Brandon Hein case made for clemency from governor

It was hard to be in Panama this past Wednesday when many of the other Friends of Brandon Hein were at the United States Court of Appeals in Pasadena for oral arguments in the final opportunity for Brandon to find justice through the court system. It has taken 14.5 years to get to this point . . . where Brandon’s appeals attorney has 15 minutes, and only 15 minutes, to address the court, and the State has the same. 30 minutes . . . and lives hang in the balance . . . that’s our system.

There is one other option, and that is for the Governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger to grant clemency.

Late last year Karen Baxter wrote this piece that appeared in the VENTURA COUNTY STAR . . .

Thirteen years ago in the cozy Southern California neighborhood of Agoura Hills, Jimmy Farris lost his life in a backyard brawl during a teenage confrontation over marijuana.

Brandon Hein took part in the fight, and so did several other boys, including Jason Holland, who admitted to stabbing young Farris during the struggle.

I recently attended a screening of “Reckless Indifference” at California Lutheran University that provided documented evidence from all sides. I was heartbroken and shocked to find out that this sentence had really been given to Brandon. It was a prejudicial situation from the start because the teenage victim in this backyard brawl was the son of a Los Angeles Police Department officer. Add to that a vicious and aggressive prosecution by the District Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles, and the result was the sentencing of life in prison for all three boys.

A group of parents, independent thinkers and experts has spent more than a decade trying to gain release for Brandon. It is clear that Brandon’s only crime was drinking and getting involved in a fight that resulted in tragic consequences. How can participation in a backyard brawl be grounds for life imprisonment? Who is immune? What teenage boy has not been vulnerable to those circumstances in some variation? I have yet to meet a perfect teenager who has not made a choice at some time that might have exposed himself or someone else to unfortunate circumstances or potential tragedy.

Because life cannot be returned to Jimmy Farris, what right do we have to take away Brandon’s freedom for the rest of his life? In an attempt to balance the loss of Jimmy, we have turned the table and sentenced a young man with the same litmus as a Charles Manson-type murderer. Where is the justice? Who is safer because this young man is locked up?

The frightening thing is that this verdict could truly happen to anyone in the wrong place at the wrong time. I dare say, had Jimmy been on the other side of this incident, his parents would have moved mountains to keep him from going to prison, let alone for life.

We have lost sight of the value and rights of Brandon. We have traded those critically important standards — to secure what? To punish whom and why? After thousands of years of civilization, we have still not learned why the necessary component of mercy is the only thing that separates us from a crippled, harsh and ill-equipped Neanderthal society. America has lost something — something serious. I fear she has lost her heart.

This young man is rotting away in maximum security. Someone had better explain to this mother why. I am horrified at this sentencing. Has our legal and judicial system thrown away all sense of measure and mercy, and what cost will we pay in the end? The loss here is a whole life locked away for good. How can this be? What crime so great did Brandon commit? What did he do to deserve life imprisonment without parole?

There are times in this experience we call life that all answers and explanations fail the situations or circumstances. It is often the name of the crime upon which a life shatters, not the nameless and personal act itself.

I ask all who read this to take some time to explore Brandon’s story on http://www.brandonhein.com. Please contact the governor and ask him to extend executive clemency and commutation of sentence. It takes real courage to right this wrong.

We’re trusting you, governor.

— Karen Baxter lives in Malibu.

You can read the piece of Brandon’s Web site that I wrote over thirteen years ago . . . “What happened?”

Over these past years people from around the world have voiced their support for Brandon. Here are some samples from the thousands of comments supporting justice for Brandon Hein . . .

The Experts

Alan Dershowitz, Harvard Law School Professor – “This is a case that violates the Bible, that violates the Constitution, that violates the law, that violates common sense, and that violates common decency.”

Dr. Jeffrey Fagan, Criminologist, Professor Columbia University, Director, Columbia University Center for Violence Research and Prevention – “This was a modern-day lynching. It shows the power of a legal system where there are no effective checks and balances against prosecutorial power, and the conspiracy among cops and prosecutors to stifle basic freedom such as the presumption of innocence.”

Marta Moczo-Santiago, Commissioner of Juvenile Justice, City of New York – “There’s law and there’s justice, and in this particular case there has been an injustice . . . [These kids] need to be held responsible, but I think in this case the severity by which they are being held responsible, truly, is nonsensical.”

Tom Hayden, Activist, Politician, Former State Senator – “Why should people unequally involved in crime be equally punished? Brandon is on solid ground asking if everyone (involved in the murder) is equally guilty.”

William Gazecki, Academy Award Nominated Director, Director of “Reckless Indifference”, a documentary film about the case – “These kids were stupid and they were reckless, but they were kids, and the system was equally as reckless.”

The Press

Al Martinez, Columnist Los Angeles Times – “Brandon Hein’s radiant smile may conceal the sins of suburbia, but his sins, at least, aren’t damning enough to cost him the rest of his life.”

Geraldo Rivera – “What about justice? . . . This sentence is cruel and vindictive.”

Editorial, The Acorn, Local Agoura Hills Weekly – “To lock the door and throw away the key on a pair of boys who spent a single afternoon on the fringe of the law is an affront to the concept of rehabilitative justice . . . Life cannot be returned to Jimmy Farris, but it shouldn’t be taken away from Hein and Miliotti.”

The People

Gene Hein, Brandon’s Dad – “My son didn’t kill anybody. He didn’t have a knife. He didn’t know anybody had a knife. He is not a threat to society.”

Vickie McGowen, Writing in a “Letter to the Editor” VENTURA COUNTY STAR – “My heart breaks for the Farris family because their son was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Perhaps they find some small comfort in knowing their son’s killer is in prison. They also know that several other young men who didn’t kill their son are in prison. How could that make us, or a society, feel better?”

Steve Young, Agoura Resident – “The whole case stinks to high heaven of judicial and prosecutorial abuse and misconduct. How the judge and prosecutor can sleep at night when they know that these kids are rotting in jail for the rest of their lives is beyond me.”

Kreig Vens, Police Officer – “If we, as individuals, or collectively as a nation, allow such disproportionate and grossly abusive sentences [as this] to be invoked without challenge, we become as barbaric as the crime itself . . . The sentencing in this case can only be labeled ‘judicial brutality’.”

The World

Mrs. Chloe Swann, From a town near Leicester in the middle of England – “I feel so sad that Brandon has been the victim of a barbaric law [based on English common law] that we in England abolished in 1957, but I suppose what he is the real victim of merciless people who exploit these outdated laws which obviously predate modern values and common sense.”

Stephen Blackwell, Melbourne, Australia – “For a world leader, this injustice is a continuing blot on the international reputation of the USA. The work of the United States Government in high lighting the injustices found in other countries is commendable but it is time to set an example by seeing that justice and mercy are given in this case.”

Plons, Belgium – “As a Belgian law student this story is very shocking and disturbing to me. Apparently the Dark Ages of criminal justice are not over yet in California. All the best to Brandon.”

Arjan, Netherlands – “I accidentally came across BrandonHein.com and I was shocked! Is this the justice system in the USA???????? How can I country like the USA do things like this? Aren’t they supposed to be an example to the world? I knew the US had the death-penalty, but to lock up people forever is a shame. This may sound anti-American but it’s not supposed to. Brandon might have been at the wrong place at the wrong time, but he doesn’t deserve this. I know that ‘Dutch courage’ is a negative expression, but I wish him an enormous amount of courage from Holland.”

Thank y’all for the mail!

