(b) An accused is entitled to a public trial, at least to the extent of having his friends, relatives and counsel present -- no matter with what offense he may be charged. Pp. 333 U. S. 271-272.
Counsel have not cited and we have been unable to find a single instance of a criminal hearing conducted in secret in any federal, state, or municipal court during the history of this country. Nor have we found any record of even one such secret criminal trial in England since abolition of the Court of Star Chamber in 1641, and whether that court ever convicted people secretly is in dispute. Summary "status conferences" for findings of "incompetence" have not been regarded as an exception to this universal rule against secret trials.
"[e]very procedure which would offer a possible temptation to the average man as a judge . . . not to hold the balance nice, clear and true between the State and the accused, denies the latter due process of law." Tumey v. Ohio, 273 U.S. 510, 532 . Such a stringent rule may sometimes bar trial by judges who have no actual bias and who would do their very best to weigh the scales of justice equally between contending parties. But to perform its high function in the best way "justice must satisfy the appearance of justice." Offutt v. United States, 348 U.S. 11, 14
A. Howard Matz (born 1943) is an American lawyer and judge.
He has sat on the United States District Court for the Central District of California since 1998.
Matz, A Howard reference * Short Description * United States federal judge. The "Bonsai Tree" Hanging Judge.
Comment * A. Howard Matz (born 1943) is an American lawyer and judge. He has sat on the United States District Court for the Central District of California since 1998.
Label * Howard Matz
Howard Matz
Category: Judges of the United States District Court for the Central District of California.
Category: United States district court judges appointed by Bill Clinton
Category: 1943 births * Category: Living people
Given name Alvin Howard
Name * A. Howard Matz, A Howard Matz
Matz, A. Howard
Born 1943 in Brooklyn, NY
Federal Judicial Service:
Judge, U. S. District Court, Central District of California
Nominated by William J. Clinton on October 20, 1997, to a seat vacated by Harry L. Hupp; Confirmed by the Senate on June 26, 1998, and received commission on June 29, 1998.
Professional Career:
Law clerk, Hon. Morris E. Lasker, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York, 1969-1970
Private practice, New York City, 1970-1972
Private practice, Los Angeles, CA, 1972-1974
Assistant U.S. attorney, Central District of California, 1974-1978 Chief, Special Prosecutions Unit, 1977-1978
Private practice, Los Angeles, CA, 1979-1998
No principle of procedural due process is more clearly established than that notice of the specific charge, and a chance to be heard in a trial of the issues raised by that charge, if desired, are among the constitutional rights of every accused in a criminal proceeding in all courts, state or federal. In re Oliver, 333 U.S. 257, 68 S.Ct. 499, and cases there cited. If, as the State Supreme Court held, petitioners were charged with a violation of Section 1, it is doubtful both that the information fairly informed them of that charge and that they sought to defend themselves against such a charge; it is certain that they were not tried for or found guilty of it. It is as much a violation of due process to send an accused to prison following conviction of a charge on which he was never tried as it would be to convict him upon a charge that was never made. De Jonge v. State of Oregon, 299 U.S. 353, 362, 57 S.Ct. 255, 259, 81 L.Ed. 278.
"what would be the capacity of law enforcement
and of the courts to SUPRESS this kind of SPEECH?" -Judge A. Howard Matz, PRE-TRIAL HEARING OF KILLERCOP.COM
Here is the rule of law: Wherever Law ends, Tyranny begins. And that's a fact! Why? CauseIsaySo!! You are not entitled to anymore information, 'cause ya got no right to it. Git it? I bet you will soon enough. I'm all a Twitter waiting to see your reaction, to my reaction, to your Treatment. You'll just die when you see what I have in store for everyone in 2010.
Now move along folks, nothing more to see. Make like a Quack and disappear like Dr. Who.
"This is really a "pretty good" system you have here. What do you call it? "Due process". We're very proud of it." ~Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit, Court Of Appeals.
Thus, the Constitution does not guarantee
that a criminal defendant be present at all stages of the trial but
rather only at “critical stage[s].” La Crosse v. Kernan, 244 F.3d
702, 707-08 (9th Cir. 2001).
Rule 43(b)(3), Fed. R. Crim. P., provides in part that a
defendant need not be present where the “proceeding involves only
a conference or hearing on a question of law.” Like the Fifth Amendment due process
clause and the Sixth Amendment right to confrontation.
