cindy's world

Remember that defendant I wrote about in the October 26, 2005 entry The Human Side of the System? I said I’d let you guys know what the sentence is and today is the guy’s sentencing.

I’d like to first address how people seem to think that judges pull a random number out of their butts when they’re sentencing someone to jail time. Our justice system is not so arbitrary as to let judicial officers amerce based on their moods. Every crime has a sentencing range that is mandated by law. Assault with a Deadly Weapon, for example, Penal Code section 245(a)(1), has a sentencing range of 2-3-4, which means that if the judge does not put the guy on probation and decides to give state prison time, he can select either the low term of 2 years, mid-term of 3 years, or high term of 4 years in state prison for this crime alone. The judge can take into consideration myriad factors when he’s selecting the sentence, such as whether the guy has a significant criminal history, whether this was a freak situation that created the assault, etc.

Anyway, in a case where a man is convicted of having shot and killed his wife and therefore is guilty of the crime of first degree murder, Penal Code section 187(a), as the judge said from the bench, “The crime of murder of the first degree warrants significant punishment and there is essentially little to no — with an emphasis on “no” — latitude with respect to Mr. [defendant]’s sentence in this case.”

Murder –> 25 years to life in state prison
Enhancement that he used a gun in committing the crime –> another 25 years to life in state prison
total sentence –> 50 years to life in state prison

This means he needs to serve 50 years in state prison before he’s even eligible for parole. This guy’s not even 40 yet.

So, boys and girls, the moral of this story is, when your wife is divorcing you, LET HER GO. Do not kill her. And if you do decide to kill her, DO NOT USE A GUN. Not even as a bludgeoning device, cuz that still counts as using a firearm in the commission of your offense. Seriously, if someone no longer wants to be with you, take that as an opportunity to get a clean start and have a great rest-of-your-life.

…Harry Potter.

I had no interest in reading the books nor in watching the movies, simply because the series was so overhyped and it seems like every kid, young adult, and most of my peers are under the Harry Potter spell. I even walked by the living room once when visiting my parents and they were watching some Harry Potter movies. And not even subtitled versions! I typically avoid trendy stuff in general (with the exception of Cancun, but boy, am I glad I went when I did given the weather-beaten town now).

So imagine my consternation when Mr. W and another one of his close friends (whom I’m also familiar with) jumped in on me about how they’re going to watch the new Harry Potter movie when it comes out and they’re so excited and the books were so great and they’re planning a big group to go and stand early in line, etc. I politely turned down their invitation to go along, explaining that I couldn’t possibly watch the movie because I hadn’t read the books and hadn’t seen the prior movies so I wouldn’t be able to understand what was going on. Mr. W’s solution? “Well, I guess you’ll just have to come over to my house and watch the first 3 movies and catch up.”

I watched all 3 movies last week.

I’m hooked.

Harry Potter is SO much better than Lord of the Rings. Karen was right. Those LOTR dwarfs were retarded to be walking around, tripping and starving and freezing and victimized by various magical things when they had Gandalf as their friend and mystical flying animals in their realm. If Harry Potter were in charge of getting rid of the ring, he would’ve flown on a broomstick over the volcano and done it already, or ridden a dragon, or ANYTHING. It woudn’t have taken 3 DVDs of 3 hours in length each. (This is how little I care about LOTR. I bought the first 2 DVDs, slept thru them, loaned them to William and Raquel, haven’t seen them since, and I don’t even care to find out if the couple still has them or whether they returned the DVDs to my ex, who never returned them to me.)

I’ve been walking around for a few days in a sort of confused Harry Potter haze, avoiding knobby-limbed trees in case it decided to “wump” me to death, hearing the buzz of an insect fly past my ear and thinking it’s the Golden Snitch and where the hell are the Seekers to snatch it and win the Quidditch game…

Yeah, I’ll be watching Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire when it’s released on November 18, 2005.

photo courtesy of movies.about.com

Mr. W treated me last nite to a nice sushi dinner and a movie. We saw The Legend of Zorro, starring Antonio Banderas and Catherine Zeta-Jones. I love Catherine Zeta-Jones. She’s so beautiful, even after popping out 3 kids. I’d said long ago that if any woman could turn me lesbian, it’d be Catherine Zeta-Jones. And then she had to go and marry Michael Douglas and burst that dream. Hmm. Come to think of it, I may have been overly vocal with that proclamation before because I remember getting an email from my friend Raquel with an attached photo of Catherine Zeta-Jones, and Raquel had typed as the introduction: “Your favorite.” I don’t even recall having had a discussion with Raquel about the actress.