As a Southerner born and bred, I’d like to set the record straight on “y’all” and “all y’all.” “Y’all” is NOT singular. It denotes a number of persons greater than one. “All y’all” means everybody in the room (or wherever). Bonnie Williams

Ignorant, naive or both?

In response to my request for prayers to correct the horrible injustice visited on Brandon Hein . . . life in prison without possibility of parole . . . I received the following:

Your blog entry doesn’t give all of the facts, and its incompleteness serves to blunt the truth. I read the trial documents and the appeal documents, and I don’t agree.

This couldn’t happen to me because I pay attention to what my kids are doing, who they are with and where they are. I am instilling values in my children – that’s MY job, not someone else’s or the government’s. MY kids won’t be out looking for pot, or getting in fights, whether it is to buy it or to steal it.

I too wrote a letter to Gov Schwartzeneggar , but asking him to ignore this appeal. Karl

Karl, I’m going to try to be nice here, not that you necessarily deserve it IMHO. You certainly have a right to your opinion, but . . .

You “read the trial documents and the appeal documents” – I congratulate you, since the trail took 10 weeks and the court record for the trial alone is over 40 volumes, over 10,000 pages. And that’s just the trail, and you read all the appeal documents too! Wow! Who is watching over your kids while you are doing all this reading?

You state, “I too wrote a letter to Gov Schwartzeneggar , but asking him to ignore this appeal.” Thank you and I’m sure the Governor’s staff will give it full consideration, especially since the “appeal” is with the US Circuit Court of Appeals 9th District . . . which is something quite different than the Governor’s office. And it is a federal court, not a state court. And by the way, his name is Schwarzenegger, but not to worry, I’m sure he is used to a zillion variations . . . “If I am not me, who da hell am I?” –["Total Recall"]

Lastly, about your kids . . . I certainly hope you are right! But I suspect you are a pretty young parent with a whole lot to learn about raising kids, and life, for that matter. ALL of these parents . . . the parents of the murdered boy, the parents of the drug dealer, the parents of the boys, now men, in prison . . . ALL of these parents tried to do what was best for their kids! They ALL could have said, just as you say now, “This couldn’t happen to me because I pay attention to what my kids are doing, who they are with and where they are. I am instilling values in my children – that’s MY job, not someone else’s or the government’s. MY kids won’t be out looking for pot, or getting in fights, whether it is to buy it or to steal it.” But guess what, Karl . . . shit happens! You can’t be with your kids 24 hours a day! When your kids get into their teens you just got to pray a lot, listen a lot and hold on tight and hope they live through adolescence! These were all goodkids, who just got tragically lost and all ended up at the wrong place at the wrong time. The cop and his wife were secure knowing that their son was hanging out with his childhood friend . . . never knowing. The drug dealer’s mother was a teacher, busy molding kids and grading papers . . . no idea. All of these parents were bush wacked! So you’d better get a grip now, Karl, and wise up or you are going to be the one facing tragedy. For the sake of your kids, don’t be naive and stupid. Your kids and any other kids out there can find themselves at the wrong place at the wrong time.

I’ve been amazed through the 14 years I’ve been friends with Brandon, associated with this case and his Web site, and reading comments from around the world. A lot of comments have come from kids who knew and went to school with these guys in Agoura Hills, and were into the same stupid teenage shit . . . and who managed not to be caught at the wrong place at the wrong time . . . and are now parents themselves (who hopefully won’t forget what it was like when their own kids become teens), are professionals, active and engaged citizens contributing to the world.

These guys were at the wrong place at the wrong time and singled out by the rage of folks like you.

Karl, I was trying to be nice . . . that was the “nice” me response to your comment. Not being the President, I can’t invite you to the White House for a beer . . . but we obviously see the world from two very different viewpoints.

To the rest of you . . . thank you!

I feel that nobody should have to be put through this even if they commit the crime or not its wrong and the court is wrong. Even though Jimmy’s dad is a police he should of known what his son was doing and not so much of judgin other people of their kids. Its was wrong what happen to his son but his son was no angel – he wasn’t perfect because everybody is not, but you can’t be like that. Everybody is entitled to speak the truth and to be able to be free to speak without nobody callin them a liar, but to tell the truth because the truth will sent you free . Angelique Holman

Thank you Richard for bringing this injustice to thousands of people. I wrote to the Governor of California and forwarded the information about his case to all my California friends. Brandon is in my hopes and prayers. ” As long as hope remains, only the coward will despair.”—Bertrand Russell Teresa

I have prayed and will continue to lift this young man up to the Lord. Dinah

Coming to Boquete . . .

Hi Richard, Is it easy to “Rent by Owner” for a couple of months in Boquete or would Isle Verde be the way to go? My husband & I would love to visit Boquete for the months of Jan. & Feb. in 2011. I used to live in Panama City in the 70’s and Boquete was my favourite get-away. The Panamonte was the only hotel at that time and I loved it. My husband has never been to Central America so I would love to share this with him. I would also like to take a Spanish course at the Boquete Language School. I find your Blog so interesting – thank you so much! Margot Williston

Hi Margot! Welcome back! There are lots of rentals that might be available for two months . . . some folks have casitas on their property that they rent for short periods and there are some nice apartment rentals as well. Isla Verde has the advantage that it is within walking distance of “downtown” Boquete. Check out www.boquete.org  where there are frequently postings by folks who have places for rent.

Church . . .

Does Boquete have a center of activities for Christians? Wendy

Wendy, I assume you’re referring to services in English? For locals and Spanish-speaking there is a very active Roman Catholic church, a large Assemblies of God church that is affiliated with the mega-church Hossana (Panama City – over 25,000 members), and smaller Baptist, Seventh Day Adventist, Mormon and a number of other independents. There is no English church per se, but there are several groups . . . There is a large mission effort out of the US working with Gnobe Bugle in Volcancito, and they have a Sunday evening service in English. There is a missionary-type family affiliated with Trinity Broadcasting that also has a service in English in their home. And a new “home church” has started meeting Sunday mornings in the Fundadores Hotel. I know of at least one women’s Bible study, and I’m sure there are other things as well. So you will find lots from which to choose.

Thank you!

So glad I stumbled into your website. Its 7:30 pm Sunday in San Francisco Peninsula town of Redwood City, cA – am trying hard to find interesting tours for my husband Bob & I on our 1st Panama Canal cruise on Princess departing Oct 31st. Kept reading about Embera Village in Tripadvisor.com – will contact Ann as you suggest then read your fascinating blogs! Love what I’ve seen so far…. best wishes from California. Pamela Ezra

REALLY enjoyed your site! I was stationed in Panama (at Ft. Clayton and Amador) in 1988 and 1989. Reading your page was like reading a science fiction novel. Its amazing how the country has rebounded in 20 years. I loved the people and the culture and have been contemplating going back for a visit. I would like to show my wife the “real” Panama, and not the made-up touristy places. Thanks for the information and the entertainment! Casey Duncan

5,252 Days Later . . . Please Pray

5,252 days ago . . . that’s almost 14.5 years ago . . . in the middle of the night Gene Hein’s family was awakened by pounding on the door of their little duplex in Oak Park. The Los Angeles County sheriff was at their front door. The sheriff arrested and carted away Hein’s son Brandon who had just turned 18 and charged him with murder. That was the last time they saw Brandon except in prison or in a courtroom.

