The death penalty is a cruel and out of date form of punishment, therefore it should be put to an end.

We need a governor that can govern Kansas without prejudice. A governor that can get us out of the red. A governor that does not slash programs for the poor. A governor that cares about the people of Kansas.

These two bills address the shortsightedness that plagues Sacramento politics regarding AB 1014 and Prop 47. They forget that it's the criminals we're suppose to punish not lawful citizens. Credits to Cougar for writing up the petition. We will make further proofing corrections in the final phase of the petition. Direct link to AB150 http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/15-16/bill/asm/ab_0101-0150/ab_150_bill_20150115_introduced.html Direct link to AB225 http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/pub/15-16/bill/asm/ab_0201-0250/ab_225_bill_20150203_introduced.html

Analog drugs are currently LEGAL in 49 states, ILLEGAL in Florida & 5 European countries. They are ILLEGAL federally, but most local LEOS & District Attorney Offices have no idea how to follow through with arrest or prosecution of analog offenders. Analogs KILL~ most importantly because there are no 12 panel tox screens for them, so when a patient presents to the ER after an OD~there is no way to test for the analog drug, wasting precious time in helping these patients. MY son Zach~FOREVER 20 DIED Aug. 08, 2014 from MXE given to him by friends.

Oregon law enforcment agencies have obtained over 4,000 military surplus items worth over $10 million since 1997. In the wake of tanks driven by police through the small town of Ferguson, MO, this needs to stop.

Chanan Aqu-Simmons #313-893 (North Central Correctional Institution PO Box 1812 Marion, Ohio 43301) was wrongfully convicted at18 yrs. old in1995 in an all circumstantial evidence trial. After the presentation of all evidence "EXCEPT ONE PIECE" THE DNA... In this case two people were fighting over the victim's gun a one was killed. There were two (2) different blood types found on the ground after the fight at the crime scene. One was the victims, “THE OTHER WAS NOT". The judge ordered Chanan Aqu-Simmons to submit to a blood test to compare his blood with the blood found at the crime scene... The blood found was" NOT" even Aqu-Simmon's blood type... THE JURY NEVER HEARD THIS EVIDENCE!!!!!! After nine days the jury returned the verdict of guilty of aggravated murder!!! Chanan Aqu-Simmons appealed to have all of the evidence heard. The Ohio innocence project requested to help fight this DNA issue to prove Chanan Aqu-Simmon's innocence by gathering the DNA (blood swabs) from POLICE that were: #1. Recovered at the crime scene #2. Compared against Chanan Aqu-Simmons This was so the DNA could be placed into the national DNA database and matched to the person it belonged to. After all the years of waiting to have his day in court to bring this evidence to the light so that he can be a free man again the unimaginable happened... THE POLICE DEPT. SAID: "THEY LOST THE DNA”!!!! In a case where there is no physical evidence or eye witness only here say. How can the only SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE that exist "mysteriously "come up missing right after the results returned that the(DNA) is not the boy's you have on trial....? SOMETHINGS FOUL HERE... The innocence project stopped fighting because they said: "they only argue the validity of DNA" in court not why have the courts lost DNA!!!!! So Chanan Aqu-Simmons has been in limbo writing attorneys for help. All the attorneys say the same thing nothings for free this is why we are coming to you for help as many signatures we get then we can show that the community, family and friends have all their support for his release on this FALSE IMPRISONMENT! If you are an attorney we are pleading for your time to look into this case Chanan Aqu-Simmons is still in limbo 20yrs. later waiting to have his Prayers heard by an ANGEL.... If you are interested in helping please check out www.firstthingsmokin.org all his case files on Advocating for the Falsely Accused Prisoners

My daughter Jessica was murdered by her drug dealer, he wants everyone to believe she died of an overdose, the Tyngsboro Police and Massachusettes State Troopers both believe this is the case. Jessicas' dealer had threatened to kill her in this manner on more than one occassion, he followed through with his threats on 10/5/14. Massuchusettes does not prosecute the Supplieor/Dealer I was told by the Massachusettes State Trooper and the Tyngsboro Police involed with the case. There is a nationwide epidemic of Heroin overdoses and there are many states that are prosecuting the dealer/ supplier. On 1/25/15, two women in Aurora, IN were charged with Reckless Homicide. They allegedly supplied drugs that ultimately caused the death of another person. The edition of the Chicago Tribune dated 1/29/15 stated in part, that Andrea Neilsen was found guilty by a jury on January 28, 2015 of Drug Induced Homicide in connection with the death of Abbey Nordmeyer. Also on January 29, 2015, 24 Hour News 8 from Wood, MI, reported that Kevin Obi was convicted in 2004 of supplying the drug that caused the death of a 21 year old young lady. Kevin Obi was sentenced to 25 years in prison for his crime. Please help my family get the Justice that our loved one so deserves.

