If it had been up to Oregon’s governor, Cal Coburn Brown would have awakened this morning to a brand new day. He could’ve had his morning coffee and looked forward to whatever simple pleasures were available to him. Maybe a yoga class. Listening to music. Reading a book. Watching TV. Or reliving his glory days when he could torture a woman for more than a day before finally stabbing her to death.
Nine years ago this month, Cal Coburn Brown breathed his last, courtesy of then-Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire, a more courageous leader than Oregon’s current governor, Kate Brown (likely no relation to Cal Brown, but she stands with men like him).
Gov. Brown and her fellow progressives continue to make a mess of Oregon’s criminal justice system. They want to return to the days when Cal Brown, who had a history of assaulting women, could get away with serving 7 ½ years in an Oregon prison.
Two months after Oregon released him in 1991, he violated parole and headed to Washington state. There he spotted 21-year-old Holly Washa in her parked car near Seattle-Tacoma airport. With deliberate premeditation, he told her there was something wrong with her car’s rear tire. When she opened the door to check, Brown pulled a knife and carjacked her, then forced her to drive to a bank and withdraw money. He took her to a motel where he held her for about 34 hours, raping and torturing her until he slashed her to death and stuffed her body in the trunk of her car.
Then he flew to California where he was arrested for trying to rape and kill another woman. During that investigation, police discovered Brown had murdered Washa.
A Washington state jury gave Brown the death penalty. Many states’ political leaders do not have the will to carry out a death sentence. It’s easier to invoke the usual excuse about the possibility of an innocent person being executed, which has nothing to do with confirmed killers like Cal Coburn Brown.
Murderers – including those whose guilt is not in dispute – are swaddled with special rights and privileges. This drives up the costs while allowing death penalty opponents to claim it’s too expensive – even though they are ones inflating the costs.
As usual, Cal Brown’s attorneys threw everything they had to save him. Among other excuses, he blamed his criminal behavior on mental illness (now the go-to defense for everything from shoplifting to serial killing). After numerous appeals, Washington state’s Clemency and Pardons Board split 2-2 on whether to commute his sentence.
When Brown appealed to Gov. Gregoire for a commutation, she did something amazing. She carefully studied the record of the case – and sided with the jury. She could find no rational basis to reverse their verdict.
Sixteen years after he was sentenced to death, Brown finally died. Before he went peacefully by lethal injection, he had the opportunity to play the victim. He claimed his execution was unfair. He only killed one person! Other people who have killed more were given life sentences.
The media dutifully reported on his goodbye calls to his family, his last meal (pizza and apple pie). The prison superintendent held a microphone to Brown’s mouth so he could have his last say. He did not apologize.
After the execution, his attorney Jeff Ellis, a long-time death penalty foe and media regular, used the opportunity to offer empty condolences to the victim’s family while also denouncing the death penalty.
But Washa’s sister, Becky, captured what is beautiful and just about the death penalty: Her family would never have to think about the murderer again, what he was doing, whether he could some day be free. He was truly gone. He no longer existed.
This week, Oregon Gov. Kate Brown left no doubt that families of murder victims in her state will never know that kind of peace.
Earlier this year, the legislature approved Senate Bill 1013, which redefined aggravated murder, the only crime that qualifies for the death penalty in Oregon. Initially, the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Floyd Prozanski (D-Eugene), said the legislation would not apply retroactively to those already on Death Row. State lawyers agreed.
Gov. Brown, who has called the death penalty “immoral,” eagerly signed the bill, which takes effect Sept. 29.
Then state lawyers, upon further consideration, said the bill was retroactive. Although Oregon voters approved the death penalty, SB 1013 effectively overturns it.
Sen. Prozanski lobbied for a special session to fix the bill so it would not apply retroactively. But the bill’s co-sponsor, Rep. Jennifer Williamson (D-Portland), said it was exactly what she wanted. She had no problem with it.
When the public got wind of the controversy, Williamson waffled. Maybe a special session would be in order. Then again, maybe not. It was hard to track her flip-flops. She wants to run for higher office, possibly Secretary of State or Attorney General.
Williamson is an attorney who once worked for the Western Prison Project, an advocacy group for inmates. Now the organization is called Partnership for Safety and Justice. Words are a tool that Williamson and her progressive cohorts use to cover their tracks.