That afternoon Brandon had gone with a group of friends to the Agoura Hills home of Mike McCloren, a local high school drug dealer, to buy pot and “smoke out”. McCloren hung out in his backyard shack of a “fort” with his buddy, Jimmy Farris, whom kids referred to as McCloren’s “bodyguard”, and also happened to be the son of an LAPD officer who lived nearby. All these teenagers had been drinking and smoking pot and in this tiny shack a fight broke out between the drug dealer, McCloren, and the youngest kid, a 17-year-old named Micah Holland. Fists were flying and at one point Micah Holland’s older brother jumped in. When the fight was over and everyone left to lick their wounds, Jason Holland said that during the altercation he had pulled out a 2″ Swiss Army-type knife and stabbed both McCloren and Farris.

Incredibly the 2″ knife had struck Jimmy Farris directly over his heart. The emergency room doctor who treated Farris would later write to the judge, “Jimmy Farris did not die of grossly brutal wounds. A single small puncture wound penetrated his chest and into his heart. Had that stab wound been one inch further to the left, he perhaps would still be alive today . . ” Because of the severity of the stab wound to the heart most of the bleeding was internal, so it wasn’t immediately evident to the boys in the dark shack what had happened.

The trail made headlines. The LA District Attorney’s office, stung by defeats in O J Simpson trial, the first Menedez brother’s trial, and their bumbling attempts to go after Michael Jackson, desperately needed a win at all costs in this high profile trail. Based on 17-year-old Micah Holland’s use of two words . . . “Gumbys” and “ese” . . . the DA created an imaginary gang that threatened the lives and property values of everyone in Agoura Hills. Under California’s antiquated “Felony Murder Rule” all the boys who had gone to buy marijuana were charged with murder. Originally the District Attorney had hoped for the death penalty, but wasn’t sure he could get a death penalty conviction. The fact that the dead boy, Farris, was the son of an LAPD officer, caused the police and courts to rally ’round and demand revenge and a conviction.

In return for his testimony that the boys had come to “steal” not “buy” pot, the cops gave Mike McCloren immunity, a fact that was not revealed to the defendants or their attorneys. There was no evidence, other than the testimony of the drug dealer who had been given immunity if he testified.

Although Jason Holland has always admitted that it was he, and he alone, who stabbed Jimmy Farris and has taken full responsibility for his actions, under the “Felony Murder Rule” all the boys present were convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. This sentence has to be seen in the light of sentences that are routinely handed down in California to gang-bangers who go out, intent to kill, and do drive by shootings and intentional killings, and get 5 to 15 years.

So Brandon has languished in prison for 5,225 days . . . He went in a boy of 18, he is now a man of 32. He has been in prison for 14.5 years for a crime nobody says he committed. I have been a friend of Brandon for 14 years, have sat with him in various prisons in the armpit towns of California that end up with prisons, and been involved in this case in a myriad of ways. It stinks! Brandon’s case is one of the worst miscarriages of justice in recent US history.

I ask for your prayers . . .

After 14 years of tortuously making its way through the appeals process, this week the United States Court of Appeal, 9th District hears Brandon’s case.  This is the end of the line for justice . . . it is the end of the line for Brandon.  Please pray . . .

Please read about this case and tell others.  Please write to the Governor of California who has the power to grant Brandon a pardon.

We have tried to bring this case to the attention of the people, but most people have had their own lives on their minds, and frankly, haven’t cared much about the injustice.  This could happen to you! It could happen to your children, or your grandchildren!  Please don’t sit idly by!

Brandon Hein: For better or worse Brandon gets a Wikipedia page

www.BrandonHein.com

Brandon Hein Prison Interview with Sen. Tom Hayden

My blogs on Brandon Hein

Dan Rather “60 Minutes” with Brandon Hein

Starry Morning

Good morning! It’s 5AM in Panama . . . when I usually am up and writing my blog . . . sitting in my flannel shirt and drinking Diet Coke. The Boquete coffee comes later . . . when I can savor my coffee. The Diet Coke is just to pour caffeine into my system.

Life starts early in Chiriqui. Work starts at 7AM, so at 6:45am I need to feed the dogs and then drive down the hill to Boquete to pick up Carlos, who is doing the tile in the casita rennovation, Oscar, my electrician and plumbing engineer, and Jonathan, who is filling in working on our little coffee finca. The “team” is rounded out by Sabino who lives on our farm and has been working on and off as needed, helping me on projects for a year.

I guess the day starts early in Chiriqui because we are primarily an agricultural province. And in the rainy season it will often start to rain in the early afternoon, so you need to get as much as possible accomplished before the rain begins.

At 5AM it is pitch dark in Panama. I rolled over in bed this morning and looked out the windows that surround our bedroom and it was a clear morning with no moon and the stars were absolutely awesome! It was like being in a planetarium! Absolutely stunning! And all I could think of was Vincent Van Gogh’s “Starry Night” painting.

There are actually two Starry Night paintings . . . The best known is . . .

But there is also this “Starry Night Over The Rhone” as well . . .

I enjoy watching the stars on clear Panama mornings . . . and I enjoy it not just for myself, but on behalf of my friend Brandon Hein  as well. Brandon has been in prison in California for, as of 5AM this morning, 5214 days, 5 hours, 33 minutes, and 47 seconds or over 14 years for a crime nobody says he committed. Brandon, like a whole lot of 18-year-olds was guilty of drinking underage, smoking some pot, and getting into a fight . . . that’s it! One of the boys he went to buy pot with had started the brawl and in the process the other boy stabbed another kid in the fight. The other kid who was acting as the drug dealer’s “body guard” was the son of an LAPD officer and ended up dying of his stab wound. The LA District attorney had just lost the OJ case, had been embarrassingly unsuccessful in charging Michael Jackson with sexually abusing boys, and had been forced to retry the case of the Menendez brothers, went after all of the boys who had come to buy drugs with a vengeance, charging all of the boys with felony murder. Initially the DA had actually tried to find a way to send all of these boys to the death chamber for essentially just being at the wrong place at the wrong time. In a highly politicized and publicized trail all the boys, not just the kid who wielded the knife, were sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. Incredible as it may seem, this happened in the USofA, in California, and in one of the greatest injustices of our time, these guys still rot in prison.

In preparation for my ROYAL PRINCESS stint this fall, where we will be visiting Devil’s Island every 14 days, I’ve been reading some of the books written by survivors of the French penal colony at Devil’s Island, popularized by the Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman film “Papillon”. I am amazed at how much of the same mentality still dominates the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation . . .[Is that name a joke! There is no attempt at rehabilitation! It is warehousing pure and simple, and many of these folks in prison will eventually be moving back into your community!]

Anyway, knowing that this is Brandon’s view from prison . . .

I enjoy my “Starry Morning” in Panama on his behalf as well.

I know some of the stuff Brandon has dreamed about in prison for over 14 years and I pray that this gross injustice ends eventually and that Brandon can live some of his dreams.  Martin Luther King said, “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice” . . . but in Brandon’s case it is taking an incredibly long time to bend!

When he first went to prison I was still in the travel business and I used to send Brandon tons of cruise line brochure pictures which he stuck on the walls of his cell.  I can tell he still thinks about cruising since he calls this one “Cruise” . . .

Brandon’s artwork, often signed just “Heinsight”, is accomplished often with very limited materials, and sometimes with nothing.  At times he has fashioned his own hair on pencil stubs to make brushes, and made ink and paint from taking the greasy remains of lunch and mixing the food oil with scrapings from checkers.  You can see more of Brandon’s incredible artwork at www.BrandonHein.com – just go to the bottom of the home page and click on the icon marked “The Box”.

Wrong Place, Wrong Time

 

Charles Grodin has been a long-time friend of Brandon Hein  arguing for justice for Brandon in his books, on air, in a play ["The Prosecution of Brandon Hein"] and before people like the Kennedys and others.  Brandon has now been in prison for a crime that nobody says he committed for exactly 5200 days, that’s over 173 months, over 14 years . . . simply for being at the wrong place at the wrong time.  What happened to Brandon could happen to you!  It could easily happen to your children or your grandchildren!  One of my great disappointments and bewilderments in life is why people haven’t risen up in a massive outcry to this gross injustice!