Weldon Angelos could have hijacked a plane and spent less time in jail. But due to mandatory sentencing laws, the father of two was sentenced to 55 years in jail for selling pot – a term so long even the judge who gave it to him protested its injustice. A group backed by the Koch brothers agrees, and is now fighting to get him out of prison. Angelos is an extreme case: even though the crime was considered non-violent, Angelos carried a firearm during a series of marijuana sales to a Salt Lake City police informant – so federal mandatory minimums required that he be put in jail until he’s 80 years old. Judge Paul Cassell protested the sentence when he was forced to make it in 2004, a move he told The Daily Beast he considers “the most unjust, lengthy sentence that I had to hand down.” At the time of the trial, Cassell noted that Angelos’ sentence exceeded the minimum required for an individual convicted of airline hijacking, detonating a bomb intended to kill bystanders, and the exploitation of a child for pornography. Angelos is now 35 years old and has spent some 11 years behind bars. Judge Paul Cassell told The Daily Beast he considers the mandatory sentence, “the most unjust, lengthy sentence that I had to hand down.” He has more than 40 years left to go. Even though his crime was non-violent, parole is not an option at the federal level. His only hope for relief from his sentence is an order by the president. “If we’re going to deprive someone of liberty, and deal with the high cost of incarceration, it better solve a problem. And in this case, it doesn’t solve any problem,” argued Mark Osler, Angelos’ lawyer, who filed a clemency petition on his behalf in 2012. This is where the Koch brothers come in. The case is being highlighted by Koch-backed group Generation Opportunity, which targets millenials, in a broader campaign to press for criminal justice reforms this year. They will kick off the campaign with a documentary highlighting Angelos’ predicament, premiering at Washington, D.C.’s Newseum next week. “[This year] offers a unique moment in history in which people of different backgrounds and political leanings are coming together to facilitate a substantive dialogue on how to fix [the criminal justice system],” said Evan Feinberg, the group’s president. “We can work towards a more just system that reflects the rule of law without overcriminalizing non-violent offenses.” The new campaign will target the overcriminalization of non-violent crime, mandatory minimum laws, and helping criminals who have served their sentences reintegrate into society. The demilitarization of police and the excesses of civil asset forfeiture will also be addressed. Generation Opportunity worked with Families Against Mandatory Minimums on the documentary. FAMM founder Julie Stewart was in the room during Angelos’ first sentencing hearing. It was, she said, a severe example of a worrisome trend in the criminal justice system. In 1980, the average drug offense sentence was four years. Now, it’s more than nine years. “Is the defendant twice as bad? Or have we just gone crazy with sentencing? I would say the latter,” Stewart told the Beast. For the Angelos case, she added, “we all know 55 years is too much.” “A lot of people just thought that because of the amount of time my brother was [sentenced to], he had done something terrible, just because of the ignorance that is out there about mandatory sentencing,” said Lisa Angelos, Weldon’s older sister and advocate. “Before the case, I had no idea that this was possible in America.” The judge who was forced to hand down the sentence, Paul Cassell, said the Angelos case is an example of “clear injustice marring the public perception” of the federal courts – and victimizing taxpayers who have to pay to keep him locked up. “We have in place in our country today some very draconian penalties that distort our whole federal sentencing scheme,” Cassell said. “When people look at a case like Weldon Angelos and see that he got 55 years, and they see other cases where victims have gotten direct physical or psychological injuries and don’t see a similar [result] from the system, they start to wonder if the system is irrational.” When he was sent to prison, Angelos’ children were small, now both are in their teens. Without their father, the family fell on hard financial times. His children rarely talk to him, Weldon’s sister says, because they can’t afford a cell phone on which they can be reached. “When I tell him stories about his kids, you can tell how very hard it is for him to hear it… to know that he can’t be here,” Lisa Angelos said. “It’s destroyed him in many ways.” The Angelos’ have waited for more than two years for word on their executive clemency request. The average successful clemency request takes approximately four years, according to his lawyer. Weldon Angelos deserves clemency, Osler said, because his sentencing “doesn’t correlate in this country with what’s wrong, and what those wrongs deserve.”

