Law & Justice: June 2003 Archives
The Supreme Court ruled today that a California law that retroactively removes the statute of limitations for sex crimes is unconstitutional. Basically, the statute of limitations for sex crimes previously said that a prosecution had to be brought within 7 years of the crime, or else it could never be brought. The recent California law temporarily suspended that restriction and only required that a prosecution be brought within 1 year of when the victim filed a police report, which could be done any amount of time after the alleged abuse occured.
Statutes of limitations are important because it can be impossible to mount a defense against accusations of wrongdoing that may have occured in the distant past. Witnesses die and move away, memories fade and change over time. Realize, once an accusation is made and a prosecution has begun, there is no time limit on how long it can take to complete. If the suspect flees justice he can still be tried and convicted in absentia. Statutes of limitations only prevent accusations from being brought too long after the fact.
It may or may not be good policy to lengthen or eliminate the statute of limitations that applies to sex crimes, and that is still within the power of the California legislature, but the Supreme Court has ruled that it cannot do so retroactively for crimes that have already been committed.
Update:
This CNN story indicates that the statute of limitations for sex crimes in California is 3 years, not 7 as I said previously.
The WaPo has an article about a man named Charles T. Sell who is refusing the anti-pychotic medication which would make him mentally competant enough to stand trial. What's interesting is that the crimes he is accused of aren't violent in nature -- he's a dentist who has been charged with Medicaid fraud. The Supreme Court has just ruled that since he isn't a danger to himself or others, and hasn't been charged with any violent offenses, forcibly medicating him against his wishes does not "significantly further" an "important" government objective, and would not be "medically appropriate".
The vote in the Supreme Court was 6-3, and I really have no problem with it; I'm pretty much neutral. Justice Bryer does raise one issue that causes me some distress, however:
The U.S. government indicted him on charges of Medicaid fraud in 1997, but courts have found him to be so mentally ill that he is not competent to stand trial. Those courts have agreed with government doctors who say the only hope of rendering him competent is to administer anti-psychotic drugs -- by force, if necessary -- but Sell, citing the drugs' sometimes debilitating side effects and his own constitutional rights, has refused. ...Society has no compelling interest in further prosecuting this man, guilty or not. It's a tremendous waste of government resources to pursue this issue any further, and Charles T. Sell should be released immediately based on his non-violent condition and the time he has already been imprisoned. The prosecutor in charge of the case, however, feels differently.During the arguments on in March, Justice John Paul Stevens noted that Sell has already been confined longer than he would have been if convicted on all counts of the Medicaid fraud indictment.
But Deputy Solicitor General Michael R. Dreeben, arguing for the government, told the court that Sell has himself to blame for his extended stay behind bars, since he is one of only a handful of people who have ever litigated their refusal to be medicated to such an extent.The Supreme Court has just ruled that the "fact" Dreeben refers to is actually false."Most individuals accept the fact . . . that medication is the appropriate, medically sanctioned way" to get better for trial, Dreeben said.
