Bernarded for getting hired by Michael's

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Man shouldn’t have gone to jail for getting a job at Michael’s instead of Home Depot, court rules

Alfred Scott was arrested for a first-time marijuana offense last year, but he was willing to plead guilty and he even lined up a full-time job at Home Depot to show he deserved mercy.
But when that job fell through and he got a job at Michael’s instead, Judge Russell Healey seemed to insist that the job needed to be at Home Depot. Healey decided his mercy had been worn out. For getting a job at the wrong store, Healey sent Scott to jail for 90 days.

That decision was overturned last Friday by an appellate court that said Healey failed to find Scott had willfully violated his probation.

Scott’s sentencing score was so low that state prison wasn’t even a possibility. But Judge Healey told him he would face 90 days in county jail for selling marijuana. When Scott said he had a job offer at Home Depot, Healey offered mercy, saying he’d let him out of jail on the condition “that he gets a job, full-time job, or show at least five applications per week until he gets a job.”
But a Department of Corrections probation officer said Home Depot rescinded the job offer likely because of the conviction, but “he’s been complying with everything I asked him to do.”
Scott got a full-time job at Michael’s and a part-time job at McDonald’s. In total, he was working 60 hours a week. But that wasn’t good enough for Judge Healey.

Healey, the chief felony judge of Duval, Nassau and Clay counties, sent Scott to jail for 90 days. Chief Judge Mark Mahon said that because the case was sent back for resentencing that Healey couldn’t comment on it. The resentencing has not been set on the docket.

At the hearing, Healey said he shouldn’t have offered any lenience to begin with. “That will teach me a lesson,” he said at the conclusion of the hearing.

The appellate court ruled that Healey was inconsistent about if the job had to be at Home Depot. At times, it appeared Healey had demanded the job be at Home Depot, but at other times, he only said it had to be a full-time job. Regardless, appellate Judge Scott Makar wrote, Healey could not prove that Scott “willfully violated” the probation if Scott was genuinely seeking out a job.
This isn’t the first time an appellate court ruled that Healey violated a defendant’s rights during sentencing.

In one rape case, Healey was criticized and a 30-year sentence was overturned by the 1st District Court of Appeals because Healey lectured a Hispanic defendant that a “good Catholic fellow” shouldn’t commit adultery. Makar also wrote an opinion in that case.

In the case of a woman who shoplifted $17.19 of food from Walmart, he declared her a “danger to society,” something that should have been decided by a jury, the appellate court ruled.
And in a dissenting opinion a few months ago, Makar criticized Healey’s demeanor in a case where the Department of Corrections waived supervision fees for a poor mother who was struggling with a part-time job as a janitor. In response to the department’s lenience, “the trial judge went on a tirade,” Makar wrote of Healey. Healey even made offhand comments about the public defender’s advocacy. (“How lovely,” Healey said).

At least six times, the First District Court of Appeals ruled in favor of pro se defendants who filed their own appeals against Healey without an attorney. In those cases, they tried to appeal their convictions, but Healey denied their appeals without holding any hearings or “conclusively” refuting their claims.

Before joining the felony bench, Healey was a county judge who handled misdemeanors, evictions and minor civil cases. He was appointed by Gov. Rick Scott to the felony bench in 2014 after he presided over the two murder trials of Michael Dunn, a white defendant who murdered a black teenager over a dispute about loud rap music. The case garnered national attention. Yet during those trials as well, the appellate courts overturned Healey’s decisions to limit access to the media. The Florida Times-Union was involved in appealing those decisions.

He conducted part of jury selection in private; he removed a juror in private, and he held hearings in private.

Healey was unopposed in his 2016 re-election to the bench. Judges serve six-year terms.

[Samson's Wig 3,202]

Electing judges has consequences, and we have some real head-scratchers on the bench in Texas as well.  

But still - Florida gonna Florida.

[smuggs 9,359]

This thread is making me want to go browse the model airplane aisle.

[Js1 85,929]

Judge getting kick back for sending Home Depot employees?

[irishtexan 11,602]

This guy looks like a bald little asshole

[F250 28,990]

[HornsOverIthaca 2,339]

3 hours ago, smuggs said:

This thread is making me want to go browse the model airplane aisle.

Remember when they had model rockets?

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