Don’t get me going . . .

While Brandon, who received a sentence greater than that of Charles Manson, sits in a maximum security prison in California (because of the severity of his sentence), and having already cost the taxpayers of California over $1 million . . . no wonder the State is broke! . . . his case has tortuously ground it’s way through the legal system.  Presently his case is sitting before the United States Court of Appeals, 9th District, scheduled for oral arguments October 7th in Pasadena.

Charles Grodin has written a piece that has just appeared in NEWSWEEK entitled, “Wrong Place, Wrong Time”:

“In 1995 Gene Hein appeared on my CNBC show to talk about his 18-year-old son, who was serving a life sentence with no chance of parole—even though he hadn’t killed or robbed anyone. What had Brandon Hein done?

On May 22 of that year, in Agoura Hills, Calif., Brandon and three friends went to buy marijuana from two boys operating out of a backyard fort; Brandon and his friends were drunk. An argument ensued, and one of the friends wound up stabbing one of the boys from the fort, who bled to death.

At trial, the prosecution didn’t claim that Brandon had killed anyone. But it did convince a jury that he and his friends had intended to commit robbery, even though most of the boys knew each other, no one wore disguises, and nothing was stolen. According to the felony-murder rule, all participants in a felony can be held equally culpable, including those who did no harm, possessed no weapon, and didn’t intend to hurt anyone. Brandon got the same punishment as the boy who committed the murder. (One explanation: the murdered boy’s dad was a police officer, and after the Simpson acquittal and the hung jury in the Menendez case—both of which occurred in the same judicial venue—the prosecution desperately wanted a conviction.)

As the years have gone by, I’ve become friends with Brandon’s father, mother, and stepmother. I’ve tried to get elected officials to take up Brandon’s cause, but I’ve had little luck—no one wants to look soft on crime. A few months ago I met with Attorney General Eric Holder. He was sympathetic but promised nothing.

Brandon is now 32. Earlier this year, after he’d served 14 years, his sentence was commuted to 29 years to life with a chance of parole. In California, one must serve 85 percent of a sentence before becoming parole-eligible. That means Brandon must serve more than 24½ years before being considered—another decade. Among Western nations, only the U.S. retains the felony-murder rule, though Michigan, Kentucky, and Hawaii have dropped it. It’s a disgrace—and if the Obama administration is talking about reforming drug-sentencing laws, it should consider abolishing the felony-murder rule on the grounds of cruel and unusual punishment.

Gene told me once that, back in 1995, when they got to court, Brandon’s attorney told Gene, “The prosecution may ask for the death penalty.” This is a boy who, at 18, got drunk and got into a fight, and he’ll be 42 before he gets a chance to reclaim his life.

Grodin was cited by former governor George Pataki for helping reform New York’s Rockefeller drug laws.” © 2009

In the first picture above Brandon was about 20, when the picture at the left was taken he was about 27.   Brandon is now 32, the same age as my oldest daughter. When she was 18 she went to college: Brandon went to prison.My daughter has a college education, a Master’s Degree in education, a husband, a son, a house and a cat, and most importantly . . . a life! Brandon has been sitting in prison for a crime nobody says he committed. Doesn’t anyone see the injustice and stupidity of this?

When the picture at left was taken, both of us were dreaming about the tropics, so we had this picture taken by the prison Polaroid in front of another inmates painting in the visiting room. I have my dream, and Brandon still languishes in prison.

* * * *

You CAN make a difference by appealing to the Governor of California  for executive clemency and commutation of sentence for Brandon Hein . . .How to write the Governor

The Golden State . . . Busted!

I am sorry . . . please don’t be offended. I didn’t pose for the picture, HE did. And he is a man, after all. I just couldn’t resist the picture from Julian Ayers blog “The Tattler” and Julian’s comment, “Give a man a couple of inches and he thinks he’s a ruler . . .” Too cool Julian! I’m sure the Gov regrets that pose: maybe it is true what they say about steroids shrinking it . . . Boys looking for big pecs take note!

Anyway, California is a mess . . . and it’s not going to get any better. In fact it is going to get a whole lot worse. These are desperate times . . . and some of the measures are desperate . . . and they are not going to solve the problem. Ironically I, and a lot of others, voted for the “Terminator” because we really wanted someone to go to Sacramento and shoot up the place and change the way the California legislature did business Unfortunately in politics you can’t just go in and shoot up the place and terminate the elected legislature. So, and this really is the irony, Arnold finds any political future in the crapper, and finds himself in the very same place as Gray Davis, the then Governor whom he campaigned against. Really a tough break for Arnie . . . worse than the picture! I think he really tried but . . .

Among other things eliminated, the Pregnant Teen Parenting Program my wife had been working with in Ventura and across California for 18 years . . . gone! Maybe not such a bad thing since the next governor can announce a teen pregnancy problem, and take credit for funding a program to solve it!

Bob Burnett writing on the Huffington Post had some interesting observations . . .

Now that the dust has settled and Californians can see the drastic consequences of the state budget train wreck, it’s time to consider ten actions to fix California.

(1) Elect a leader . . .
(2) Change term limits . . .
(3) End gerrymandering . . .
(4) Restore majority rule . . .
(5) Revise the initiative process . . .
(6) Adopt a two-year budget cycle . . .
(7) Revamp the tax code . . .

You can read all about those . . . but these I found particularly interesting, and I’ve been advocating these for years . . .

(8) Legalize marijuana. There’s a huge market for marijuana in California, but only medicinal use is fully legal. The black market for pot is an enormous source of potential tax revenue. If marijuana were to be taxed and regulated the same as alcohol, California would garner more than $1 billion per year. Legalize pot.

(9) Reduce the prison population. In the recent budget compromise, education funds were cut by $6 billion but the Department of Corrections was reduced by only $1.2 billion. California continues to spend a disproportionate amount on prisons — ten percent of the state general fund; the average cost per inmate is roughly $46,000, while the average cost per pupil is $11,626. The prison population — 167,000 — can be dramatically reduced by common-sense actions such as deporting undocumented aliens and making non-violent crimes, such as writing bad checks, a misdemeanor so that prison time is not an option. Reducing the number of prisoners would free up billions for other state purposes.

(10) Designate more toll roads . . .

One of the immediate things the Governor can do is address the prison issue, and the justice issue in California by immediately commuting the sentence of Brandon Hein. There is no reason for a man who never committed the crime, who nobody says committed the crime, to not be paying taxes and contributing to the California economy, and have been locked up in a Level IV close custody prison (THE most expensive) for 5,187 days at an estimated cost to taxpayers of over $1M just for Brandon!!! [That's 14.2 years times $75,000] That is nuts!

And about that picture . . . I’m sure at the age of 62, the Governor is damn proud of that picture!

Rip Van Winkle and The Internet

It is hard to believe that when I was in the dot com business, near the beginning, folks were making extravagant predictions to the effect that someday the Web would be as ubiquitos as refrigerators, and just taken forgranted. When I try to talk with my 18-month-old grandson, Rian, via Web cam, when he sits still long enough, he is immediately grabbing for the keyboard. I suspect he will be emailing before he can read. The computer is just another part of everyday life . . . I was going to say, like the telephone, but who has a telephone anymore outside of the office? And even offices are going to cell phones. My daughter, Noelle, tells me that there is a whole line of retro-toys, including the little toy telephone that she used to have as a kid. Crazy!