As I have written before, Williamson is the keeper of the Kleenex box at legislative hearings. She has a long history of sponsoring and supporting bills favoring criminals. But she’s ready with a tissue for victims if someone testifies on their behalf. With the death penalty conflict, she needed more than a box of Kleenex. She offered a progressive’s favorite bribe: More money – in this case for victim “services.” As if the victims of Death Row inmates can be bought off. As if counseling can ease the pain of having a loved one killed in a cruel and depraved manner.
Oregon is a state with a Democratic supermajority in the legislature, increasingly led by progressives. Ultimately, Gov. Brown said the votes weren’t there to call a special session and fix the bill.
Williamson is my state representative. Shortly after the legislative session ended, I received a mailer from her crowing about her accomplishments. Things like public education, health care, family leave – all paid for by taxpayers. Here’s what she also included:
“This was an incredible session for criminal justice reform and efforts to protect civil rights. As chair of the House Committee on Judiciary I was proud to help move much of this legislation through the process. While there is too much to recount in this limited space, I am especially proud that we passed youth sentencing reform, giving Oregonians who commit crimes as minors a second chance at rehabilitation. We also gave Oregon the strongest anti-hate crimes law in the nation.”
There is no stronger expression of hate than murder. Williamson will go after “hate” crimes, but she defends those who commit violent assault, even murder. Notice her reference to “youth sentencing reform.” Here’s what that really means:
In 1995, Oregon voters approved Measure 11 requiring mandatory-minimum sentences for certain violent crimes. (Had it been in effect when Cal Brown was sentenced for rape, he likely would not have been free to torture and murder Holly Washa.) Measure 11 also required juveniles, 15 years or older, accused of certain violent crimes to be tried as adults.
Under the youth sentencing reform legislation that Williamson is so proud of, a juvenile can now commit the worst kind of violent crime and – if a judge agrees – be tried as a juvenile, not an adult. His criminal record will not be made public. When Senate Bill 1008 came before Williamson’s House Judiciary Committee on April 24, an overflow crowd turned out for the public hearing. Here’s how she pretended to care about victims while stifling their speech:
“I wanted to make a quick comment that the testimony we may hear today may be hard to hear, upsetting, traumatizing to some people. We are trying to be very cognizant of that this session. We have had a few instances where we’ve had the public have to get up and leave courtesy of testimony and so, in an effort to give people warning, if your testimony is going to involve graphic details in anyway if you could please say that before you give your testimony so that people who would be uncomfortable hearing that have the ability and advance warning to get up and leave.”
In other words, please don’t go into graphic details about the violence teenage boys are capable of.
What’s next for criminal justice reform in Oregon? Legislators will continue to undercut voter-approved laws for mandatory-minimum sentences for violent offenders and for repeat property offenders. In their place: more goodies for criminal offenders in hopes they won’t reoffend. Anything but jail or prison.
This future has been under way for decades in Great Britain.
In a book entitled “A Land Fit for Criminals,” a long-time probation officer named David Fraser reveals the intellectual dishonesty of politicians and their bureaucratic allies when it comes to failing at public safety. Simply change the meaning of words and the definition of various crimes.
Want to lower the number of people sent to prison? Stop making arrests. Not just for minor crimes but for robbery, burglary, assault. Have the cops just issue warnings, and the public will stop calling the police.
Fraser’s book details what decade after decade of leniency has led to, whether it’s homegrown criminals or foreign-born. Protection of the law-abiding has become irrelevant. The intellectual and political elite — and their flacks in the media — insist it is too costly to send offenders to prison.
Fraser zeroes in on the invisible victims of robbers, burglars and thugs who are spared serious punishment. Many of these victims are ordinary people who have been preyed upon repeatedly and no longer feel safe in their homes. Fraser, in details too graphic for Williamson, describes how an assault can leave permanent, life-altering injuries on a victim.
The book was written before Brexit. Did ordinary Britons finally have their say?
They will never have their say on the death penalty. As Fraser points out, the UK Parliament abolished it in 1969.
With the Oregon legislature’s duplicitous rejection of the death penalty, there is a call to bring it back to the voters. Why not? What are politicians like Williamson, Prozanski and Brown afraid of?
Perhaps they have looked south to California, another blue state. Three years ago, under Proposition 62, California voters declined to repeal the death penalty. At the same time, they also voted in favor of Proposition 66 to speed up executions.
People want justice, not protection from graphic details.
– Pamela Fitzsimmons
From the archives:
A Sexual Sadist Makes His Plans
Looking more and more like a coordinated orchestrated attack nationally by letting prisoners out early to disrupt and possibly force us into martial law and weaken our law enforcement.
