[LSNN] Court remands D.A. sentence appeal for local mobster

[Kaspersky]

 

Court remands D.A. sentence appeal for local mobster

The decision comes after Lawrence Zampa served only nine months in prison

 

Lawrence Zampa is pictured above in an LSPD processing mugshot.

 

On Tuesday, the Appellate Court of San Andreas denied a request by the District Attorney’s Office to hand down a new sentence on Lawrence Zampa, who was convicted of Conspiracy to Commit Murder and Racketeering. In an astonishing written decision, Justice William Randolph refused the request based on his opinion that Judge Eric Stanford did not sentence Zampa in a preferential spirit, but rather as an administrative error. The Justice noted that mandatory minimum sentences are not set in stone, but rather act as a guideline by which Justices base their decisions. As such, the Appeals Court remanded the case back to the Superior Court without giving an official opinion on whether the sentence was too lenient or not.

District Attorney Saeko Nishijima had pursued a new sentence for Zampa, alleging that the presiding Judge Stanford had encountered “multiple legal errors” in his judgment. Among those, the D.A. had argued that Zampa did not serve the mandatory minimum sentence for his charges and that a sentence revision was necessary to ensure Justice Stanford had not fallen into a severe legal problem. It would appear to the average observer that Judge Stanford may have misinterpreted the sentencing enhancement clause for Conspiracy in the Penal Code. The clause states that a person convicted on any count of Conspiracy "Shall be charged with a quarter (25%) reduced sentence on the original charge." However, Judge Stanford decided to sentence Zampa to just 25% of the original crime, rather than deducting 25% from the Code's mandatory minimum, leading to a debate on the wording of the Code. In his decision, Justice Randolph denied that there had been a substantive legal error that would warrant his Court to hand down a revised sentence.

 

Typically, a case involving the charges in question would see the defendant behind bars for double the time Zampa served. Had the sentence been reevaluated on the basis of a legal error, Zampa would likely have faced a significantly stricter sentence. Justice Randolph noted that for a re-trial to be considered, the D.A. would have to show that an “illegal, unconstitutional, or excessive” punishment was handed down. As Zampa's sentence falls into neither of these categories, the Court decided that there were no grounds to warrant handing down a new sentence.

Prior to the decision by the Appeals Court, Assistant District Attorney William Eden expressed concern for the handling of Zampa's case, stating that the sentence handed down "may set a concerning precedent... that crime pays." Following the decision, District Attorney Saeko Nishijima added that she was "disappointed" in the Appeals Court ruling, but was not planning to escalate the case to the Supreme Court. Doing so would be unlikely to change the result of the Appeals Court's decision.

Although there is no question Zampa's sentence of nine months is unusually low for his crimes, his case is unlikely to continue in the court system as he had already served his prison time and cannot be tried again for those crimes due to double jeopardy protection. Regardless, the case is likely to be a contentious topic in the San Andreas legal community for years to come and is sure to become a talking point this coming election, as candidates battle for seats in City Council.

 

 

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Edited August 13, 2020 by Kaspersky

[Queen]

Username: QOS3

Comment: wooooo!! another shining example of our amazing justice system! 9 months, what a fucking joke