I bring this up in the context of my friend Brandon Hein, who I hope you all know has been sitting in prison for 14 years in California for a crime nobody says he committed under California’s draconian and stupid “Felony Murder Rule.” If you don’t know this story, you should!! It is probably THE injustice of the decade! Aside from the outrage and injustice of stealing 14 years of a young man’s life, there is the stupidity of the State of California spending over a million dollars to keep him in prison! No wonder California is going broke! This is such an injustice, and I’ve been fighting it for 14 years, that I can’t imagine why people aren’t storming Sacramento demanding justice!

Anyway . . . Brandon has grown up . . . from just 18 when he was imprisoned, to now almost 32 . . . never having seen the Internet as we know it! No Internet access in prison!

Brandon happens to be an incredible artist. Sometimes without any supplies . . . using only brushes made from his own hair and Kool Aide from the commissary, or black ink made from scraping checker pieces and mixing it with grease from his food . . . he has created absolutely incredible artwork. He signs his stuff “Heinsight.” A play on his name, and also an admission that if he knew then, what he knows now . . .

Brandon’s artwork is displayed on the Brandon Hein Website. . . “his” Website although he has never seen it. [The site is maintained by the Friends of Brandon Hein a loosely knit organization of his many supporters.] Having never seen the Internet as we know it, Brandon conceived of this unique and very special online gallery for his work. You have to see the application and his art work to believe it! The musical background was composed by one of his cell mates. The artwork was created by Brandon and some of his friends created the Web application for him.

To see it go to www.BrandonHein.com  and in the lower left of the page click on a link that says, “The Box”. Trust me . . . you will be amazed and enraged.

”The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.”

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made this quote famous.  And I believe it . . . just as the Old Testament writers of Psalms believed it, but often I wonder . . . how long?

You would like Brandon Hein.  His warm, engaging smile and personality.  He’s articulate, talented, and although I can’t see him much, especially now that I live in Panama, he has been a good friend for 13 years and an inspiration.

Brandon currently lives at the California Correctional Institution in Tehachapi, California.  He is a “close custody, level four” inmate, which means because of his “life in prison without the possibility of parole” he is considered to be one of the most dangerous prisoners, and is housed with others who are “property of the State of California” and are considered to be the most dangerous.  It costs about $100,000 a year to keep Brandon in prison, not counting lost revenue which the state would have if he were working.

I got to know Brandon when I received a simple prayer request, placed in the offering plate of the United Methodist Church in Westlake Village, California, where I was serving as an Associate Pastor.  The prayer request read, “Please pray for our son, Brandon Hein, who is sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.”

I first visited Brandon when he was in that “no-man’s zone” between being held for trial at Los Angeles Central Jail and being “state property” (That’s what they call it!  Brandon is K24820.)  Not even his parents could visit, but I was able to “pull rank” as clergy and get to see him in the attorney visiting area.  They brought this kid who had just turned 18 into the room wearing an orange prison jumpsuit, legs and hands shackled, and shackled him to the floor.  I was very skeptical.  But after getting to know Brandon, spending countless hours researching the case, developing www.BrandonHein.com, and speaking on Brandon’s behalf at every opportunity, I am convinced that this is one of the worst miscarriages of justice in the US. 

Brandon’s crime?  Being at the wrong place at the wrong time.  And drinking underage, and smoking pot, and maybe hanging out with some questionable friends and defending himself in a fight.  Pretty much like 80% of 18-year-olds in the US.  Brandon went with some teenage friends to buypot at the local high school drug dealer’s back yard hang out.  The drug dealers best friend and self-proclaimed “bodyguard” was the son of an LAPD officer.  A skuffle broke out.  One of the boys, age 15 at the time, who went with Brandon to buy pot, got into a fight with the drug dealer and his “bodyguard.”  All hell broke loose with punches flying everywhere.  Unbeknown to Brandon, the 15-year-old’s brother, pulled out a 2″ pocket knife and stabbed the son of the LAPD officer.  Tragically that random knife wound landed precisely in one of the few spots it could do damage, and ended up killing the LAPD officer’s son.  The boy who stabbed the LAPD officer’s son always admitted his action.  But the District Attorney chose to rely on the verbal assertion of the drug dealer, high at the time and high in court, that the boys had come with the intention to steal not buy pot.  Based on that flimsy “evidence” all the boys, even if they had no connection to the killing, were charged with “felony murder” and sentenced to life without possibility of parole. 

At the time of the trial the Los Angeles DA’s office was reeling from failures: the Menendez brothers took two trials, OJ got off scott free, and they blew trying to get Michael Jackson on child molestation.  So the DA was out to win this high profile trial at any cost.  LAPD pulled out all the stops in pressuring the judge.  [Makes one wonder how much pressure LAPD might have been able to exert on a judge who had a drinking problem.]

So where are we THIRTEEN years later.  One agreed to a deal and is out of prison.  The drug dealer graduated from college and is an artist.  The Assistant DA has been named a judge.  The judge who heard the case, who himself had just gotten off probation for drunk driving, Lawrence J. Mira, is still on the bench in Malibu hearing celebrity trials.  And Brandon still sits in prison.

You would think that if enough people raised an outrage something would be done.  I thought so.  That’s why I convinced Brandon to go public on the Internet, and on 60 Minutes, and Rolling Stone ["Lynching in Malibu"], even at great cost to him.  The guards and other inmates have access to television and see articles. [No prisoner has access to the Internet.  Brandon has never seen his www.BrandonHein.com Website and the Web was in its infancy when he went to prison.  Yet if you check out his Web site and click at the bottom on "The Box" you'll not only see his amazing art work, but you'll be amazed at this Web application that was conceived by Brandon, even although he's never seen the contemporary Web.]

We’ve been through 13 years of appeal, and are now at the 9th US District Circuit Court of Appeals.   Still Brandon sits in prison.  If you’d like to find out more there are lots of resources.

http://www.brandonhein.com/

 http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?FBH

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2003/01/29/60II/main538407.shtml

http://www.recklessindifference.com/ - “Reckless Indifference” is a feature length documentary by Academy Award Nominee William Gazecki.

If you find this an outrage, write to Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger  HOW TO WRITE TO THE GOVERNOR  Schwarzenegger CAN pardon Brandon.

What’s this have to do with Panama?  Years ago Brandon and I planned to sit on the beach when this is all over, drink rum, and watch the sun set.  I now have the beach at Boca Chica, and lots of rum . . . the only thing missing is Brandon.  I’d like to live to see this, and I’d like Brandon to be young enough to enjoy it!

Through all these 13 years Brandon has been amazing!  He manages to relate to some of the toughest people on the planet . . . everyone from stone cold killers to Dan Rather!  He has an amazing circle of friends who have brought his case to the attention of everyone from ex-Presidents to rock stars.  He has become a skilled artist working under great difficulty and many times without supplies.  He has an amazing confidence that somehow all of this is going to work out for his good.  He has put up with the attention in an effort to help his case, but if you check out “The Box” and his painting entitled “Limelight” you will see that the attention has not always been easy.

Wacked!

Yeah, and a lot of us were “jerks” when we were 18 . . . and some still are!

Adam Montiel, has a radio show, “Adam Montiel in the Morning” on a local radio show (KXTZ/KXDZ) in San Luis Obispo, California. Prisons are big business in California and around San Luis Obispo. 12.9% of California’s state workforce are in the prison biz. California spends almost $11 million a year on prisons, 83% of what it spends on higher education. So understand that there are a lot of people in Central California . . . particularly in the “armpit” towns of the state (Santa Barbara obviously doesn’t want, or need a prison!) . . . who have a vested interest in keeping as many people locked up as possible. Now I’m not saying that’s Adam’s position, just that his listening audience has a real vested interest in the prison biz.

