Where does Bernie Sanders go for criminal justice advice?

Joe Schoffstall reports in the Washington Examiner,

former adviser on criminal justice issues to Sen. Bernie Sanders (I., Vt.) was plotting a violent prison escape, stashing guns and ammunition inside a soon-to-be-opened prison, authorities said this week.

Nashville police said Wednesday that Alex Friedmann, a prison reform advocate who helped shape the Vermont senator's criminal justice agenda, spent months plotting an escape for inmates of the city's detention center. Sanders worked with Friedmann to develop positions on criminal justice in the lead up to his 2016 presidential campaign—positions Sanders still touts.

Davidson County sheriff Daron Hall, at a press conference on Wednesday, said Friedmann hid at least three loaded guns upon breaking into the detention center in December. The break-in was part of "an extremely deliberate and, in my opinion, evil plan" Friedmann developed "over many months," Hall said."What disturbed me most is not that this was about an escape, it was also about loss of life," Hall added. "Mr. Friedmann, a convicted felon and self-described criminal justice advocate, planted loaded guns with additional ammunition inside the detention center."

Friedmann, while managing editor at Prison Legal News and associate director at the Human Rights Defense Center (HRDC), helped Sanders go beyond his usual focus on economic issues in 2015. Acting as a consultant for the senator's office, Friedmann called for Sanders to adopt progressive criminal justice positions such as the abolition of private prisons. Sanders's current presidential campaign promises to ban private prisons.

HRDC's 2015 annual report detailed the organization's role in getting the Vermont senator to become more aggressive on the issue.

"Staff at U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders's office consulted with several criminal justice organizations, including HRDC, for a bill he planned to introduce related to the private prison industry," the report stated. "Alex Friedmann participated in multiple conference calls with the senator's staff and suggested the name that was eventually used for the bill, the ‘Justice is Not for Sale Act,'" which aimed to ban private prisons.

Friedmann was arrested last month after he posed as a construction worker, entered the Nashville detention center, stole keys that could open 100 doors, and made a diagram of the jail's layout. He attempted to eat the diagram during his arrest. The facility delayed its opening until April to replace all of the locks. It has now pushed its opening back even further to ensure personnel can do their jobs in a safe and secure environment.

The activist is currently being held on $2.5 million bond at the Tennessee Department of Corrections.

Friedmann was previously arrested in 1987 for armed robbery and assault with attempt to commit murder. In 1991, he was convicted of attempted aggravated robbery and spent 10 years in prison. Friedmann began to battle for prison reform after being paroled in 1999.

Sanders's office did not respond to a request for comment by press time.

Creative, Inventive, Manipulative, and Retarded?

An illegal immigrant from Mexico is being arraigned today on charges of murder. His name is Jose Luis Rubi-Nava. Mr. Rubi-Nava lived here in Colorado with a friend named Maria Franco-Fierros. Before murdering Ms. Franco-Fierros, Mr. Rubi-Nava beat her, as he had on numerous other occasions. This time, however, he was not satisfied just to beat her. He tied a strap to the bumper of his truck, and then fastened the other end around the neck of his friend, then sped away, leaving a mile long track of Franco-Fierros' mutilated body behind him on the road.

Mr. Rubi-Nava's public defender (that's right, this illegal immigrant murderer's defense is being paid for by the American taxpayers) is claiming that her client is mentally retarded and has "other cognitive-comprehension disabilities". Colorado law, and Supreme Court opinion forbid the execution of mentally retarded inviduals.

Let's see now. Mr. Rubi-Nava snuck into America, found a woman friend who lived in a nice suburban subdivision in Colorado, found a job, sent money back to his wife and kids in Mexico, hid himself from apprehension by police, and dreamed up a marvelously inventive, albeit considerably depraved, way to murder his woman friend.
David Harsanyi covers the story today here in the Denver Post.

I wonder if they will find a forensic psychologist who will help the killer get off. I am confident that they will find at least one, if not several who will sell their soul to help this attorney protect her client from getting the justice he deserves.

In the course of doing "best interest of the child" reports for the District Courts in Colorado, I have met such individuals in the psychology profession. They can put up a reasonable argument for any side of any issue, depending upon who is paying them for their testimony. Facts are not what matters. It is the all-knowing psychologist's interpretation of facts that is important! This is a case, however, in my opinion, where there surely could not be a reasonable argument put forward on behalf of this killer.