the stand in her own defense.
Lawyers for MIT-trained scientist Aafia Siddiqui say her request to testify "is driven by her severe mental illness and would turn the trial into a spectacle."
"It has been and continues to be our belief that Dr. Siddiqui suffers from diminished capacity," the lawyers wrote in a letter to Manhattan Federal Richard Berman.
The bid to muzzle Siddiqui - charged with attempted murder for opening fire on Americans in Afghanistan - is a longshot since she's already been found competent.
Since the trial began last week, she's been tossed from the courtroom several times for outbursts - including pleas to talk to President Obama and boasts that she can broker peace with the Taliban.
The lawyer fear more of the same under oath.
"Should Dr. Siddiqui continue her irrational and bewildering insistence that she has the power to influence the Taliban, she will invite jurors to infer that she has terrorist associations," they wrote.
Her family says they're also worried about Siddiqui's mental state.
What the heck does "already found competent" mean? Don't they know that mentally ill people can decompensate at any time? Judges have an obligation to not let litigants go crazy in courtroom. It is clear this woman is going to do it every day. She should be found incompetent!
It is settled that, if evidence available to a trial judge raises a bona fide doubt regarding a defendant's ability to understand and participate in the proceedings against him, the judge has an obligation to order an examination to assess his competency, even if the defendant does not request such an exam. Drope v. Missouri, <466 U.S. 984 , 986> 420 U.S. 162 (1975); Pate v. Robinson, 383 U.S. 375 (1966).
Somebody please call those judges. Send them copies of this. File complaints. They are a danger to our country.
Section 100.3 A judge shall perform the duties of judicial office impartially and diligently.
(A) Judicial duties in general. The judicial duties of a judge take precedence over all the judge's other activities. The judge's judicial duties include all the duties of the judge's office prescribed by law. In the performance of these duties, the following standards apply.
(B) Adjudicative Responsibilities.
(1) A judge shall be faithful to the law and maintain professional competence in it. A judge shall not be swayed by partisan interests, public clamor or fear of criticism.
(2) A judge shall require order and decorum in proceedings before the judge.
(3) A judge shall be patient, dignified and courteous to litigants, jurors, witnesses, lawyers and others with whom the judge deals in an official capacity, and shall require similar conduct of lawyers, and of staff, court officials and others subject to the judge's direction and control.
(4) A judge shall perform judicial duties without bias or prejudice against or in favor of any person. A judge in the performance of judicial duties shall not, by words or conduct, manifest bias or prejudice, including but not limited to bias or prejudice based upon age, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, disability, marital status or socioeconomic status, and shall require staff, court officials and others subject to the judge's direction and control to refrain from such words or conduct.
(5) A judge shall require lawyers in proceedings before the judge to refrain from manifesting, by words or conduct, bias or prejudice based upon age, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, disability, marital status or socioeconomic status, against parties, witnesses, counsel or others. This paragraph does not preclude legitimate advocacy when age, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, religion, national origin, disability, marital status or socioeconomic status, or other similar factors are issues in the proceeding.
(6) A judge shall accord to every person who has a legal interest in a proceeding, or that person's lawyer, the right to be heard according to law. A judge shall not initiate, permit, or consider ex parte communications, or consider other communications made to the judge outside the presence of the parties or their lawyers concerning a pending or impending proceeding, except:
If they know she is going to be disruptive again, the judges have an obligation to take steps to prevent that from happening. If they do not, they are grossly negligent.
Hey Everybody- This is the first news story about this. It's a local paper. A weekly.
Independence Township man leads charge to have Hackettstown man convicted of Tillie Smith murder pardoned -- nearly 150 years later By Warren Reporter December 06, 2009, 4:04PM
An image of James Titus, who was convicted of the 1866 (sic) murder of Tillie Smith in Hackettstown.
Story Written By Todd Petty
Regardless of whether you believe in ghosts, Hackettstown residents have been aware of the presence of Tillie Smith for well over a century. Murdered in 1866 (sic), Tillie’s name still elicits an impassioned reaction from local residents – it is a part of their dialogue, a part of their folklore, and a part of their history.
However, pieces of the story may still remain unwritten — there remains a specter of doubt regarding the involvement of James Titus, the man who was found guilty and sentenced to prison for seventeen years for Tillie’s murder.
One resident in particular from Independence Township, Erik Anderson, is determined to close the case once and for all. Anderson is working to have Titus pardoned for a crime that he does not believe that Titus ever committed.
