Northeast News
April 5, 2017

Federal law (18 U.S.C. § 922[g][1-9]) prohibits certain individuals from possessing firearms, ammunition, or explosives. The penalty for violating this law is ten years imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine. Further, 18 U.S.C. 3565(b)(2) (probation) and 3583(g)(2) (supervised release) makes it mandatory for the Court to revoke supervision for possession of a firearm.
We’re just going to leave this here for the benefit of the Jackson County Prosecutor’s office that can’t seem to find the wherewithal to keep violent, convicted felons in jail.
Last August, as you may recall, the back of our building was shot up by a known felon in possession of a firearm during the commission of a violent crime. This lil’ doggie wrote about that incident and the ensuing madness that allowed this person to walk free less than 24 hours later despite having admitted to shooting another individual as well as our back storm door in the process. Then, we covered how the County Prosecutor’s office had to actually be pressured repeatedly by Police Detectives to even have the case charged properly. The suspect was later arrested and charged with the possession of a controlled substance and was sentenced to four years in the pokey. No mention of any gun crime in the court record whatsoever. Imagine this news-dog’s surprise last week when we were paid a visit by this individual at our office. Yes folks, walking free and on the streets of Northeast.
We did some checking and found that the state had suspended the execution of his sentence. So despite all of the prosecutorial tools in their arsenal, our County Prosecutor couldn’t find it within the legal system to keep a violent felon incarcerated. The Prosecutors office has yet to respond to our email asking why and how this happened.
That same federal statute listed above also defines what’s called “constructive possession.” Per that statute, “Constructive possession exists when a person knowingly has the power and intention at a given time of exercising dominion and control over the object or over the area in which the object is located….” The “object” in this case would be the firearm with which the suspect committed the crime.
In other words, even if detectives didn’t find the weapon on the suspect’s person, the mere fact that the suspect had access to the weapon either personally or through another individual, our suspect, could have been charged under this statute and put away for up to 10 years. The dog won’t even begin to get in to federal statute 924c that mandates up to 30, count em, three-zero years for specific gun crimes including the one committed last August by the suspect. Instead, Jean Peters-Baker’s office decided it was too much work to do her job properly and put a known felon in possession of a firearm away per the federal statutes that dictate hard mandatory minimum sentences. Instead, another criminal is walking the streets in Kansas City because the top law enforcement official in Jackson County wouldn’t do her job. That, in this dog’s eyes, is prosecutorial malfeasance at its finest.