New York – Citing Prosecutorial Abuse, Legal Heavyweights Ask Obama In WSJ Op-Ed To Pardon Rubashkin

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    June 1: Moishe Rubashkin, 16, says hello to his father defendant Sholom RubashkinNew York – As President Obama counts down his final weeks in the Oval Office, two well known names in the legal world have called for a presidential pardon for Sholom Mordechai Rubashkin.

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    In an op-ed that appeared in Sunday’s Wall Street Journal, former United States federal judge Charles Renfrew and former United States attorney for the Northern District of Iowa James Reynolds charge that federal prosecutors unlawfully intervened numerous times in the Rubashkin case in order to ensure a maximum jail term.

    The two also allege that prosecutors attempted to keep their behind the scenes maneuverings hidden from the public eye.

    “The prosecutors who charged him wanted to extract a pound of flesh, and then some – even at the cost of illegally overstepping their bounds and interfering in the bankrupt company’s sale,” wrote Renfrew and Reynolds in their op-ed.

    As previously reported on VIN News (http://bit.ly/2gwMZuo), more than 100 big names in the legal world called on U.S. Attorney Kevin Techau to correct injustices perpetuated against Rubashkin, citing evidence of prosecutorial tampering in the sale of the Agriprocessors poultry plant in Postville, Iowa.

    Those actions allegedly lowered the price of the plant by millions, giving prosecutors an opening to seek a life sentence against Rubashkin.

    Rubashkin has already served seven years of his 27 year prison term, an amount of time that Renfrew and Reynolds charge is more than double the sentence he should have received had prosecutors not intervened illegally.

    In addition to asking for a presidential pardon, the two well known names in the legal world called on Congress to take steps to deter future prosecutorial abuse, suggesting that illegal tampering by those who are charged with watching over the criminal justice system should be classified as a felony.

    “The watchers must be watched,” wrote Renfrew and Reynolds. “If they are not, the criminal-justice system will too often deliver the kind of injustice that Sholom Rubashkin is experiencing.”


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    35 Comments
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    7 years ago

    Nu, halevai hussein obumination will listen to those that know better than him, if such a thing can even exist……

    Liepa
    Liepa
    7 years ago

    Hope this doesn’t fall on deaf ears !!!

    7 years ago
    7 years ago

    Both rubashkin and Weberman need to remain locked up. Enough of this nonsense already. Neither ever showed remorse.

    Noochie
    Noochie
    7 years ago

    Why would Obama listen to the Yidden who have been calling him a Kenyan, a Muslim, an anti-Semite, and worse for eight years? Frum Jews have expressed nothing but hatred for this President and it’s the height of arrogance to expect favors in return.

    7 years ago

    Any such irregularities could at most argue for a new sentencing hearing. Unfortunately Rubashkin is guilty of committing a major felony every month, when he submitted phony invoices as loan collateral. Reade’s 54-page statement explains very clearly why there was no reason to reduce the statutory sentence.

    Fortunately for Rubashkin, judges aren’t allowed to double the penalty in cases of chillul Hashem. It’s also fortunate that the OU and KAJ were on hand to keep him from selling treifus, or all these same Jews would be calling for his execution.

    7 years ago

    It’s claimed the prosecutors made it more difficult to sell the company. But it was already in very bad shape, a financial pack of cards. A firm that size should have had ample lines of credit, but Rubashkin had to forge accounts receivable every month to con more money out of the bank. All he cared about was cutting costs and increasing market share, and he put a lot of frum Jews out of business. He is the victim not of antisemitism, but the corrupting power of his own greed.

    Normal
    Normal
    7 years ago

    Google how many sms the types of crimes Obama has commuted. 774 people as of October.

    7 years ago

    to # 4
    you are an “aczor”

    how can you compare rubashkin to weberman
    weberman destroyed lives

    rubashkin did what he thought he can do to save his company and hundreds of
    jobs

    AHIVIM
    AHIVIM
    7 years ago

    A bunch of self hating Jews!!!!!! If you don’t have anything smart to say then shut up!!

    qazxc
    qazxc
    7 years ago

    Has he applied for clemency?

    7 years ago

    Correction it on today, Mondays paper. The wsj does not even have a Sunday editon

    qazxc
    qazxc
    7 years ago

    How many here read Judge Reade’s decision before commenting?

    7 years ago

    4, 6 & 7, I am not sure if you were raised by your parents or if they just drag you up but your comments are completely out of place if not dead wrong. 4 what is the connection between the two? 6 comma last I checked the legal experts requesting his emancipation I’m not even Jewish let alone religious ones 7, you’re just a fool and sorry excuse for sperm so I won’t bother to respond.

    7 years ago

    Many have wondered why a few of us are so angry about Sholom Rubashkin. Allow me to speak at least for myself. Forty or so years ago, the frum community was much smaller, poorer, less learned and less machmir in observance. It was also scrupulously, almost pathologically honest. Storekeepers would see our covered heads and offer to accept our personal checks. Whatever our style of levush, the worst thing in the world was to be a disgrace to the uniform.

    The nursing home scandal in the mid ‘70s shocked us to our core. How could a rabbi cheat the government and treat old people so badly? Since then one we have become desensitized, as each month we have yet another instance of “frum” Jews going to jail. Jews wearing long black coats and peyos and beards are also wearing handcuffs.

    This cannot become the new “normal”, or Am Yisroel is in very deep trouble. The Nevi’im very occasionally criticized Shabbos observance, but their main complaint was that Jews were no longer honest in their dealings bein adam l’chaveiro. Rubashkin may not be the worst offender, but he’s the only one held up as a hero and martyr. This must not go unchallenged.

    7 years ago

    I seriously doubt if Obama will do anything; Trump must be approached by the frum community, through his son-in-law-Jared Kushner, in an effort to commute the horrible sentence of Mr. Rubashkin. Also, the horrible parole restrictions of Jonathan Pollard must be lifted. Obama has commuted the lengthy sentences of over 1,000 drug dealers, some of which committed violent crimes. The injustice meted out to Rubashkin and Pollard must be corrected now!

    scy4851
    scy4851
    7 years ago

    But how can Obamination pardon him if he didn’t do drugs…..?