Judicial activism must end
Activist judges in Massachusetts courtrooms continue to endanger the public, unapologetically.
Judge Timothy Q. Feeley ruled that alleged child rapist Scott Smith could be released on bail last week and confined to his home with an electronic monitoring device.
Smith, 38, of Salisbury is awaiting trial on indictments charging him with two counts of aggravated rape of a child, posing a child in a sexual act, providing liquor to a person under age 21 and two counts of possession of child pornography.
At the last minute, prosecutors scrambled to keep Smith behind bars by appealing to a different judge with evidence that he was scheming to have his two accusers killed. The only thing keeping Smith off the streets before the intervention was a fitting for an ankle bracelet he was waiting for. Had that happened, he’d be walking free.
Two counts of aggravated rape of a child and a slap on the wrist, pending the trial, from Judge Feeley. It is outrageous and unacceptable. Unfortunately, this kind of malfeasance is all too common in the commonwealth and occurs with some regularity in the courtroom of Judge Feeley.
Feeley was embroiled in controversy earlier this year when it came to light he had reduced the bail of Maine resident John Daniel Williams one month before Williams returned home and allegedly shot to death Somerset County Sheriff’s Cpl. Eugene Cole, 61, to stop the father of four from arresting him.
Williams, 30, was being held on $7,500 bail in Massachusetts on weapon charges. He walked out of jail after Feeley reduced the bail to what he said was an “appropriate” $5,000.
Another time, Feeley sentenced convicted heroin dealer Manuel SotoVittini of Peabody to probation instead of jail time. SotoVittini had a green card and was in the country legally. Feeley said he would have ordered the drug pusher locked up if he was a U.S. citizen because then he would not be risking deportation.
Such activism on behalf of judges puts the general public at risk and degrades the efficacy and credibility of the legal system as a whole. But the act of mercy and forgiveness toward the criminal element is so intoxicating to some on the bench that it outweighs any dire consequence to society, whether that is a drug epidemic, sexual assaults on women or dead police officers.
The Governor’s Council, Gov. Baker and the Legislature can bring judges to account and they should.