Was that Brie Felnagle's dad I been watching all over the news lately, from TacomaWA, Judge Felnagle?

That's him alright. I would know.

Yes, Judge Thomas Felnagle, allowed Clemmons, a child rapist (raped his own daughter!), soon to be cop killer, 3 time loser out on $150,000 bail.

http://annecarolinedrake.com/2009/12/01/clemmons-killed-by-seattle-cop-judge-felnagle-knew-he-was-dangerous/

Judge Felnagle is a champion when it comes to animal abuse:

http://www.paws.org/about/emailnetwork/archive/actionline/actionline_2004_09_03.html

Reading that first story just made me sick to my stomach.

Appalling wrote:

Yes, Judge Thomas Felnagle, allowed Clemmons, a child rapist (raped his own daughter!), soon to be cop killer, 3 time loser out on $150,000 bail.

http://annecarolinedrake.com/2009/12/01/clemmons-killed-by-seattle-cop-judge-felnagle-knew-he-was-dangerous/

Judge Felnagle is a champion when it comes to animal abuse:

http://www.paws.org/about/emailnetwork/archive/actionline/actionline_2004_09_03.html

I haven't followed the case much, but it appears to me that he was not a convicted child rapist, but merely an alleged child rapist. In contrast, the sickos who tied up and shot the dog with arrows had already been convicted of the crime for which they were denied bail pending sentencing.

Bail pending trial, bail pending sentencing, and bail pending appeal are all very different matters.

The bail Judge Felnagle set for Clemmons was higher than the prosecutor asked for. He wasn't expected to raise it.

I find less outrage with a judge setting a high bail for an alleged offense than I do with a governor and presidential hopeful pardoning the same individual with a life sentence.

Thanks, Appalling, for the heads-up on this story. You've hit a hot button for me, and I'll certainly be writing about this on my blog.

And, thanks for providing a link to my blog ~ I hit a new all-time record for number of daily visitors!!! Wow!

Anne Caroline

Bill O'Reilly just called him out by name and said he might sic one of his producers on Hizzoner if a statement/explanation is not forthcoming.

I read that the Prosecutor wanted 200K, where did you get your info? The state of Washington surely is equal in blame. Presidential hopeful...? not in my book, never was.

I can not stand Huckabee, I think very little of him.

However, please get your facts straight instead of just spouting nonsense, Tacomafan. Huckabee DID NOT pardon Clemmons, that would be insanity (though his commuting of the sentence treads the line of insanity and just bad judgment).

Huckabee commuted (Read: shortened) Clemmons' sentence from something like 105 years to 47 or so, thereby making him eligible for parole. Subsequently, he was paroled.

I completely agree with your overall premise though, every high-powered government official charged with overseeing this man failed to such an extent that it is difficult to ever trust their judgment. Trying to sort out which mistake was worse is a fruitless activity though.

Avocados Number wrote:

Appalling wrote:

Yes, Judge Thomas Felnagle, allowed Clemmons, a child rapist (raped his own daughter!), soon to be cop killer, 3 time loser out on $150,000 bail.

http://annecarolinedrake.com/2009/12/01/clemmons-killed-by-seattle-cop-judge-felnagle-knew-he-was-dangerous/

Judge Felnagle is a champion when it comes to animal abuse:

http://www.paws.org/about/emailnetwork/archive/actionline/actionline_2004_09_03.html

I haven't followed the case much, but it appears to me that he was not a convicted child rapist, but merely an alleged child rapist. In contrast, the sickos who tied up and shot the dog with arrows had already been convicted of the crime for which they were denied bail pending sentencing.

Bail pending trial, bail pending sentencing, and bail pending appeal are all very different matters.

Yo Avocado, You haven't been following the case? you trollin'? S'up?

The cop killer is dead now, thanks to one of Seattle's finest, God bless this policeman and the families of those that were murdered.

