To the Editor:
Recently, candidate Donald Trump referred to the defendants charged in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the nation’s Capitol as hostages rather than as criminals.
He has done so without regard to the reality of the events of Jan. 6. He has done so with indifference to the suffering and injuries that good and decent law enforcement officers endured at the hands of the insurgents. He has done so with disregard of the impact of the insurrectionists’ actions upon our democracy. And he has done so with a willful indifference to the way in which our courts administer our system of criminal justice.
More than 1,200 people have been charged with crimes for their conduct on Jan. 6. Approximately 870 of them have been convicted — 170 after trial and 700 by admitting their guilt in open court.
The process of entering a plea of guilty in Federal Court is exhaustive. It begins with the accused being placed under oath to ensure the integrity of the proceeding and the truthfulness of any admissions that the accused makes.
This solemn process is designed to identify indisputable facts and to determine that the accused is pleading guilty knowingly and voluntarily.
Before accepting the defendant’s plea of guilty, the court determines unequivocally that the defendant is guilty as charged, and that the defendant’s plea is based on his guilt and on nothing else.
At that moment, the defendant becomes a convicted criminal, not a hostage.
Trump’s glib identification of criminals as hostages may be entertaining to his base but that characterization is arrogantly dismissive of the horrors of Jan 6, and that characterization is made in cruel and reckless disregard of the fragility of our democracy.
Emil M. Rossi
Syracuse
Joseph Fahey
Fabius
Brian DeJoseph
Jamesville
Rossi is a lawyer. Fahey and DeJoseph are retired judges.
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