Pitchforks and Torches
The news from Waupaca County, WI was big. On 9 January, 2009, four dead, and one dying deer were discovered which appeared to have been run down by persons driving snowmobiles. Naturally, people were upset by this reported cruelty.
Once the perpetrators were found, supposedly law abiding citizens began turning into a mob.
The initial charges against three persons were felony cruelty to animals. Brothers Robby and Rory Kuenzi and Nicholas Hermes were charged with the felonies on 16 January, 2009. A fourth person was present at the killings, but was not charged.
A televised report showed one animal lover confronting defense attorneys. She believed that once the allegation was made, that no defense should be allowed. But, that is not a unique American attitude.
Prosecutors didn’t waste any time in attempting to tie one of the suspects to an unsolved fatality. Rory Kuenzi was a suspect in the October, 2004 hit and run death of Keven McCoy. Only after the deer killing incident did law enforcement pay attention to the old case.
After the prosecutor released the information to undermine the accused, the level of incompetence in the Waupaca County District Attorney’s office became clear. An accident reconstruction report had not been completed four years after the investigation, and no one had followed the case until after the cruelty charges. Finally, someone paid attention.
Many persons were outraged by this act, and it was horrific. But, the action of some was to harass and attack people who were not connected to the crime except by similarity of surname to the charged. That is an act of bigotry and perhaps if the Waupaca County prosecutor were creative it could be leveraged into a hate crime.
At least one family, distantly related to the charged was the target of hate telephone calls and hate letters. Charlene Kuenzi received mail that threatened revenge among other things. The mob of citizens was turning criminal.
In March, the three were charged with a slew of hunting related charges. The prosecution had already obtained a ruling from Judge Phillip Kirk that allowed the felony charges to be applied to wild animals. But, Waupaca County District Attorney John P. Snider was greedy and had the new charges filed by his assistant James Fassbender.
The prosecution got greedy and overcharged. It is also possible that the original felony charges were erroneous and the embarrassment of false filings were being hidden behind the new misdemeanors.
The problem is that in Wisconsin, hunting exempts the hunter from cruelty charges. So, judges in Waupaca County applied the law and said you can’t have both. Judge Kirk even gave Fassbender a break and gave him a choice of dropping either the misdemeanor or the felony. Fassbender did neither so the felony was dropped.
And to make things worse, the prosecution had presented evidence that this was hunting despite the snowmobile involvement. One of the new misdemeanor charges was specific that the snowmobiles were used for hunting. The prosecution was shooting itself in the foot.
The public was already worked up over the case and the District Attorney played on this agitation to pretend that the judges were at fault. And citizens dutifully picked up their pitchforks and torches. They wrote letters to the judges bitterly complaining about the rulings. They wrote letters to newspapers expressing their desire for unpleasant punishments for the accused. These citizens needed no law and order. They believed that their hate is enough to overrule the law. Some citizens wrote and telephoned the distant relative with threats and false accusations.
What upsets me is that there is more to be upset over. Such as innocent people who have been imprisoned because of incompetence or dishonesty. Such as children involved in human trafficking because of judges accepting bribes to send them to private prisons. Or the idiots in the Wisconsin Legislature who decided that praying over a dying child was as good a remedy as medical treatment.
The Post~Crescent, an Appleton based member of the Gannett chain, picked up its own pitchfork and torch in the 3 July, 2009 edition. In the “Thumbs Up and Down” column the paper gave a thumb down to the judges. This is ignorance. The District Attorney was the person responsible for the dropped charges. He just didn’t “man up” and drop the misdemeanor when he had the opportunity. Any escalation of threats or violence that occurs in the citizenry will stem from the behavior of the District Attorney.
Editorials had already appeared in the Post~Crescent decrying the reduced charges and claiming ignorance of reasons for the changes. Ignorance is no excuse. The Post~Crescent staff could try reading and reasoning.
The 55th District State Representative, Dean Kaufert (R ‑ Neenah), jumped on the bandwagon by attempting to craft legislation that will add animal cruelty definitions to the hunting statutes. That can be tricky, since hunting means attempting to kill animals.
But, I don’t believe that the legislature should be spending resources to protect prosecutor screwups. I would much rather see a legislative mandate to prevent district attorneys from overcharging. After all, these people are supposed to be professionals. But that expectation seems to have been lost by newspaper editors and legislators alike.
And, Wisconsin prosecutors already have such a lopsided advantage over charged citizens that conviction of the innocent is inevitable.
When citizens with their torches and pitchforks attack innocent families, even by mistake, I believe they should be jailed. Those actions are more serious than animal cruelty. The persons are more dangerous than the accused here. I hope that Kaufert would be willing to address this side of the outcry.
And, I would give those persons more credibility if they paid more attention to the damage that is done to our fellow citizens by incompetent or dishonest lawmen and prosecutors. People who spend years in prison because of poor investigation and prosecution practices receive short shrift from the public.
Even areas that people claim are important; such as child welfare receive less interest that this case. Perhaps some thought and energy could be applied to getting children safely to and from school in the crime ridden ghettos that we Americans pretend do not exist.
Finally, I’d like to propose a thought experiment. Suppose you or a family member is accused of a crime such as this one. And further suppose that the press and television news behave typically and repeat inflammatory statements that undermine your right to a defense. Would you simply plead guilty or advise your loved one to plead guilty and not retain a lawyer? If the allegation is false, would you still allow the citizens with pitchforks and torches to hound you or your loved ones into prison?
by Brian McCorkle
in category Criminal Justice,Rants