KING5 reported the prosecutors asked for $300,000. But, the Tacoma News Tribune said the prosecutor requested $200,000 at the initial appearance; the total was $190,000 ($40,000 for the assault and $150,000 for the child rape).

KIRO reported that Judge McCarthy set bail at $40,000 for the assault on the police officer; Judge Felnagle set bail for the child rape charge at $150,000.

I ferreted out his bar rating at the News Tribune. An attorney blasted him in a comment for lacking "empathy towards. . .women who are victims of domestic violence. . ."

If you click on the purple text in my post, you will be connected to my sources.

I'm almost finished with the post you inspired. I'll come back and post a link here when it is finished. Thank you again, Appalling, for tipping me off.

It's Clemmons fool.

This coward was shot in the back too when he started running after the first couple shots hit him. I'm glad the SPD officer emptied his clip in him... The second amendment guarantees rights to law abiding citizens for protection. Oh and remember your statement when a cop is drawing down on you, they are very aware that they are being hunted, if I was in law enforcement I'd shoot first and ask for forgiveness later.

Thank you Anne, I'm glad that I found your blog.

6 months ago a Santa Clara sherrif was given probation for killing a biker while on duty. He claims he fell asleep. Bikers in the area think he killed him intentionally. When cops get to murder with no consequences it draws the ire of the crazies

Thanks everybody for visiting my blog today. I had the biggest day EVER and broke through the 10,000 visitor milestone!!! I'm doing a happy dance here in Seattle and loving Appalling for posting a link to my site.

I've finished my post on the disparity in denying bail to the animal cruelty felons versus granting bail to Clemmons. Hope you find it interesting. FYI, I'm a domestic violence survivor (he was a VERY high-ranking judge), and I was licensed to practice law in two states.

Here's the link ~ hope you'll check it out:

http://annecarolinedrake.com/2009/12/01/clemmons-bail-judge-felnagle-grants-bail-to-alleged-child-rapist-denies-bail-to-convicted-animal-abusers/

My web site BTW is pretty much dedicated to Crystal Judson Brame.

Appalling wrote:

Yo Avocado, You haven't been following the case? you trollin'? S'up?

It just didn't interest me much. People get murdered all the time in this gun-loving country. Now, if Fox News suddenly decided to get rid of the television host who commuted the guy's sentence, and followed that up with a call for stricter gun control laws, that would get my attention.

Based on what little I do know about the case, I don't have strong views about whether and to what extent any officials screwed up. I do, however, believe that governors and presidents should exercise the powers of pardon and commutation sparingly, since I believe that these matters are usually more equitably and carefully reviewed within the judicial system. In this case, I give Huckabee credit for a decision that was arguably a matter of moral conviction, as opposed to Clinton's sleazy pardon of Marc Rich or Bush's disgraceful commutation of Scooter Libby's sentence.

AnneCaroline wrote:

I've finished my post on the disparity in denying bail to the animal cruelty felons versus granting bail to Clemmons. Hope you find it interesting. FYI, I'm a domestic violence survivor (he was a VERY high-ranking judge), and I was licensed to practice law in two states.

Since you were licensed to practice law in two states, I assume that you know the difference between denying bail to an individual who has merely been charged with a crime and denying bail to an individual who has already been convicted of a crime and is simply awaiting the judge's ruling setting the length of the term of incarceration. It is not, as you assert in your blog, "a distinction without a difference."

I don't object to scrutinizing the judge's decision to grant bail to Clemmons, but I do object to a totally bogus comparison of those two cases that trivializes the crimes of some very twisted individuals.

I think it's funny how the gun lovers say that since the gun bans, violence has skyrocketed in Britain (and Australia). I may have missed something, but I don't believe we ever hear about multiple police being knifed to death or beaten to death with a baseball bat over there (in all of Europe). Mass shootings there are less frequent. It is too bad that this is our reality in the U.S.A. and that it is probably too late to control guns because there are so many of them.