Anyhow, Adam took issue with my recent comments about Brandon Hein.

Very disappointed you’re still on the same “wrong place-wrong time” We all know that’s not true. I went to school with these guys. They were jerks. They were the guys you would look at them and say, “yea, they’ll end up dead or in prison”. Well, we were right. But Jimmy Farris was the one that ended up dead.

And to have the balls to call the deceased a “bodyguard” for a drug dealer is abhorrent. Yes, Mike was selling weed, so he was a drug dealer. Jimmy was a long time friend of his who had long time lived on his street.

Yes, being a person who sells, weed can be fairly considered unsavory character. But certainly not more than the group who tries to outnumber and rob him of his weed.

And I wonder if the HS official knows about Alice Moulder. The lady they stole from right before the stabbing of Jimmy and Mike.

My only consolation in reading all your garbage: Simply put…you’re wrong. The court thought so. The law thinks so. The jury thought so. And I know that those folks who did this, especially Brandon and Jason will get what they deserve, which was their sentence….LIFE.

Weren’t you a clergymen at some point? I thought TRUTH was supposed to seep its way into that lifestyle, no?

Hey Adam! I appreciate you taking the time to comment, even if I disagree.

Yes, these guys were jerks!! Brandon would be the first to tell you. But we don’t put people away for life for being jerks! Otherwise you and I . . . to say nothing of Barack Obama (screwed up as a teenager and used drugs), John McCain (smart ass, “maverick” Admiral’s-son-Navy-pilot who crashed 4 Navy planes in his reckless youth), George W. Bush (drunk and shiftless college student) . . . and a whole host of others, would be locked up for life. So let’s forget that argument.

Alice Mulder. Yes, Jason Holland stole her wallet. Jason Holland did, probably showing off for his jerky friends. But again, we don’t put kids away for life for stealing wallets or being smart asses. So what does that have to do with anything? [And because of that should not have been brought up at the trial.]

Each of us is responsible for our own actions. If someone listens to your show, and based on something you say, goes out and does something stupid, or reprehensible, are YOU responsible?

Yeah, Mike was the local high school drug dealer. Was he yours? And Jimmy was his buddy . . . and his mom says he was “an angel”, clean as the driven snow and perfect in every way and never smoked pot. OK, he was that 1% of high school kids in Agoura Hills . . . but he clearly hung out with Jimmy Farris and according to other kids was his “bodyguard.”

Brandon didn’t know Mike or Jimmy but went with his friends to buy pot and get smoked out. Sure, wrong. But again, we don’t lock up every kid who uses pot!! Or every adult, or talk show host, or minister, or president. The operative word is “buy.” Although it never came out at trial, Brandon stopped at an ATM at the supermarket to withdraw $20 en route in order to have money to buy pot.

The ONLY testimony that these guys went to steal anything was from the drug dealer, Mike McCloren, who was high when detectives interviewed him and high when he testified in court. No finger prints were found on the audio/TV equipment, which McCloren first claimed they were there to “steal”, no fingerprints were found on the drawer or the hiding place in the floor where McCloren kept his stash . . . no credible evidence whatsoever that these guys intended to steal anything.

This was a railroad job pure and simple, or as ROLLING STONE put it, a “Lynching in Malibu.” The victim’s dad was an LAPD officer and LAPD put tons of pressure on the Judge, who was on parole for rolling over his car while drunk (because that happened on a Freeway it was CHP who responded and arrested him, not LAPD) . . . so the whole “trial” process reeked!

Jason Holland always accepted responsibility for HIS actions. I realize Jimmy’s family was devastated, consumed by grief and looking for revenge. But how many people are you going to lock up? Is their loss somehow compensated by locking up other kids who didn’t commit the murder? If you locked up everyone in Agoura Hills who smoked pot at the time, would that ameliorate their grief? Jason accepted the responsibility and is willingly “doing the time”, so why everyone else? And why “life without possibility of parole” in a state where gang bangers who hop into a low slung old car and go out intentionally to drive by and kill and end up killing innocent kids and folks . . . and those gang bangers routinely get 15 year sentences . . .

And you don’t see that this is WACKED? Adam, wake up man!!

Obviously, we have very different world views. But keep reading, and have your say, and if I ever get back to the Central Coast I’ll be sure and tune in!

What???

The Terminator is sometimes difficult to understand . . . is confused syntax a “Republican thing”? Bush often leaves me shaking my head, and Palin jumps around Cliff Notes talking points so rapidly I’m quickly lost . . . but here’s Arnie’s take on Palin . . .

(CNN) — Wednesday, I [Campbell Brown, CNN correspondent] sat down with California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger for a lengthy interview mostly about the presidential campaign.

One exchange in particular has been getting a lot of attention. It was when I asked the governor if he thought Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin was qualified to be president.

Now, a quick nod to transparency here. When we do interviews like this, due to the time constraints of television, we often edit down a portion of the interviewee’s remarks.

But we try to make sure we maintain the full context of what was said, so that there is nothing misleading about a given sound bite.

There is a shortened portion of the governor’s remarks about Sarah Palin circulating on the Internet and other TV outlets that leaves the impression he does not think she is qualified for the job.

Right now, I just want to show you the governor’s full answer, so you can decide for yourself exactly what he meant.

Brown: Do you think she is qualified to be vice president?

Schwarzenegger: I think that she will to be qualified get there.

Brown: She will get there? What do you mean? She’s not ready yet?

Schwarzenegger: She will be ready by the time she is sworn in. I think she will be ready. You get up to speed.

I know when I became governor there were a lot of things I did not know but it is not about what you know.

Because Sacramento, for instance, in 2003 had all the knowledge and has all the experience, warehouse full of experience, but there was not the will for both of the parties to work together and solve the problems.

So that’s not the only answer, the experience. The answer is, do you have the will? Do you have the will to educate yourself? Do you have the will to get up to speed? Do you have the will? Are you a sponge that absorbs information very quickly? And I have read some of her stuff and she said, ‘When I became governor, you know, I didn’t know a lot of things but I absorbed information quickly and they could run with the state.’ And that’s the kind of person that she is. That is what I think she would also do if she becomes vice president.

Can you figure out what he was saying? Is he saying she’s qualified . . . or not? Or is he just saying she’s a quick learner?

So I got to wondering what is Sarah to do if she doesn’t win?

I came up with a few ideas . . .

10. Become a faith healer and cast out demons of witchcraft

9. Become a FOX News State Department, UN or foreign relations correspondent

8. Open a travel agency in Wasilla

7. Get a multi-million dollar advance on a book deal . . . and find someone to write it for her

6. Do dog mushing tours from Wasilla to Russia . . . “right across this frozen little thingy of water between Russia and Alaska”

5. Have an affair with John Mc Cain and replace Cindy, just as Cindy replaced . . .

4. Become a personal shopper for Sak’s Fifth Avenue

3. Become a cruise director on a Carnival ship and write a blog

2. Do Tina Fey impersonizations on “Saturday Night Live”

1. Replace Katie Couric

Even if you hate Obama . . .

You have to admit he’s run an almost flawless campaign.  His campaign staff didn’t have the bickering and infighting that Clinton’s did.  There were no false starts and erratic turns.  He’s cool, calm and collected.  Even if you don’t like his message, you have to admit he’s stayed focused and “on message.”  He’s run an effective campaign, used the Internet and media, and tried to shift the focus from personalities to issues.  Whether you want him as President or not, you have to admit he’s an effective leader and administrator.