Anyway, the movie was pretty good. I love all of Catherine Zeta-Jones’s expressions, the way her eyes look when she’s conveying anger, coyness, hurt, fear, confidence. I think my favorite scene was when her character, Elena, was fighting some bad guys with Zorro, and they managed to turn one villain’s back to them and you just see the two of them swiping away with their swords. The camera then goes to the villain’s back, and on the right buttcheek of his white underpants were tears in the fabric forming the legendary “Z”, and on the left buttcheek was an “E.” The camera then cuts to Zorro and Elena, and the two of them cock their heads slightly to the side, seemingly mesmerized by and admiring their handywork. Then the pause in the action is over and they jump right back into the swordplay.

Zorro and Elena’s son, now a mischievous 9-year-old Joaquin de la Vega, played a large role in the movie. I would’ve enjoyed the movie more if he weren’t in the movie, because as I see it, the kid was nothing but a liability to his parents and leverage for the villains. If he weren’t in the movie, his parents would’ve taken care of business and the movie would’ve only had to be 30 minutes long.

This movie was also my first IMAX Theatre experience. Altho it wasn’t 3-D, it did play on the gi-normous IMAX screen, where I felt like if I didn’t keep moving my head and eyes to follow the action, I’d miss something on the other side of the screen. I think that’s what kept me from falling asleep at the 8pm movie. That, and Catherine Zeta-Jones.

I had lunch today with 4 coworkers plus one retired coworker. The retired coworker was a very good friend when she worked with us, and she drives back to the courthouse almost every Tuesday to have lunch with whomever would like to come along. I haven’t been going to lunch with them because I’d been working out every lunch. Today, I’m just tired, hungry, and vexed by the lack of result from all the working out and running (my body is SO stubborn, whereas my trainee’s weight’s just flying off her body such that people come up to ME to tell me how great she looks now), so I went to lunch and had a great time. I tend to be reclusive at work although I consider myself on at least decent terms with everyone, so it was nice to see the girls in a more social setting and catch up on each other. I also got a heaping helping of moral support and affirmation. That’s definitely worth missing a workout for. 🙂

This is the basis for our present criminal trial:

The soon-to-be victim (5’5″ Latino man in his 20s) is driving down a street in his van, when the defendant (5’6″ 22-year-old Latino man) drives by and sees him. The two know each other and they don’t get along. The defendant starts waving and screaming profanities out the car at the victim. The defendant keeps following the victim until they get to a more residential street, at which time the defendant drives in front of the victim and cuts him off and stops the car. The defendant gets out of the car and goes to the victim’s van, pulls the victim out, and starts smacking him upside the head. Somehow one of them gets the victim’s Club (metal steering-wheel lock anti-theft device) out of the victim’s car and the story gets disputed at this point about who was hitting whom on the top of the head with the Club. The defendant uses the Club to smash the side of the victim’s van and some of the van windows. This altercation took place in front of a car repair shop and the owner of the shop and one employee are eye witnesses.

I’m sorry, this scenario sounds so juvenile that it’s actually funny to me. It plays out in my head like a movie. These two kids just going at it, and they’re costing the County millions of dollars in resources to make the arrest, prosecute this case and bring it to a jury trial.

First off, I’d like to say hello to all my readers, and thank you for your interest in my blog. Wow, you guys hail from all over the globe! I don’t know how you found me, but I hope you stay.

According to the server’s statistics for this blog, in October, I got most (31.18%) of my hits from US Commercial sources, and 30.34% from within the network (I assume that means when I log in to write or when the server is doing its backup and saves and servicing, right, Wilco?). By country, US hosts are ahead with 12.70% of the hits, and Sweden is next up with 5.75% of total hits. Canada is only 0.20% with 52 total hits in October. Mark, your people are slacking! =)

To see the top 30 of 34 total countries who’ve hit up this blog in October and how they rank, click on the “more,” below:
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