The Real Crime

While Rome I-mean-Baltimore burns, Baltimore State's Attorney Marilyn Mosby is getting her rear end kicked.

Not by a brilliant defense strategy, but by the facts.  Facts that she could have discovered had she conducted herself professionally and ethically.  

People with expertise told her - immediately after her dramatic announcement of charges - that she acted too fast, that she could not possibly have known all the facts with her two-week "parallel" investigation, her failure to study the police and medical examiner's reports, and her failure to use the grand jury or her own experienced homicide division.

But she created her story and she stuck to it.  We have an exploding homicide rate, a demoralized police department, and her own office in shambles.  Perhaps all of that could have been justified had she pursued a real case of police brutality and murder.

Instead, she made the death of Freddie Gray "in police custody" the equivalent of "murder by police." She made the failure to put on a seat belt a form of homicide.  She stole the livelihood of six people for her own ideology and career.  

Her own probable cause statement did not support her sensational indictments. The autopsy report didn't either, despite it's legal conclusion (that was clearly influenced by Mosby.)  And now the facts reveal that not only are the charges not provable beyond a reasonable doubt, but the officers are actually innocent.

Freddie Gray did not suffer his fatal injury until after the second to last stop.  He wasn't being given a deliberately rough ride, but was doing his own banging around.  Perhaps a seat belt would have prevented him from killing himself, but so would his just staying seated.  In any event, there is no such crime as "homicide by no seat belt."  If one wants to call it negligence - despite other police departments (not to mention other transit vehicles, like buses) not using seat belts - then fine.  That's why the city paid the Gray family over $6 million.  But there was no police brutality or a criminal disregard for Gray's safety.

There is no way this jury can convict Officer Porter on any count.  If they do, it will prove only that Judge Williams should have changed the venue because jurors are afraid of the consequences of an acquittal.  

It's Marilyn Mosby who has committed a crime, a crime against the criminal justice system and the oath she took less than a year ago.  A crime against people who should never have been charged and prosecuted.  A crime against the citizens of Baltimore, and the false road she took them down.

It's a crime she will get away with.  But the city won't. We'll be paying for this for a long time to come.