Now comes word of yet another big storm brewing in the McCain/Palin camp, just at the very time it is NOT needed.  This from POLITICO:

Even as John McCain and Sarah Palin scramble to close the gap in the final days of the 2008 election, stirrings of a Palin insurgency are complicating the campaign’s already-tense internal dynamics.

Four Republicans close to Palin said she has decided increasingly to disregard the advice of the former Bush aides tasked to handle her, creating occasionally tense situations as she travels the country with them. Those Palin supporters, inside the campaign and out, said Palin blames her handlers for a botched rollout and a tarnished public image — even as others in McCain’s camp blame the pick of the relatively inexperienced Alaska governor, and her public performance, for McCain’s decline.

“She’s lost confidence in most of the people on the plane,” said a senior Republican who speaks to Palin, referring to her campaign jet. He said Palin had begun to “go rogue” in some of her public pronouncements and decisions.

“I think she’d like to go more rogue,” he said . . .  [Ed Note: She said she was a "maverick"!]

The emergence of a Palin faction comes as Republicans gird for a battle over the future of their party: Some see her as a charismatic, hawkish conservative leader with the potential, still unrealized, to cross over to attract moderate voters. Anger among Republicans who see Palin as a star and as a potential future leader has boiled over because, they say, they see other senior McCain aides preparing to blame her in the event he is defeated.

“These people are going to try and shred her after the campaign to divert blame from themselves,” a McCain insider said, referring to McCain’s chief strategist, Steve Schmidt, and to Nicolle Wallace, a former Bush aide who has taken a lead role in Palin’s campaign. Palin’s partisans blame Wallace, in particular, for Palin’s avoiding of the media for days and then giving a high-stakes interview to CBS News’ Katie Couric, the sometimes painful content of which the campaign allowed to be parceled out over a week.

“A number of Gov. Palin’s staff have not had her best interests at heart, and they have not had the campaign’s best interests at heart,” the McCain insider fumed, noting that Wallace left an executive job at CBS to join the campaign.

Wallace declined to engage publicly in the finger-pointing that has consumed the campaign in the final weeks.

“I am in awe of [Palin's] strength under constant fire by the media,” she said in an e-mail. “If someone wants to throw me under the bus, my personal belief is that the most graceful thing to do is to lie there.”

But other McCain aides, defending Wallace, dismissed the notion that Palin was mishandled. The Alaska governor was, they argue, simply unready — “green,” sloppy and incomprehensibly willing to criticize McCain for, for instance, not attacking Sen. Barack Obama for his relationship with his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Palin has in fact performed fairly well in the moments thought to be key for a vice presidential nominee: She made a good impression in her surprise rollout in Ohio and her speech to the Republican National Convention went better than the campaign could have imagined. She turned in an adequate performance at a debate against the Democratic Party’s foremost debater.

But other elements of her image-making went catastrophically awry. Her dodging of the press and her nervous reliance on tight scripts in her first interview, with ABC News, became a national joke — driven home to devastating effect by “Saturday Night Live” comic Tina Fey. The Couric interview — her only unstaged appearance for a week — was “water torture,” as one internal ally put it.

Some McCain aides say they had little choice with a candidate who simply wasn’t ready for the national stage, and that Palin didn’t forcefully object. Moments that Palin’s allies see as triumphs of instinct and authenticity - the Wright suggestion, her objection to the campaign’s pulling out of Michigan – they dismiss as Palin’s “slips and miscommunications,” that is, her own incompetence and evidence of the need for tight scripting.

But Palin partisans say she chafed at the handling.

“The campaign as a whole bought completely into what the Washington media said — that she’s completely inexperienced,” said a close Palin ally outside the campaign who speaks regularly to the candidate.

“Her strategy was to be trustworthy and a team player during the convention and thereafter, but she felt completely mismanaged and mishandled and ill advised,” the person said. “Recently, she’s gone from relying on McCain advisers who were assigned to her to relying on her own instincts.” . . .

When a McCain aide, speaking anonymously Friday to The Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder, suggested that Palin’s charge that Obama was “palling around with terrorists” had “escaped HQ’s vetting,” it was Scheunemann who fired off an angry response that the speech was “fully vetted” and that to attack Palin for it was “bull****.”

Palin’s “instincts,” on display in recent days, have had her opening up to the media, including a round of interviews on talk radio, cable and broadcast outlets, as well as chats with her traveling press and local reporters.

Reporters really began to notice the change last Sunday, when Palin strolled over to a local television crew in Colorado Springs.

“Get Tracey,” a staffer called out, according to The New York Times, summoning spokeswoman Tracey Schmitt, who reportedly “tried several times to cut it off with a terse ‘Thank you!’ in between questions, to no avail.” The moment may have caused ulcers in some precincts of the McCain campaign, but it was an account Palin’s admirers in Washington cheered.

Palin had also sought to give meatier policy speeches, in particular on energy policy and on policy for children with disabilities; she finally gave the latter speech Friday, but had wanted to deliver it much earlier.

She’s also begun to make her own ad hoc calls about the campaign’s direction and the ticket’s policy. McCain, for instance, has remained silent on Democrats’ calls for a stimulus package of new spending, a move many conservatives oppose but that could be broadly popular. But in an interview with the conservative radio host Glenn Beck earlier this week, Palin went “off the reservation” to make the campaign policy, one aide said.

“I say, you know, when is enough enough of taxpayer dollars being thrown into this bill out there?” she asked. “This next one of the Democrats being proposed should be very, very concerning to all Americans because to me it sends a message that $700 billion bailout, maybe that was just the tip of the iceberg. No, you know, we were told when we’ve got to be believing if we have enough elected officials who are going to be standing strong on fiscal conservative principles and free enterprise and we have to believe that there are enough of those elected officials to say, ‘No, OK, that’s enough.’”

(A McCain spokeswoman said Palin’s statement was “a good sentiment.”)

But few imagine that Palin will be able to repair her image — and bad poll numbers — in the eleven days before the campaign ends. And the final straw for Palin and her allies was the news that the campaign had reported spending $150,000 on her clothes, turning her, again, into the butt of late-night humor.

“She never even set foot in these stores,” the senior Republican said, noting Palin hadn’t realized the cost when the clothes were brought to her in her Minnesota hotel room.

“It’s completely out-of-control operatives,” said the close ally outside the campaign. “She has no responsibility for that. It’s incredibly frustrating for us and for her.”

Between Palin’s internal detractors and her allies, there’s a middle ground: Some aides say that she’s a flawed candidate whose handling exaggerated her weak spots.

“She was completely mishandled in the beginning. No one took the time to look at what her personal strengths and weaknesses are and developed a plan that made sense based on who she is as a candidate,” the aide said. “Any concerns she or those close to her have about that are totally valid.”

But the aide said that Palin’s inexperience led her to her own mistakes:

“How she was handled allowed her weaknesses to hang out in full display.”

If McCain loses, Palin’s allies say that the national Republican Party hasn’t seen the last of her. Politicians are sometimes formed by a signal defeat — as Bill Clinton was when he was tossed out of the Arkansas governor’s mansion after his first term — and Palin would return to a state that had made her America’s most popular governor and where her image as a reformer who swept aside her own party’s insiders rings true, if not in the cartoon version the McCain campaign presented.

“There are people in this campaign who feel a real sense of loyalty to her and are really pleased with her performance and think she did a great job,” said the McCain insider. “She has a real future in this party.”