“If you look at the case and if you read the trial documents, it’s really obvious that there is a ton of reasonable doubt,” Anderson said.
This was officially my first real interview with a newspaper reporter. I was talking fast, as I am wont to do. I was talking really fast when I did a radio interview last month. Hey, what do you want? I have no experience. Check out the radio interview on the Free James Titus Myspace page. I wish people would add it to their Myspace Player, hopefully getting this thing viral.
There are two errors in this Warren Reporter Article. The year that Tillie Smith was murdered happened in 1886. People from Weird NJ still come to town to scare each other (and us). I call Hackettstown the heart of so-called Weird NJ. If you look at this case, it makes sense why we are inundated with paranormal investigators, especially in October.
The other error is I got my Bachelor's in Sociology from West Chester University (in Pennsylvania), not Westchester Society. I will be more careful when I speak out in the public next time, especially when I relate facts.
Apparently, no one has ever asked for a posthumous pardon for anybody in New Jersey. There is no procedure in place. I left a message for someone in the Legal Department of the Executive Clemency Divison of the New Jersey State Parole Board. I think I'm going to have to write a letter directly to her.
I hope they don't need new legislation just for this. Maybe they do. I don't know. Stay Tuned:
Posted by Kire in Justice
Tue Nov 03rd 2009, 10:01 PM
How do you free someone who has been dead for 57 years?
Write to President Obama and tell him about James Titus (b. 1857 - d. 1952).
Titus served almost nineteen years doing hard labor in the New Jersey State Prison because he was a little guy prone to panic attacks and the newspapers in New York, Trenton and Philadelphia were angry because the 1886 Tillie Smith Rape and Murder case in Hackettstown, NJ was a dead end.
You can do everything you can to spread the word that James Titus needs a Presidential Pardon.
Listen to WRNJ-AM Radio on the morning of November 4, 2009 for an interview with local Hackettstown resident Erik B. Anderson, one of the few who actually read
Stay tuned for more developments.
This man is gone. His family is wiped out.
The Hackettstown Historical Society still sells T-shirts that say "Got Ghosts?" and incessantly talk about "Tillie's Ghost." They get real quiet when you try to bring up the subject of James Titus' innocence.
The real killer will never been found, but James Titus doesn't have to be a prisoner anymore.
Remember Tillie Smith! Remember James Titus!
Warm Regards,
Erik B. Anderson Independence Township, New Jersey Established 1782
I wrote this letter to the editor. It was published today.
Show compassion for troubled person Tuesday, October 13, 2009 I've been thinking a lot about the man who was arrested for taking a bath in public in Belvidere. He had been living in his car outside the Warren County Courthouse for several months after he lost this house. Finally, The Express-Times reported he had had enough and tried to get the filth off of himself in public because he thought he had nowhere else to go.
I met this man over the summer, just a few weeks before the incident. So I read the article with interest. He had a sign on his car window that said he was running for Warren County surrogate because he didn't like the way Susan Dickey had handled his case after the last of his parents died. He had a genuine tin-foil helmet in his backseat.
I am not writing to continue the ridicule that this man has surely received since his face appeared on the front page of the paper under the headline, "Naked man arrested." I am sorry if this letter has that effect on him. The real intent of this letter is to encourage readers to be more compassionate to him. I certainly hope his accusations are false, but if some of them are true, I hope the officials who made the mistakes will read this and do their jobs in an exemplary manner in the future. With the economy going the way it is going, one thing is certain: We are going to encounter more cases such as this.
ERIK B. ANDERSON Independence Township
This was a front page article about a month ago. I can't seem to find the article online. I don't even remember the poor guy's name. Anyway, I hope it helps someone.
N.J. Sen. President Codey seeks to restore grave sites for mentally ill By Lawrence Ragonese/The Star-Ledger September 19, 2009, 9:00PM
MORRISTOWN -- The small concrete cylinders are buried at Morristown’s Evergreen Cemetery, virtually impossible to see until you are almost standing on them.
Each is marked with a four-digit number etched into its flat top, like a bar code for the dead — fading markers into past lives of indigent state psychiatric patients long ago placed shoulder-to-shoulder in the ground in body bags or pine boxes.
