Law-abiding citizens should not have to live this way. The public must have recourse when lunatic judges release career criminals back into the community.
In the meantime, at least some Nevada residents know that they can rely on their police to fight judicial tyranny.
According to KLAS-TV in Las Vegas, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department last week filed a petition with the Nevada Supreme Court rather than comply with an order from Las Vegas Justice Court Judge Eric Goodman, son of former Las Vegas Democratic Mayor Oscar Goodman, to release a dangerous career criminal under the department’s electronic monitoring program.
In January, police arrested 36-year-old Joshua Sanchez-Lopez on a charge of grand larceny of a motor vehicle. The defendant, a convicted felon most recently incarcerated after drug and involuntary manslaughter convictions, has an appalling 35 arrests on his record.
Common sense should tell us that a man with an arrest for nearly each year of his life belongs in prison. In Goodman’s courtroom, however, common sense is apparently in short supply.
On Jan. 29, the police department told the judge that it could not release Sanchez-Lopez into the electronic monitoring program.
Mike Dickerson, LVMPD’s assistant general counsel, explained, according to KLAS.
“We have to take a look at that and say, ‘Is this somebody who our electronic supervision program can monitor safely in the community?’” Dickerson said, calling it “an issue of public safety.”
Moreover, the department considered the safety of its officers as imperiled by the judge’s order. After all, during a 2020 arrest the defendant fled from officers while wielding a gun, KLAS reported.
On Feb. 5, however, Goodman, with the characteristic haughtiness of a robed rogue, threatened the department with sanctions for contempt of court.
Now, presumably, the Nevada Supreme Court will decide whether, under state law, the judge or Clark County Sheriff Kevin McMahill has final say over the defendant’s fitness for electronic monitoring.
“We have a system that’s set up so people can get out of jail quickly, and sometimes, there just needs to be a little bit more thought given to it because lives are on the line,” Dickerson said, according to KLAS.
In a statement, LVMPD showed respect for judges’ authority in general while criticizing Goodman in particular.
“The Justice Court of the Las Vegas Township has the authority to release dangerous people into our community. However, the sheriff will not violate the law to assist those few judges who seek to use LVMPD’s electronic monitoring program in disregard of public safety and the safety of the dedicated LVMPD corrections officers who administer the electronic monitoring program,” the statement read in part.
By pretty much any measure, Judge Goodman is a product of a political dynasty. Not only did his father, Oscar Goodman, serve as mayor of Las Vegas from 1999 to 2011, the judge’s mother became mayor after that, serving until 2024.
According to a City of Las Vegas news release, it was “the only known instance of a spouse succeeding a spouse as mayor in the United States.”
When the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported Eric Goodman’s interest in running for a judge post in 2008, the story was headlined in a way that made the nepotism apparent: “Goodman’s son seeks court post.”
According to the newspaper, Goodman, as a practicing lawyer, once specialized in criminal defense.
The judge’s current term will end on Jan. 4, 2027, per Ballotpedia. A nonpartisan primary on June 9, followed by a general election on Nov. 3, will determine if he wins re-election.
One must hope that voters choose wisely. After all, judges who ignore sheriffs’ concerns and release career criminals back into the community require chastisement from the sovereign people.
Indeed, recent examples of soft-on-crime judges suggest a dangerous epidemic. In the last year alone, for instance, repeat offenders have slain innocent victims with shocking brazenness.
It raises the question: Must police act as law-abiding citizens’ first line of defense against rogue judges? Or, if that fails, must we do it ourselves?
The question itself amounts to a kind of slippery slope. But we must ask because, based on experience, we have no faith that judges will do right.
Above all, in a sane society the phenomenon of the career criminal would not exist. But since it does, members of a peaceful and law-abiding community have the right to live without such criminals in their midst.
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