Convicted killer Daniel Tavares Jr. got out of a Massachusetts prison in July and fled the state for Seattle, Wash., where he managed to live for a few months before killing two other innocent people.
Once again, the Massachusetts judicial system is under national scrutiny. Once again, people are looking for someone to blame.
Former governor and current presidential candidate Mitt Romney wants to blame Judge Kathe Tuttman, the former Essex County prosecutor whom he appointed to the bench in 2006. Romney has called for Tuttman to resign.
Tavares had completed a 16-year sentence for manslaughter after killing his mother. But he was still being held in jail on $100,000 bail on charges he had assaulted corrections officers while in prison. Tuttman heard Tavares' appeal of the high bail and released him on personal recognizance with no monitoring other than a requirement to report to a probation officer three times a week. Tavares reported twice, then disappeared.
Judges and defense lawyers are supporting Tuttman, who lives in Andover. Chief Justice Barbara Rouse said Tuttman made her decision based on the law. The former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association, Edward P. Ryan Jr., said in a letter to a defense attorneys' organization that Tuttman made the decision she was compelled to make under state law: In deciding a bail amount, she can consider only the accused's risk of flight. Ryan argues that prosecutors failed to ask for a dangerousness hearing on Tavares or bring charges on the assaults - the first of which allegedly occurred two years ago - in a timely manner.
But the search for someone to blame and the defense of Judge Tuttman overlook a few salient facts.
The assessment of Tavares' risk of flight was clearly wrong. Tavares took off within days of being released.
The district court judge who first set Tavares' bail at $100,000 saw the law differently. Why did Tuttman see fit to overturn this judge's assessment of Tavares' flight risk and set him free?
More importantly, Tavares is a dangerous lunatic and a killer. Consider the police description of what happened at the home of Brian and Beverly Mauck about 40 miles south of Seattle:
Tavares confronted Brian Mauck over a $50 debt. Tavares told police Mauck insulted him and "after spending 20 years in prison" he was not going to put up with being called an insulting name. So he pulled out a gun and shot Mauck in the head.
Once again, the Massachusetts judicial system is under national scrutiny. Once again, people are looking for someone to blame.
Former governor and current presidential candidate Mitt Romney wants to blame Judge Kathe Tuttman, the former Essex County prosecutor whom he appointed to the bench in 2006. Romney has called for Tuttman to resign.
Tavares had completed a 16-year sentence for manslaughter after killing his mother. But he was still being held in jail on $100,000 bail on charges he had assaulted corrections officers while in prison. Tuttman heard Tavares' appeal of the high bail and released him on personal recognizance with no monitoring other than a requirement to report to a probation officer three times a week. Tavares reported twice, then disappeared.
Judges and defense lawyers are supporting Tuttman, who lives in Andover. Chief Justice Barbara Rouse said Tuttman made her decision based on the law. The former president of the Massachusetts Bar Association, Edward P. Ryan Jr., said in a letter to a defense attorneys' organization that Tuttman made the decision she was compelled to make under state law: In deciding a bail amount, she can consider only the accused's risk of flight. Ryan argues that prosecutors failed to ask for a dangerousness hearing on Tavares or bring charges on the assaults - the first of which allegedly occurred two years ago - in a timely manner.
But the search for someone to blame and the defense of Judge Tuttman overlook a few salient facts.
The assessment of Tavares' risk of flight was clearly wrong. Tavares took off within days of being released.
The district court judge who first set Tavares' bail at $100,000 saw the law differently. Why did Tuttman see fit to overturn this judge's assessment of Tavares' flight risk and set him free?
More importantly, Tavares is a dangerous lunatic and a killer. Consider the police description of what happened at the home of Brian and Beverly Mauck about 40 miles south of Seattle:
Tavares confronted Brian Mauck over a $50 debt. Tavares told police Mauck insulted him and "after spending 20 years in prison" he was not going to put up with being called an insulting name. So he pulled out a gun and shot Mauck in the head.
When Beverly Mauck tried to run out of the house, Tavares shot her in the back of the head. Then he dragged her body over to her husband's and covered them both with a blanket because "he respected them," according to court papers.
Tuttman's defenders say the judge did only what the law requires. If so, there's something seriously flawed with a law which supposes that a man who has served 16 years in prison for killing his mother and is charged with assaulting corrections officers, is honorable enough that he will show up for his court dates.
To paraphrase Charles Dickens, if the law supposes that, then the law is an ass, an idiot.
This horrific crime is being compared to the case of William Horton, a convicted killer who raped a woman and tortured her and her fiance after he walked away from a prison furlough program. The Horton issue helped sink the presidential campaign of former Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis.
This case is quite different. For one thing, Horton was still serving time for his murder when he was allowed to participate in the furlough program.
But 20 years after Horton hit the headlines, the Tavares case illustrates this clearly: There are still glaring problems with the Massachusetts judicial system that are obvious to everyone - except, apparently, the defense lawyers and judges.
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