This would make the president look like a dictator. Is it really far fetched?
It is orchestrated in that countries, states, cities borrow ideas and slogans from one another. They cite each others’ successes that may not be successful at all. Kind of like the way they share “experts” who testify in public hearings on behalf of “evidence-based practices” (and dutifully reported unquestioningly by the media).
David Fraser’s book, “A Land Fit for Criminals” has a chapter devoted to propaganda. The problem, he points out, is how to control the prison budget when politicians can’t control criminal behavior that demands prison.
One way is to embrace the idea that all crime is attributed to social causes. It’s a way to drum up sympathy for the offenders. To help them, the remedies should be sought in community programs — not by imprisoning offenders.
Slogans are helpful at selling this idea to the public. Here in Oregon, “Smart on Crime” is popular. Translation: Take the money spent on jail/prison and spend it on criminal offenders and the organizations that support them.
Williamson has a genius for this. A couple of years ago, she sponsored House Bill 3078, which she called “the Safety and Savings Act.” What did it do? It virtually overturned the voter-approved Measure 57 that called for stronger sentences for repeat property offenders. What’s wrong with punishing chronic thieves?
That’s a failed policy of the past, according to Williamson. She wants “to make investments in effective treatment programs that make our communities safer and ensure that we continue to bend the cost curve on ballooning corrections budgets.”
Williamson is an attorney married to an attorney. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have private security service at their home. If they get burglarized, they probably have good insurance and no concern about their rates going up.
You do the crime, you do the time. We need the death penalty back in and sentence carried out swiftly, that will make criminals think twice. Victims will never get justice if we don’t reverse Kate brown’s doings. We also need TERM LIMITS for ALL Politicians.
We do need to retain the death penalty. Once it’s gone, here’s where attorneys like Jeff Ellis, politicians like Jennifer Williamson and organizations like the ACLU will turn their attention: Getting rid of Life Without Parole. There has been a move under way for a few years now.
http://exhibits.haverford.edu/prisonobscura/picturing-incarceration/
There is also a phrase you may heard: “Death by incarceration.” Death penalty foes think that dying in prison is as cruel and unusual as capital punishment.
Mayhaps cultural shifts do not favor norms as we know/knew them:
https://www.premier.org.uk/News/UK/Church-leaders-urge-government-to-ban-pointed-kitchen-knives
Thanks for that amazing story. When I first clicked on the link, I thought it was a joke, the UK’s version of The Onion. So now good people are being urged to lay down their kitchen knives.
Oregon loves being a national model. Maybe we can be the first in the country to enact knife control.
Do the crime, do the time established boundaries and helped control behavior. Not anymore. One of the news sites had video of teenagers in downtown Portland beating up on a homeless guy. Because of Williamson and her crowd teenagers were removed from Measure 11. Nothing will happen to those “kids.” Why arrest them?
Where are the MeToo gals in all this? Sweet little Sara Gelser treated a hand on the knee like a capital crime. Did she side with Williamson and vote away the death penalty?
Yes, Sen. Gelser voted in favor of SB 1013 — as well as SB 1008, which will make it easier for violent juveniles to avoid prosecution under Measure 11. It will also help them avoid a criminal record, which should come in handy if they want to buy a gun and need to pass a background check.
I’ve never been a fan of capital punishment truth be told. It’s not a deterrent to crimes of passion and the costs of prosecutorial over-reach are too high. I am in favor, however, of throwing a monster into a box until it ceases to exist.
…and that seems to be the rub here. The current push for “criminal justice reform” seems to equate to little more than empty all the jails at any cost because — racism. There seems to be no one willing to say that we need protection from those wolves among us who would do harm us while admitting that the pressures put on investigators and prosecutors of especially heinous crimes can produce a desire to “solve” the case at any cost.
Where have you gone, Mr Average Joe? The moderates have left and gone away.
Murderers who plan their crimes down to cruel detail don’t deserve to share the oxygen we all breath. Humanely euthanizing them — when their guilt is not in doubt — could save money if the sentence was carried out promptly. It also allows society to establish boundaries. THIS line you don’t cross, or THAT will happen to you.
In Oregon, prosecutorial over-reach isn’t a problem. If anything, it’s prosecutorial paralysis brought on by a legislature that’s as schizophrenic as the voters. You may have seen the video a couple of weeks ago showing what appeared to be teenagers beating up on a homeless man in Portland. Thankfully, the offenders appeared to be white so it was OK to criticize them and demand that somebody do something. Commenters at Willamette Week demanded: Where are the cops? Where are the prosecutors? Well, they are doing their part to help empty jails and prisons per the legislature’s request.
