imported post
If I understand this correctly, Frank and Wisconsin Carry accepted 10 Grand in exchange for dropping the charges. If the defendents weren't judged to be in the wrong, what has changed in Racine, besides 10 Grand going out of the city coffers?
Hey Dave,
The "charges" were not dropped. This was not a settlement. The defendents WERE judged. A
judgement was entered against them. That judgement is a matter of public record.
This is civil law, not criminal law, so to be precise, these aren't "charges" they are complaints that the plaintiffs (WCI and Frank Hannan-Rock) made against the defendants. We asked for damages. The court awarded damages have been awarded in favor of WCI and Frank Hannan-Rock and against the defendants, City of Racine and Officers Nethery and Prince.
Being civil law, the semantics aren't exactly the same as criminal law, but consider what Racine did as the criminal law equivalent of pleading "no contest". When you plead no contest you aren't admitting guilt, but you are saying "I know I will be found guilty, so I won't fight the charges" If Racine didn't think they did anything wrong, they would have fought the charges. If the case was frivolous, Racine could have just asked the Federal Judge to throw it out and the judge could have. Racine knows their officers broke the law. The Racine city attorney admits it in this article:
http://www.journaltimes.com/news/lo...cle_25295ce2-2acb-11df-bd14-001cc4c002e0.html
Attorney Kevin Reak, who represents the city in this matter, said officers didn't have authority to arrest Hannan-Rock for refusing to identify himself.
The attorney who represents the city ALSO goes on to admit that the reason Racine made an offer of judgement is because they were worried what they could lose if it went to trial:
Still, Reak said, the judgment does not admit any liability or guilt. It was about limiting the amount of money the city may have to pay if the case went to trial and was decided in Hannan-Rock's favor.
TRUE Racine does not admit guilt... But in that regard, thousands of people in this country in criminal court are found guilty every day and they NEVER admit guilt.
It doesn't matter if Racine admits guilt. A
judgement was entered against them by the Federal Court. If we went to trial and Racine lost (which they would have) they STILL don't have to admit guilt. Think of how many criminals go to jail 'never' admitting guilt. (again, this is civil law, so the 'relief' sought was damages, not jail.
Going to trial would have meant more legal expense for WCI for a damage award that likely would have been around 10,000. You might note that in other states where people have sued for these kinds of things $10,000 was the damages awarded. I think Racine did some research and made that offer of judgement as a result.
Without getting too deep in the legal technicalities, there is liability for WCI if we were to refuse the rule 68 offer of judgement. If we went to trial and the damage award came in LESS than the offer of judgement racine made, WE (WCI) would have been responsible for their court costs. We would have had to pay them out of the damages we were awarded. In essence Racine could have said to the court "hey look, we offered them $10,000 in damages and they said no, now we spent all this money litigating and they only won $8,000, if they'd have taken our offer of damages of $10,000 we wouldn't have had to spend all this money to get to the same (or lesser) damage award by the court"
We have expert legal counsel in these matters. You can have confidence that our attorney has the best interest of Wisconsin Carry, our members, AND the true issue of citizens-rights and "right and wrong" in mind. Our attorney is on the governing board of Georgia Carry Inc. I am confident (this is my personal opinion) that he didn't take our case for money, as he probably will barely cover his expenses and time, he took our case because he believes in rights and freedoms also.
:lol:
