Brickbat: Now You Say You're Sorry

Former New York City police officer Jason Arbeeny was convicted of planting crack cocaine in a couple's car in an effort to frame them. He faced up to four years in prison. But Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Gustin Reichbach sentenced him to five years probation and 300 hours community service. Reichbach said Arbeeny's tearful apology, after he was convicted, made the difference. "I came into court this morning determined that the nature of this crime requires some jail time," he said. "I frankly didn't expect the defendant, at the 11th hour, to be making these claims."

Brickbat Archive

Comments

[Fist of Etiquette]

I'm sure had the couple been falsely convicted of the drug charges, they would have gotten leniency by bemoaning the situation they seemingly put themselves in.

All the other convictions this crooked cop had any part in should be thrown out.

[TELLMOFF]

The lying police thug should spend a long time in prison. Then he would be more sorryful.

[DA]

Wouldn't a different judge have heard the case against this couple that was framed if they were being prosecuted though? Kind of like how I wouldn't expect the judge of a traffic court to hear cases related to arson, I don't think the judge for this cop's case could have necessarily been the same one to hear this couple.

[mr simple]

Does that matter?

[Troy]

How can you trust a legal system that calls its local schmuck judge a Supreme Court Judge?

[Dunphy (the real one)]

yawn.

as anybody familiar with the state of NY 'legal system' would know, or if you just watched law and order, you would know that in new york, what most states refer to as 'superior court' judges are called 'supreme court' judges, and vice versa.

it's a weird ny quirk

another weird one for NYC is that each borough is actually a county.

that's what a borough is there. it's a county within the city

whereas most cities are within one county (or in rare cases, like a city nearby i might add in two counties)

each borough is its own county. so, you have the unique situation of a mayor of NYC having jurisdiction in several counties, whereas the district attorneys , while hired by the city, essentially cover one of the counties within the city.

[R C Dean]

No double standard here, nuh uh, no way.

Its routine, I'm sure, for judges to walk down a sentence from hard time to community service if the defendant bursts into tears in the courtroom.

[Auric Demonocles]

As dunphy likes to point out, cops are regularly charged just like everyone else and special treatment is something that doesn't happen or is extremely rare.

[Formerly Almanian]

Isolated incidenet, a few bad apples, thin blue line, not experts...

You know. Protect and Serve.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! "Serve." You got "SERVED", bitches! But I'm sorry...

[sarcasmic]

Of course they Protect and Serve.

They Protect and Serve "The Public".

"The Public" meaning everyone but any individual they are interacting with at any given time.

[TELLMOFF]

There can only be a few bad apples if there are a lot of good whistle blowers.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

actually, THIS is a perfect example of an extreme miscarriage of justice and CLEARLY SPECIAL treatment for a police officer

see, unlike you, i can recognize the difference between bullshit claims of special treatment and actual bona fide claims

this kind of thing IS extremely rare.

but that's tangential to the fact that this absolutely is a good example of it, and is a gross miscarriage of justice

imo (iow i am speaking normatively) any officer who is found guilty of planting evidence should get

THE EXACT SAME SENTENCE AS THE PERSON THEY ARE TRYING TO ENSURE THE FALSE CONVICTION OF, WOULD GET

iow if this guy, based on sentencing grids, priors, etc. would have gotten 6 months in jail, then the cop should get 6 months

if this guy would have gotten 2 yrs, then the cop should get 2 yrs

i am impressed that there is finally an actual example in reason.com of a gross miscarriage of justice where a police officer is given obviously, and quite obscene special treatment

[wareagle]

let's see - the cop faced four years for planting evidence. I'm sure the sentence for actually possessing crack is also no more than 4 years, right?

[Formerly Almanian]

Possession of Teh Bad Grugz is MUCH more serious than acting in an immoral, improper and illegal fashion while acting as a state official in such a manner as to erode the public's confidence in and support of the gummint.

MUCH worse. Drugs are bad, mmm'kay?

[TELLMOFF]

The fact that there is any public confidence in the cops is what is most discouraging.

[sarcasmic]

People have confidence in the cops simply because they don't know better.
They don't deal with the police other than the occasional traffic ticket.

It's only when they find themselves victim of a crime that they discover that the cops don't do shit. But since there isn't that much crime that involves victims, the odds are that they will never be put into that situation.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

except that's utter rubbish

again, as polling data shows, and literally hundreds of counterexamples i've sen in my career

we have a board in our precinct that has literally scores of letters that people who were victims of a crime sent to our agency thanking us for a job well done, etc.

iow, people who not only were totally happy with us for getting their shit back, helping to get some scumbag sentenced for burglary, etc. but they went out of their way to send a personal (and usually handwritten) letter thanking us for it.

just myself, i've got a whole bunch of such letters in my personnel file, and it's hardly an unusual case.

the primary complaitn we get from victims is the response time was too long (the other day i took a burglary case that by the time i arrived had been holding for 6 hrs).

that's simply because we are massively understaffed (wa has amongst the lowest #of officers per capita of the states, and our agency after the latest budget cuts is doing badly even for WA)

i also tell people on many cases, even though it reflects negatively on us (because it's the truth), that there will likely be no followup on their case

the current reality in our agency is that followup detectives are so understaffed (and i worked as one several years back when we had much better staffing), that you pracitcally have to hand them an incustody suspect on a silver platter for them to do a followup

[Dunphy (the real one)]

iow, some cases that clearly have a reasonably high solvability factor simply won't get followed up on because they have to prioritize in custody cases, violent crimes, etc. over property crimes.

i've written several search warrants in the last few months and done a bunch of followup cases that we are not 'supposed to do' on patrol (and our union has fought any attempts by the management to make us do these) but some of us do it anyway, because we want to close cases.

it's a sad reality, but ID theft, many bank frauds, etc. where accounts are federally insured 9(iow victim will end up with no monetary) loss will often get completely ignored even if they are totally solvable

it's fucking atrocious, but it's reality.

if you want to do crime, do that kind of crime, because in many agencies, it's very low priority.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

not sure your point. i know NY has the rockefeller drug laws which are pretty strict, but i can say in my jurisdiction, the average sentence for crack possession for a first time offender is probation and misdemeanor diversion

i can't imagine the circ's where one would get 4 yrs.

sales, with priors one could get that, but even then very rare

regardless, that's tangential to the fact this piece of shit should be in fucking prison. hard time with no special privileges, apart from isolation from general population (otherwise he'll get killed)

this is, atfpapic, an egregious example of a double standard and a gross miscarriage of justice

assume the defendant was a prior felon, with a bunch of priors and would have gotten 1 yr.

the cop should get at least that much time behind bars

[sarcasmic]

I'm sure that those tears were real as he considered the prospect of people he framed exacting revenge while in prison.

[Dunphy (the real one)]

fuck his tears. he should be in prison, no equivocation whatsoever.

it's actually refreshing as fuck to see a case here that is CLEARLY a double standard for a cop, and where it is clearly a gross miscarriage of justice vs. most of those cases here that are alleged as such, that either aren't, or there aren't enough facts to know either way

imo, there is no possible justification i could imagine where this guy should not be in jail/prison

he should get the same sentence the defendant would have gotten if he was convicted for the evidence the officer planted

i fucking HATE dirty cops like this.

[Cdr Lytton]

each hour Arbeeny spends speaking to cops or police recruits about his misdeeds will count as two

How about a new rule: whatever the usual penalty for perjury + false imprisonment + everything else and add the sentences the couple could have received. And double (or triple) the last one as a punitive discouragement to do that shit.

[TELLMOFF]

The purpose of the punishment is to discourage the crime.

[R C Dean]

Here's a thought:

The cop obviously possessed the crack. Which cops are allowed to do, when they possess it for valid law enforcement purposes.

He had no such purpose. Why, then, was he not charged for crack possession?

[Dunphy (the real one)]

assuming TFPAPIC,

FINALLY, an actual case where a police officer is given special treatment by the "justice system' and a GROSS miscarriage of justice

in a 'just' system, an officer who did this would get the exact sentence the offender who he planted the evidence on would get if convicted.

period.

THIS is real criminal police misconduct and deserves the harshest of punishments

i am relieved that, ATFPAPIC, that reason has finally presented a case of police misconduct THAT ACTUALLY is police misconduct, and is a gross miscarriage of justice and lenient treatment based on his position as a police officer.

i'd argue it's a 'double standard' too, but it's not exactly the kind of conduct a non-cop could really do in the first place, but it's a REAL example of an absolutely egregious criminal offense, that should net PRISON TIME (not jail)