SOURCE: A Manual on
Jury Trial
Procedures
Prepared by the
Jury Instructions Committee
of the Ninth Circuit
Members:
Judge George H. King, Chair
Judge Roger L. Hunt
Judge Lawrence K. Karlton Judge A. Howard Matz
Judge Jeffrey T. Miller
Judge Marsha J. Pechman
Magistrate Judge John Jelderks
Okay, so we all get the issue that I can only be present at critical stages. So much for the right to be at every stage...Unless it involves the question of a law. A question of a man's incompetence is "a question of fact, not law"
Otherwise who needs judges, ya just pass a law and say Jewish People or Black People are incompetent, so lock them up for the mental "treatment!"
In the United States, criminal prosecutions and civil cases are generally governed by explicit guarantees of procedural rights under the Bill of Rights. Most of these rights have been incorporated under the Fourteenth Amendment to the States. Among those rights is the constitutional right to procedural due process, which has been broadly construed to protect the individual so that statutes, regulations, and enforcement actions must ensure that no one is deprived of "life, liberty, or property" without a fair opportunity to affect the judgment or result.
In criminal cases, many of these due process protections overlap with procedural protections provided by the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution, which guarantees reliable procedures that protect innocent people from being executed, which would be tantamount to cruel and unusual punishment.[26]
Or, to put it more simply, where an individual is facing a (1) deprivation of (2) life, liberty, or property, (3) procedural due process mandates that he or she is entitled to adequate notice, a hearing, and a neutral judge.
The Supreme Court has formulated a balancing test to determine the rigor with which the requirements of procedural due process should be applied to a particular deprivation, for the obvious reason that mandating such requirements in the most expansive way for even the most minor deprivations would bring the machinery of government to a halt. The Court set out the test as follows: "[I]dentification of the specific dictates of due process generally requires consideration of three distinct factors: first, the private interest that will be affected by the official action; second, the risk of an erroneous deprivation of such interest through the procedures used, and the probable value, if any, of additional or substitute procedural safeguards; and, finally, the Government's interest, including the function involved and the fiscal and administrative burdens that the additional or substitute procedural requirement would entail."[29]
Procedural due process has also been an important factor in the development of the law of personal jurisdiction, in the sense that it is inherently unfair for the judicial machinery of a state to take away the property of a person who has no connection to it whatsoever. A significant portion of U.S. constitutional law is therefore directed to what kinds of connections to a state are enough for that state's assertion of jurisdiction over a nonresident to comport with procedural due process.
The requirement of a neutral judge has introduced a constitutional dimension into the question of whether a judge should recuse himself or herself from a case. Specifically, the Supreme Court has ruled that in certain circumstances, the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires a judge to recuse himself on account of a potential or actual conflict of interest. For example, on June 8, 2009, in Caperton v. A. T. Massey Coal Co. (2009), the Court ruled that a justice of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia could not participate in a case involving a major donor to his election to that court.[30
Henry Louis Gates' Contempt Of Cop Emptywheel - At tonight's nationally televised press conference, a reporter asked President Obama a question about the July 16 arrest of famed Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates. Obama set off...
Contempt of Cop' by William Norman Grigg - The police are to the government as the edge is to the knife, insists sociologist David Bayley, who apparently couldn't explain why the typical...
Welcome to America Now step inside the jail cell - The audio exchange in this video was apparently recorded at the U.S. Canada border after a Canadian displayed contempt-of-cop towards the American law enforcement officer asking questions.
Contemptible police tactics - Cops raid the home of a licensed medical marijuanna provider in Washington, handcuff the fourteen year old son and put a gun to his head, and search the nineteen year old daughter and take the contents of her mickey-mouse wallet.
How To Survive Traffic Stops in America Submit, Instantly! - What the cops want is immediate obedience. Many cops are ex-military and view the civilian motorists of America about like they viewed the hapless peasants of Iraq and Afghanistan that is, with contempt, not as fellow citizens deserving of civility and respect. It is a possibly lethal mistake to do anything other than submit, instantly and obey!
My radio interview with Katherine Albrecht - Carlos Miller Photography is Not a Crime is interviewed by Katherine Albrecht, activist, radio host and privacy advocate, Tuesday afternoon where they discussed his blog, his arrests, the situation in the United Kingdom and the spread of contempt of cop cases that are popping up on the internet on a regular basis.