They were people once, with names and lives and families. But as many as 6,000 former state patients rest in mostly anonymous graves in Morristown and in potter’s fields near state psychiatric hospitals in Glen Gardner and Marlboro, Winslow Township and Trenton. In some instances, with markers sunk underground or inexplicably removed, the history of these patients dating back as far as 150 years ago has been lost.
Now, that may change.
State Sen. President Richard Codey, who as a youth picked up the dead at Greystone Park Psychiatric Hospital for his family’s funeral business, has embarked on a crusade to find identities of these people and restore their dignity in death.
-Je suis shomer shabbos. -C'est quoi a, Walter? -Samedi, Donny, c'est le sabbat, le jour du repors joif, de ne travaille pas, je ne conduis pas, et je ne mante pas en voiture je ne touch pas á l'argent, le fair et je ne joue sûrement pas aux putains de quilles! -Mince. -Shomer Shabbos!
West Chester, Pennsylvania in 1996 is one good example:
William F. Buckley, Jr., the father of modern conservativism himself, rolled his eyes and 200 rich white people with nice watches started yelling at me to go home after I asked him what his position was on the "Timber Salvage Rider".
Then, he said "the world is a giant ashtray that we put things into". Then he made a gesture as if to put a cigarette out on his podium. I was officially frightened.
He also said, "I question the juvenile nature of people who treat all animals as pets," too. But, I was trying to talk about Trees.
All of these disrupted Town Hall events are not a surprise to me now. They don't frighten me. Not even a little bit.
Best of luck everyone.
I see your true colors, shining through. I see your true colors, that's why I love you. So don't be afraid, to let them show. True colors, true colors. You're beautiful, like a rainbow.
Which character in a Shakespearean Tragedy spoke these words?
'Twill out, 'twill out: I peace! No, I will speak as liberal as the north: Let heaven and men and devils, let them all, All, all, cry shame against me, yet I'll speak.
Without googling it, name the character and the play.
For double brownie points, describe what happened to this character after these words were spoken?
**********
Question 2
And now for a difficult one.
Which Ancient Philosopher proved that these words, by Lord Polonius to Queen Gertrude in "Hamlet", are meaningless?
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit, And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes, I will be brief: your noble son is mad: Mad call I it; for, to define true madness, What is't but to be nothing else but mad? But let that go.
For double brownie points, describe the consequence that befell the whole state of Denmark when these words were taken seriously.
And now, for double secret whammy special brownie points, answer this:
What bloviating, right wing talk show host extolls the virtues of the phrase "brevity is the soul of wit" on a regular basis?
When I told my friend I had an appointment to get this tattoo last week, he told me he was going to get a tattoo when he gets to North Carolina. It's going to have an image of the State of New Jersey, and under it is going to say "By Birth" and he is also going to have an image of the state of North Carolina, and under that it is going to say "By Choice".
That's fine and good for him, I suppose, but it's distasteful to me.
If I ever get the courage to endure the pain, I want to get a tattoo that says "The Ultimate Measure of a Man" on the soles of my feet because Dr. King said:
"The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy."
Warm Regards,
Erik B. Anderson Independence Township, New Jersey Established 1782
I made this video in January. I posted it in a few places, like the Bereavement Forum. I didn't post it here because it's not a "Political Video". Someone in another thread recommended that I do so, however, so here you go.
It's a tribute to my dad, who died of "Progressive Supra-Nuclear Palsy", according to his death certificate in San Diego, in 2003.
He was a great man.
I have gotten several "amazing" and "fantastic" comments. "Moving" and "excellent", by madfloridian, is a new one.
Someone I met through myspace the other day said it "warmed my heart for real" and wellstone dem says, "The love is clear throughout the video. Great job."
I hope you all like it. I'm going to have to take it down eventually because I don't own the copyright to the song. I sent a few messages to Colin Hay asking how to go about it, but I'm not confident it will happen.
Oh well, watch it now, while you still can. It'll be worth it.
Warm Regards,
Erik B. Anderson Independence Township, New Jersey Established 1782
...though there are whites and blacks among us who hate each other, we will not; there are those who are betrayed by greed, by guilt, by blood lust, but not we; we will set our faces against them and join hands and walk together into the dazzling future when there will be no white or black. This is the dream of all liberal men, a dream not at all dishonorable, but, nevertheless, a dream.
-James Baldwin
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"If you are going to do something, you have got to spend money. If you are going to do nothing, I beg the Government to say so with complete and appalling frankness." -Ronald Cartland, Tory MP, November 1936
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