4900 Days & Students Eager to Learn About “Justice” or Lack Thereof

Good morning!  I frequently check Brandon’s Blog for updates on the Brandon Hein case and appeal.  For those of you unfamiliar with the case, Brandon was convicted under California’s infamous “felony murder rule” for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.  He was at the fort of the local high school drug dealer with some other boys seeking to buy pot, when a fight broke out between another boy and the drug dealer’s “bodyguard” who happened to be the son of an LAPD officer.  In the fight the OTHER boy stabbed the LAPD officer’s son and the police officers son later died.  Although the boy who did the stabbing has always admitted his guilt, the other boys, who knew nothing about what had happened until later, were all charged with murder under the “felony murder rule” and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole.  That’s a more severe sentence than was given to Charles Manson or the routine 15-year sentences given to California gang bangers who go out, intent on killing, and shoot innocent people in drive-by shootings.

So 4900 days . . . as of this morning that’s how long Brandon Hein has been in prison for a crime nobody says he committed!   That’s over THIRTEEN YEARS!!  For thirteen years the case has tortuously moved through the courts at glacial speed, and now is in the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, which really is the court of last appeal for Brandon.

While the Governor of California could step forward and do the right thing, he has yet to act.

This case has never been far from my mind . . . or prayers . . . for thirteen years. I’ve been amazed at how cavalierly my fellow citizens can ignore this travesty of justice. I would have thought . . . oh well.

At any rate I got this email last week . . .

Mr. Detrich: Are you the same Mr. Detrich that appeared in the video documentary “Reckless Indifference?” If so, would you be willing to communicate in some fashion with my high school law classes? We’re currently watching the video and learning about the Agoura Hills murder case and California’s felony murder rule. Ms. Holland and Mr. Sullivan (the investigator) have offered their help and I’m hoping to get more people familiar with the case to offer some assistance. Your help could be in the form of answering student questions via email or phone. Thanks for your consideration! Dan Townsend North Hardin H.S.Radcliff, KY

So I wrote back, “Hi Dan! Yeah, that’s me . . . I wish more schools did this . . . kids need to understand the potential of “being at the wrong place at the wrong time” as well as understanding the glacial legal process. I’d be glad to help in any way I can. Email is probably best, since where I am I only have cell and it’s sometimes iffy. We could also do it via computer. Regards, Richard”

Dan wrote back,

Mr. Detrich: That’s wonderful~!! I’m not sure exactly what the process(es) of communication will be for my kids as this is only the second year I’ve used this topic in class and I’m still looking at the possibilities for assignments/projects. We just finished watching “Reckless Indifference” today and will continue discussing it on Monday. On Tuesday, we will be going to a computer lab to type letters to Governor Schwarzenegger asking for clemency for the four young men still in prison and signing the petition online. We will be, in some form or fashion, talking to/writing you, Ms. Holland, Mr. Sullivan, and hopefully Ms. Hein. I’m not sure how to get in touch with Tony Miliotti’s family yet, but might look into that as well. I’m thinking that the easiest way to communicate with those of you involved will be to divide my kids into groups of five and have them “interview” you guys and ask specific questions about the case and the circumstances around it. We’ll probably let some groups use the conference room here at school and do a conference call with Mr. Sullivan and Ms. Holland, but with you and any others we can contact, email should be perfectly fine.

Could you take a moment to email me your background and involvement in the case so I can relay that information to the kids? They obviously saw you in the documentary, but knowing your interest/involvement in the case would ofcourse help.

If you have any other ideas for us, I’m all ears! The only other thing I’m planning at this point is to have them, in groups, write statements about the case that we put on poster board and display in the room or hallway. An example of a statement from last year was: “It was a tragedy, not a murder! Life in prison is a tragedy as well!” I tried sending pictures of our “posters” to Brandon, but the letter was intercepted for other reasons and I don’t think the pictures were delivered. Maybe this year we can send them and get them to him via his parents! I greatly appreciate your willingness to help us with this and look forward to my students getting to work with you to fully understand what happened to these kids and why the court system apparently failed them so miserably. Thanks so much! Dan

Wow . . . what a great and innovative teacher! So I wrote back:

Dan, I met Brandon shortly after he became “state property” (that’s what they call it!), right after he had been sentenced and while he was at LA Central Jail. During that period he couldn’t have any visitors and his family couldn’t see him, so I was able to use my clergy status and get in for an “attorney visit.”

The story of how I got involved is on my blog – “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”  and for a number of other blogs I’ve written on the case.  I was the one who talked Brandon into making his case public in the hopes that we could get some justice. It really hasn’t worked that way, and he’s had to pay the price in prison with everyone knowing all his business. He never wanted this “celebrity prisoner” high profile case status, but I thought that if people knew they would be outraged and demand justice. Not so.

Brandon has never seen the Internet as we know it. THAT should help your kids realize how long 13 years is!! I wrote most of what’s on his Web site and I would print it out and mail it to him. Then the Corrections folks and guards, who all read his Web site, decided nothing from the Internet. So we had to develop convoluted ways to get the content in for him to approve it.  Calif Dept of Corrections does not allow any photos or interviews of prisoners. The footage on “Reckless Indifference” was done with then State Senator Tom Hayden and his Chief of Staff, Rocky Rushing, as testimony for a Senate bill to abolish the Felony Murder Rule (it lost), knowing that we also needed it for the documentary. To do the Dan Rather interview on “60 Minutes”the show had to say it wanted to interview prisoners at random, which the CDC approved. All the prisoners who wanted to talk to Dan Rather could sign up and the show would select “at random” who they wanted to talk to. Of course we got Brandon and Jason Holland to sign up, and when they got to the prison the producer said, OK, these two . . . Hein and Holland . . . There are some guards and prison officials who have been very sympathetic, just doing their jobs, and others who have kind of singled Brandon out for trouble. They’ve moved him around periodically, but they do that with lots of prisoners.

I assume your kids have read Brandon’s Web site, and there is another good one called Prison Zone  that has great photography and will give your class some idea of what prison is like.

Because of his “LWOP” (“life without possibility of parole”) Brandon’s classification in prison is the highest – Level IV Close Custody – so he gets to live with some really mean folks. Once when Jason Holland was asked what “Level IV” meant he said, “It means there are some that really aren’t very nice people.” The one I tell folks about, who was Brandon’s neighbor for a while, was a guy in his late 50’s named “Grumpy.” Grumpy was in prison for one . . . or more murders . . . and he had a cell mate who snored, so he killed him. I tell my wife, when she snores, that it really wasn’t murder but “justifiable homicide.”

If your students want to “experience” prison see if they will do this experiment: Lock themselves into their bathroom for two or three days. Throw some blankets in the tub and sleep there. Leave the light on. Take off the toilet seat and sit on the cold toilet. Flip flops only, no shoe laces or belt. If this is “administrative segregation” or “the hole” no tubes of toothpaste, deodorant, liquids other than water or juice with meals, no TV, no radio, one book, no visitors. Parents should stick food of the order of TV dinners through the bathroom door without conversation. Of course no cell phone. They get out for exercise 1 hour a day under close parental supervision. And if this were the real thing you’d have to be very careful on your way to a shower once a week. And of course there would be a TV camera in the bathroom with you and someone watching your every move.

If you can get ahold of the “Lynching In Malibu” article from ROLLING STONE [September 4, 1997] that would be great too. Regards, Richard

* * * * *

I will keep you all informed of how this plays out.  For more on Brandon Hein:

• Brandon Hein – Outrageous injustice! 18-year-old wrongly sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole
• Brandon Hein Prison Interview with Sen. Tom Hayden
• For better or worse Brandon gets a Wikipedia page
• Brandon Online Petition