Judge Defends Courtroom Party for Prisoner

[Rose Siding]

DALLAS Oct 27, 2004 — A judge who welcomed a former fugitive back to her courtroom with balloons, streamers and a cake defended her actions Wednesday, saying that getting a killer and abuser of women off the streets is reason to celebrate.
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Williams, who previously served time in prison for killing his wife, went on the lam a year ago while on trial in Johnson's court on charges he choked his girlfriend until she passed out. He was convicted in absentia of aggravated assault.

"A full year later, he was recaptured, off the streets, and no longer a community threat. And, yes, I threw a party," the judge said in a statement.

The judge said about 4 million U.S. women a year are physically abused by their husbands or live-in partners, and some 30 percent of female murder victims in this country are slain by their husbands or boyfriends.

"When these kind of stats begin to shrink, then we'll have cause to celebrate," she said. "Until then, this man's recapture particularly in national domestic violence month sends the message that the law is against domestic violence."

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory?id=202811

[mbperrin]

1. It IS decorous to celebrate a killer and an abuser being

brought to justice! He's guilty! Found so during a legal trial! Yay!

And judges are NOT supposed to be impartial! They are supposed to be on the side of JUSTICE!, not some limp notion of "time out".