“Labrie’s lawyer Jaye Rancourt said, “In his attempt to make productive use of his time and at the same time maintain some degree of privacy, he violated this court’s order, and for that he is sorry,” ABC News reported.”
Labrie still does not own this.
I saw the reference to the graduate degree too and think that’s not correct since he’s not gone to college yet. I’m curious too to know where he was studying.
In principle, no, Harvard could have the world’s best resources on some particular topic. He could try interlibrary loan I suppose.
Well, I watched the whole 40 minutes of it on YouTube just now (slow afternoon), so there’s a chunk of time I’ll never get back.
There was mention of him being “enrolled” in an educational program in the Boston area, but I didn’t hear anything about it being a graduate program. The defense lawyer bent over backwards to not name the program - spoke of that info (program and name of professor) being redacted out of the exhibits, and twice she requested to approach the bench to explain the defense exhibits to the pleadings.
It sounded from the back and forthing that there was an office (pre-trial services?) he had to phone in to every evening and it checked caller ID. @VeryHappy it didn’t sound like there was a particular “parole officer” on his case. From what the both the prosecutor and defense were saying, the service could only verify that he called in, and was not able to authorize exceptions if he wanted/needed to stay out late. (The defense helpfully suggested that the court needed to change this). For that he would have had to petition the court, which he did on one occasion, when he got permission to travel to MI to see his sick grandfather. Prosecutor Ruffle made the point that he did ask for permission to break his curfew on that one occasion, and so he should have known he had to do it for other reasons - but the defense lawyer said that he didn’t want to compromise his privacy and invite a media spectacle by asking on other occasions.
Other tidbits I thought were interesting, in no particular order:
-Defense counsel sort of threw Labrie’s trial lawyer J.W. Carney under the bus - on one of the dates in October he was in Boston for a meeting and Carney’s office was supposed to call the court about it, but didn’t.
That’s surprisingly full of holes. Seems to me that anyone near the phone could have called in for him. I wonder if there was some sort of “proof” required that it was him.
@GnocciB: That was very helpful and interesting. Sorry you lost 40 minutes, but you educated the rest of us!
For a supposedly brilliant kid, he sure seems criminally stupid. Really, how hard could it have been to comply with this bail order.
Shaking my head. You can’t keep a kid from jumping off a bridge.
Also, the requirement to call in from his home phone at a certain time every day simply means that he had to be home at that one point in time. Which is why he wound up leaving his house at 5:00 AM. No one was checking at that point.
@VeryHappy, yes I totally agree it is a very rudimentary check system with a lot of ways to game it (like having a phone “spoof” Labrie’s home number or getting another male to pretend to be him).
Interestingly, one thing that the defense lawyer pointed out was that the phone line didn’t even get answered (it wasn’t open for business) until 6pm, so even when Labrie got home at 5 he had to wait til 6 to call in. She mentioned this when she was complaining that Labrie’s curfew was more restrictive than the other people who had to check in daily with the service.
Sounds pretty sloppy. I should know this, but is this in VT or NH?
Even if he was enrolled in an undergrad institution, he wouldn’t have likely been advanced along enough to be doing a thesis.
An undergrad/honors thesis is something only tackled by those in their last year of undergrad or in some cases…started in the second half of one’s junior year of college. Not something for a frosh or sophomore…
Any criminal attorneys out there who can weigh in on whether the curfew is this case is typical? It seems like a pretty onerous condition, given that the time that he is under these restrictions won’t count as time served on his sentence. I wonder how long appeals typically take in NH?
According to http://abcnews.go.com/US/hearing-today-request-revoke-prep-school-grads-bail/story?id=37730174
After the decision, which was made at a hearing this afternoon in Merrimack County Superior Court in Concord, N.H., Labrie was handcuffed and led out of court to Merrimack County Jail.
Merrimack County attorney Scott Murray said Labrie will be jailed and begin serving the 12-month sentence that was imposed in October but suspended during his appeal. Labrie’s appeal – which is being handled by the New Hampshire attorney general’s office – will continue, Murray said.
Defense attorney Jaye Rancourt said Labrie will stay in jail while the appeal is decided. She said he could serve the entire sentence before the decision is made.
His appeal is due on April 26th.
http://www.courts.state.nh.us/caseinfo/pdf/labrie/2016/02262016labrie-order.pdf
@dstark, the judge’s reasons for revoking bail were reasonable. As he said, you earn loosening of your bail terms by proving that you can comply, not the reverse. It would not appear that Labrie had any compelling reason to break curfew, although 8-5 seems unrealistically restrictive to me if the individual is supposed to try to find a job and travel to and from it. 6-6 would seem reasonable. But I have no idea what bail terms are usually like.
I continue to think that the computer crime felony charge was a crock. That doesn’t mean that Labrie is a nice guy, or a mature one. It really boggles my mind that he would risk jail that way. But teenagers often take risks that boggle our minds.
Well, he’s no longer a teenager. I think his inability to realize that rules apply to him has less to do with his age and more to do with some sort of psychological issues.
When his grandfather was ill out of town he asked for and received permission to visit him. I’m sure if he’d found a job that meant he couldn’t be home by 5 pm he could have applied to the court and it would have been granted. If he had to go to Harvard’s library to complete an assignment, he could have asked for permission. (Presumably, he would have known this before enrolling in the course and could have gotten permission then. Nobody would have known exactly when he was going to the library.)
And, if he was actually visiting Carney, I think Carney would have put in an affidavit saying that.
The date in the order regarding the appeal is the date the initial briefs are due. In California, in civil cases at least, it can be years after the briefing is completed before the case is decided. Don’t know what the backlog is like in NH.
I am not arguing for clemency for him on the bail issue. Obviously, he could and should have requested permission if it were needed.
@dischicos, it increasingly appears that you are correct. A sad situation.
Yes, in HI, the deadlines only apply to when attorneys must submit briefs. Courts rarely have deadlines to decide appeals in cases.