Where has Mr. Average Joe gone? He’s gone tranny. Seriously, the media give priority to the extremes on the right and left. That huge swath of voters in the middle isn’t as quotable.
https://quillette.com/2019/10/08/buying-fentanyl-on-the-streets-of-san-francisco-an-interview-with-heather-macdonald/
Thanks so much for that excellent link, Larry. After reading it, I decided to pay for a subscription to Quillette. It felt especially good because this week OPB is having its pledge drive. The money I might have once sent to National Progressive Radio, I sent to Quillette.
https://www.oregonlive.com/news/2019/10/homeless-man-who-threatened-portland-mom-and-son-gets-probation-and-wraparound-services-with-68th-conviction.html
I hadn’t heard of this fellow.
I had forgotten his name, but I remember his victim. I wrote about Tiffany Hammer in my essay, “This is Not a Good Life.”
Another thug in the Army of Anthony.
Thanks for the links Larry. I read the MacDonald City Journal article yesterday and shared it where I could. I appreciated the interview companion piece.
What MacDonald misses here with her statement about giving police the support needed to enforce the law, is that the courts both state and federal have set the standard and tone for this disaster.
Thank you for pointing me to your earlier piece noting the inexplicable government conduct and Ms. Hammer’s son.
I would write more often here but it is so crazy these days: The honor with which this late local antifa anarchist is memorialized. All of the gender madness from pronouns to denying, I dunno, that women and men exist.
The pride which Brown, Kotek, the Mayor, and others take in the destruction of society. The unabated refusal to locate middle ground.
I am surprised that your home hasn’t received menaces that are fully intended to be carried out.
Words just don’t seem enough for such a thorough cultural breakdown, rejection, repudiation – whatever.
I feel that other than voting the only thing I can do is to withdraw while wishing all of us the best. I realize that is cowardly and puny but the times seem to be unanswerable.
Today somebody named Sammi with China Army Supplies sent me an email offering me a good deal on an anti-riot baton. What every Portlander needs.
Things do seem crazy. The mother of the slain anarchist sounded subdued in her comments, as if she suspects the truth might not suit her son’s political agenda. If it doesn’t, let’s see how the local media twist it.
I understand why you’re discouraged, especially since your work brings you face-to-face with some of these fools. I’m disappointed in how so many leading feminists turned out to be no better than the male leaders they bashed. Multnomah County is run by a biddy brigade that is willing to stand by and watch the taxpayer-funded Wapato Jail be demolished rather than admit that Mommy (Deborah Kafoury) doesn’t know best: A secure, clean facility away from the downtown drug culture would have been an ideal place for homeless addicts who want to get clean.
Kafoury is as arrogant as Hillary Clinton, who couldn’t be bothered to write a concession speech, just in case.
I’m encouraged by the fact that we have foreign media outlets like Quillette (from Australia) and The Spectator (from Great Britain) seeing opportunities in America. The Spectator just this month published its inaugural U.S. edition — 191 years after it launched in Great Britain.
The Spectator is not afraid to tackle absurdities our media treat as sacred.
In July The Spectator had a true and hilarious story: “Every Woman Has a Right to Have Her Scrotum Waxed.” In the hands of an American journalist, writing for the established media, that story would have been about the need for inclusivity and the horrors of homophobia.
Nobody can be blamed for withdrawing from this craziness and pursuing something healthier. Another alternative is to stay and laugh — and try to get even.
I supply this link because I think the tone of the interrogator interesting. That, and what strikes me as a palpable nervousness in the voice of the Toronto librarian. I feel it is an act of courage on her part.
She shall be ex-communicate among the people that matter in Toronto.
https://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as-it-happens-thursday-edition-1.5324424/i-m-not-going-to-reconsider-toronto-s-top-librarian-refuses-to-bar-speaker-critical-of-transgender-rights-1.5324431
“I for one am standing up for free speech and I will not back down.” Very brave librarian.
It’s disturbing the local authors (all female, it seems) aren’t standing with her. They have sided with trans-women who really aren’t women. From the interrogator’s tone, she wants everyone to know she doesn’t agree with the librarian. What is she afraid of? I don’t understand this rush that some feminists have to invite men into the sisterhood.
Portugal, Spain and Norway have softer penal systems in the world, in fact these are the only European Union countries that have no life imprisonment.
