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Wantland
& Wantland
Our jails are overcrowded
and in Oklahoma it is determined that prison populations will
quadruple in the near future according to a recent Oklahoma
newspaper article circulated via C.U.R.E., an organization
attempting to implement the job of the Department of Corrections to more closely
correspond to the gilded title Corrections than their focus on pure
punishment. Citizens
United for Rehabilitation of Errants.
No one is advocating that
jails and prisons are not necessary for some errants. And they have come a long
way from public whipping stakes and pillories of the past. Still, the foundation of
treatment in jails and prisons is based more on fear and violence
than anything else.
Fear is a valid factor.
We have no present
alternative but to cage up those we fear. John Allen
Muhammad
is a good example.
Jeffery Dahmers, Jeremy Jones and his boss. There is a long list of
violent offenders that cannot be trusted not to harm us or even kill
us should they ever get out. Some simply cannot be
rehabilitated.
Incarceration did not
rehabilitate Martha Stewart.
She still uses too much salt in her recipes.
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May first, 2006, I observed
a “Sounding Docket” in Craig County Oklahoma. There was a wide range of
charges, including minor traffic violations. Two dozen ‘accused,’ one at
a time, were called by Judge Goodpaster for disposition. Those with attorneys were
scheduled and released on bond. Some, who had posted bond,
had not been able to hire an attorney. They were ordered confined
in the Craig County Jail where they were to remain until
arrangements for an attorney could be made. And, as we all know, “If you
can’t afford an attorney one will be appointed for you.”
We are all guaranteed the
right to an attorney.
That’s the law.
Money, or lack of it, is not a deterrent to Justice. That’s the law.
One by one they came before
the Judge. Ten, one by
one, were asked the same questions concerning “attorney” and ten
responded “Tim Wantland is my attorney.” Tim Wantland of “Wantland
& Wantland” in Claremore Oklahoma. “Where is he?” “I don’t
know.”
Ten accused were ordered
confined in the Craig County Jail because their attorney, Tim
Wantland, did not show up.
Ten are being punished in a cage that has been condemned by
the Federal Bureau of Prisons because their attorney, paid by the
State, was a ‘no-show’ with something better to do than his job the
State is paying him to do!
It was alleged that Tim
Wantland was in Trial in Clarmore. Maybe so; that, if fact,
does not excuse absence abandonment of other clients; especially
when he has associates that are available to stand in for him.
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Because Tim Wantland
decided to neglect his obligation to ten accused, these ten accused
will wait at least one more month [they were re-scheduled for June
5] in an overcrowded condemned facility.
Note:
There is no criticism for
Craig
County, Sheriff
or jailers. They cannot
help it because the electrical system is far below NEC standards, a
plumbing system banned decades ago, the parapets are crumbling with
age and falling on the sidewalk and steps to the antique Court
House. Craig
County is
building a long overdue new Courthouse.
One of the accused confined
in this condemned jail is Brenda Dilbeck. She has been confined
in this jail, with Tim Wantland, as her attorney, for six months! When Tim Wantland did not
show, Ms. Dilbeck commented to Judge Goodpasture that Mr. Wantland
promised he would present her Pro-se Motion for dismissal that
date.
Judge Goodpaster did not
volunteer that, in accordance with Faretta vs. California, 422 U.
S. 806, she could proceed on her
own at that point as her own attorney and ask that the Motion be
ruled on. And, of
course, the prosecutor would not volunteer help for her. This is a problem with our
adversarial system.
“Winning” is more important than seeking justice. It is more profitable. The State [prosecutor] gets
paid to keep Ms. Dilbeck in jail; the State appointed attorney
[Wantland] gets paid as long as Ms. Dilbeck [and his other nine
abandoned clients] remain in jail; profit for both sides while ten
accused remain caged.
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With this as an example, is
it any wonder why our jails are overcrowded?
I did not delve into the
charges of the other nine accused; be they felonies or
misdemeanors. Brenda
Dilbeck’s charge I have knowledge of:
Three cocaine addicts and
pot-heads, being up to no good, were arrested for
“Possession of drugs” [cocaine] in the city of Vinita. Perry Schenk, Randy Langley
and Steve Langley. The
arresting Officer was Mike Langley. The coincidence in the name
is blood linked.
Perry Schenk stated, when
asked, that he had “a smoking pipe” at his house and he and his co
resident Randy Langley, gave permission to search their
residence.
When County
Officers went
to the Schenk/Langley residence to search it, the front door was
locked; Brenda Dilbeck was outside. She had come to retrieve
some property that was stored at the residence. She opened the unlocked back
door and led an Officer through to the front door where the other
Officers entered and searched the house finding the container in
which was the smoking pipe that Perry Schenk said was there, with
his marijuana.
Brenda Dilbeck, not a
resident, was arrested and charged with possession of
paraphernalia. “Close proximity does
not constitute possession.”
This is in Title 21 of the Oklahoma Statutes and was
determined by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals as long ago as
McBride v. State, 508 P.2d 63, [1973] and recent as Crase vs.
Oklahoma, F2000-365
[2001].
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I cannot fathom the Craig
County Prosecutor or Tim Wantland as being unaware of these two case
laws that will clearly overturn any conviction on the charge of
“Possession of paraphernalia” that Brenda Dilbeck is likely to be
convicted of because of incompetent inattentive
representation.
April 15, 2005, in
Tulsa, our past U.S.Attorney
General Janet Reno gave a talk titled “Wrongful Convictions.” The percentage she estimated
was 10%. As I
commented, I do not know the circumstances of the other nine of Tim
Wantland’s clients that were sent to jail because Tim Wantland
neglected his duties to them as their defender. Assuming these nine charges
valid, Brenda Dilbeck is the 10% in Craig County May 1st,
2006 that has been wrongfully confined and likely will be wrongfully
convicted. She will
languish the average of two more years behind prison bars before her
appeal is heard and the wrongful conviction overturned because she
is indigent, and to say the least,
“Close proximity does not constitute
possession.”
Shame
on you, Mr. Tim Wantland.
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