Some RI lawmakers responded to a protest on a freeway against police abuses by proposing misguided laws on "interference with traffic"(S129, H5192). These bills apply not just to freeways but to many streets as well, can be used against someone inadvertently standing in the road as well as peaceful picketers or homeless people, propose an extended jail sentence as a penalty, and permit the threat of felony charges against those who have caused little or no harm. Whether last year's freeway protest against police abuses was right or wrong, it's a bad idea to respond by just giving the police more excessive power. http://webserver.rilin.state.ri.us/BillText/BillText15/SenateText15/S0129.pdf

Hi my name is Dawatha Davis I had been emailing and calling agency to get help for my son. He was sentence to 20 years to life mandatory for a crime he didn't commit. He was just 16 when this all started. He took a plea at the end but was lied to by his lawyer. The lawyer stated he would do lesser time if he took the plea but when all was done it was a mandatory sentence. That was not the deal he stated not only to my son but me and my family as well. Please help me my son never had a record at all! He didn't get a fair trial. The lawyer did not call anyone to testify on my sin behalf. Not even me if you can help me please.

Currently, Florida law enforcement officers are taught they can determine drunk driving and illegal drug driving based on a set of three medical tests that you many of you will fail for over 500 medical reasons. It you fail these tests you are going to jail. Period. Street drunk and drug testing or "field sobriety testing" (FST) is actually advanced brain or neurologist physician testing. So If your are tired, a poor learner, scared, dehydrated, in pain, a diabetic, suffering with a headache, or even a poor skater or gymnast, you are going to jail. Why? Because you have no practice doing these complex medical tests or you have a medical problem that limits your skill at field testing. If you fail this testing fully sober and drug-free, you are still going to jail. You will be arrested, handcuffed with sharp steel rings tight on your wrists, your car will be searched as you wait, and you will spend many hours or days in jail, after you are aggressively searched, put in inmate clothing, fingerprinted, photographed for the morning news and fed food fit for dogs. Even if you are able to pay what a judge eventually determines is your bail, and are released until a hearing or trial, you will lose a good deal of money, time, and you will suffer. You can lose items of value in your care after your car is taken. You have to "bail out" your towed car. You need to hire a lawyer. You have misc. legal and court fees to pay. You will have to explain to your boss or clients, why you are in the paper and why you have been gone one or more days. This is simply law officers playing doctor who will never be skilled enough to understand the hundreds of variables that effect the three field sobriety tests. Hundreds of physical limitations or diseases undermine your ability to perform these field sobriety tests (FST) and these illnesses can be found in the free book, Sobriety Testing, by James Schaller, MD and Kim Mountjoy, MS at www.personalconsult.com, or in a hard copy at your favorite book store. Years ago a tired, dehydrated neurologist left an educational conference in Tampa, because a seizure patient became angry at him and was acting psychotic. To protect the rest of Hotel and patrons, he told the patient he was leaving, and talked to over ten people as he loaded his many files, books and clothing as a local police woman talked with him over thirty minutes. Video shows him driving and loading perfectly. Ninety seconds after leaving the hotel he was stopped and told to reverse in a complex manner which he did perfectly. He produced his ID materials quickly, and yet after he failed field sobriety testing after sitting handcuffed a long time in boiling Tampa blacktop, he was arrested. The arresting officer refused to talk to the hotel police officer who assisted the physician in moving his car closer for loading. The neurologist was speaking and writing at the conference, and had hundreds of books with him--so many it took him an hour to load his car at times feet away from this hotel officer. After the arrest, the officer lied and said the neurologist was slurring words and mumbling, when from taped messages left minutes before he drove, it is clear his voice was perfect. The field sobriety test trouble gave the officer confidence to "load the report" with items consistent with a drunk person. All charges were eventually dropped as they waited weeks for the drug testing to return. No alcohol or illegal drugs were found. Yet the entire process cost over 7,000 and the neurologist reports he will never trust law enforcement again. This arrest is eternal even if the charges are dropped, and in some counties, the prosecution will almost never drop a charge due to the prosecution ideology. The attorney general office can have the goal of justice, balance, high convictions at any cost or income earning plea deals. Just remember, this may all happen because of an old rear light or you did not fully stop three seconds at a stop sign. A smart law officer can usually find some reason to full you over. Most of you will fear law enforcement the rest of your life. You will likely stop assisting good law enforcement with tips or help them fight crime based on this unjust experience. That attitude is a massive loss to ethical and high quality law officers who need citizens to help them oppose serious crime. It also undermines the dangers of impaired drivers, who must be stopped from causing dangerous crashes.

I am a parent who lost my eldest daughter to a heroin overdose. She was only 29 years old. We struggled through a system that is just not working to save them. She was on methadone for 3 years. We went every day...she suffered a horrible withdrawal in prison (I received information from inside verifying that). It was the worst 5 years, only to lose her in the end. So many families struggling. Something must be done!!! I am speaking out at schools and marching in Washington D.C. for the 1 year anniversary of the arrest of "El Chapo" Mexican drug lord.