There is not life in Spain. In Spain, the fanaticism of defenders of the rights of criminals is so great life imprisonment that oppose even when there is a possibility of parole. In 1975 the criminal law in Spain professors penal law demanded the abolition of the death penalty and prohibition of all sentences of more Than 20 years. Spain Currently the maximum penalty is 20 years for first degree murder, if it is a multiple murder the maximum sentence is 25 years however Penal Reform in 2003 raises the maximum compliance in a case 40 years. Terrorism important to note That Were These penalties Fully never implemented; In 25 years, When the subject has been convicted of two or more Crimes and Punisher is one of Them by law with Imprisonment of up to 20 years.
In 30 years, When the subject has been convicted of two or more crimes and some of Them by punisher by law is 20 years Imprisonment Exceeding.
40, When the subject has Been Convicted of two or more Crimes and at least two of Them Are Legally punisher by Imprisonment Exceeding 20 years.
40, When the subject has Been Convicted of two or more Crimes of Terrorism in the second section of Chapter V of Title XXII of Book II of this Code and Any of Them by punisher by law is 20 years Imprisonment Exceeding.
You See That Follows the Principle Applies Above here, Though INSTEAD of the limit of 20 years Establishing the 40, But The Substance Remains The Same: Do Not care to kill three to thirty-three or three hundred thirty-three people.Spain penals Laws Are Even Worse Than the England: no life sentence, conjugal visits, gymnasiums, swimming pools (sic) in prisons.USA and Spain Had too many killers eleven who Were Sentenced to Death for Murders initial, kill again after having Been Spared execution: Kenneth Allen McDuff, Darryl Kemp, Joe Morse, Harvey Louis Carrignan, Bennie Demps, Eddie Simon Wein, Mad Dog Taborsky and on and on. These killers and rapists had been executed the first time around, many innocents would have lived.
Clear that after abolishing death the “reformers” would seek to attack LWOP next, then any long prison sentences.
Please, I deeply respect for human rights of the victims also Activists fight against the Death Penalty but want to keep the LWOP. I Just Want That Victims Are Not Deceived as happened in Spain.
Europe has good and bad points. We have a much more fair , inexpensive and effective than private healthcare U.S. healthcare system. The patients’ rights are better protected than in USA . We also have bad things , unfortunately the rights of victims of violent crimes are violated and ignored. USA is far more advanced than Europe in this regard. Marsy ‘s Law is an example for Spain and for Europe. Victims may appeal the probation and prison permissions benefits of their attackers , according to the draft law of the Statute of the Victims of Crime which was approved a few weeks ago by the Council of Ministers , at the proposal of the Minister of Justice. The project envisages the possibility for victims of terrorist crimes, homicide, assault and sexual offenses punishable by more than five years in prison , ie most serious crimes , or when you try to events likely to derive a danger to the victim. But I do not trust me . Let’s turn to an association in defense of victims of sex crimes : The association of women Clara Campoamor has warned that , following the annulment of the Parot doctrine , the Spanish Justice ” is putting bombs on the street to rape and kill” therefore required security protocols for victims to know how and where their attackers are .
” Affected families are desolate and afraid they might recur ,” stressed the president of this organization, Estrella Blanca Ruiz, in an interview with Efe in which advocates inform victims about the location and physical changes of his attackers including Luis Gallego and Pedro Pablo García Ribado , known as the ‘ elevator rapist ‘ and ‘ rapist portal ‘, respectively.
Ruiz regrets that can not legally implement these aggressors as an electronic monitoring bracelet , so urges victims that if they find them and feel persecuted or intimidated attend the bodies and state security forces .
No further believes that the ‘ rapist lift ‘ or ‘ rapist portal ‘ are ready for their reintegration into society and recalls that “have not acknowledged the facts , they have not asked for forgiveness, they are unrepentant , have refused to perform rehabilitation courses and have not compensated their victims . ”
“In many Valladolid were mugged by the ‘ elevator rapist ‘ and psychological issues affected only 18 complaints were recorded sexual assaults in court ,” argues the president of the association for the defense of women.
Believes that ” appears” that the European Court of Human Rights, which annulled the Parot doctrine ” does not care ” if these aggressors ” commit a crime again .”
The president of the association Clara Campoamor also emphasizes that “it is this insecurity that is causing a public alarm .”
http://www.elperiodicodearagon.com/noticias/espana/asociacion-clara-campoamor-estan-poniendo-en-calle-a-bombas-de-violar-_899373.html