Whether you support further gun control measures or not, it is indisputable that the proliferation of guns in America is one of the reasons we have so many mass shootings. But apparently not enough people are armed because gun lovers love to point out that if there had been somebody with a gun at these shootings, the outcome would have been different.

The Lakewood police shootings will soon be forgotten and more mass shootings will happen next year and the years after. Just hope that you aren't in the wrong place at the wrong time. What will it take? That's what I'm wondering. We've already had the D.C. sniper shootings and Virginia Tech. What are we waiting for? An American Dunblane massacre?

*On September 3, 2008 28-year-old Isaac Zamora of Alger, Washington, a man with a criminal record and a history of mental problems, shot and killed a sheriff's deputy and five other people, and wounded two more, during a shooting rampage near his rural home and a high-speed chase along Interstate 5 Tuesday afternoon.

*The 2009 shooting of Oakland, California police officers took place on Saturday, March 21, 2009, when four Oakland police officers were killed by a convicted felon wanted on a no-bail warrant for a parole violation.

*The Carthage nursing home shooting was a mass murder that occurred on March 29, 2009, when a gunman opened fire at the Pinelake Health and Rehab nursing home in Carthage, North Carolina. The shooter, 45-year-old Robert Stewart, killed eight people and wounded another three before being shot and apprehended by a responding police officer.

*The Binghamton shootings took place on Friday, April 3, 2009, at the American Civic Association immigration center in Binghamton, New York, United States. At approximately 10:30 a.m. EDT, a naturalized immigrant Jiverly Antares Wong (aka Jiverly Voong) entered the facility and shot numerous people inside. Fourteen people were ultimately confirmed dead, including the shooter, and four were wounded.

*The 2009 Pittsburgh police shootings took place on Saturday, April 4, 2009, stemming from an argument over a dog urinating in the house between a mother and her 22-year-old son. 22-year-old Richard Poplawski opened fire on two Pittsburgh Police officers responding to a 911 call from Poplawski's mother, who was attempting to get the police officers to remove her son from the home. Three police officers were ultimately confirmed dead, and another two were seriously injured.

*The murder of Timothy Brenton occurred on October 31, 2009 in the Central District of Seattle, Washington, United States. Brenton, an officer with the Seattle Police Department, was seated in a parked patrol car with another officer discussing a traffic stop when a gunman stopped his vehicle alongside the patrol car, opened fire on the two officers, and fled the scene. Brenton died at the scene and his partner sustained minor injuries.

*The Fort Hood shooting was a mass shooting that took place on November 5, 2009, at Fort Hood—the most populous United States military base in the world, located just outside Killeen, Texas—killing 13 people and wounding 30 others.

*The Lakewood police officer shooting took place on Sunday, November 29, 2009, when four Lakewood, Washington police officers were shot and killed at a coffee shop in the Parkland unincorporated area of Pierce County, Washington, United States.

Avocados Number, you seem to be quite interested in legal issues, and you are an excellent debater. I don't know if you practice law, but you have a amazingly keen sense of legal argument. Quite frankly, you got me thinking about something that I had missed. So, I want to thank you for that.

There's no way I intended to trivialize those punks who killed that stray dog. I think the judge got it right in that case. And, I think PETA was right to make a stink.

If this had been Clemmons' first offense, I would agree that it might be appropriate to grant bail. Except. . .he was charged with raping his 12-year old daughter. If he goes home, who protects her from further assault? This wasn't a case of he-said/she-said. There was a room full of witnesses. So, I think the court has a duty to protect children and needs to err on the side of the best interests of the minor child who will be traumatized for life by the experience. She needs to know the system is protecting her.

In addition, there's Clemmons extensive criminal history as well as his penchant for flight. Let's not forget the psyche evaluation.

The standard on granting bail is a danger to the community OR flight risk. Since Clemmons hits both, bail should obviously have been denied.

While I have absolutely no respect for those punks who killed that dog, they didn't present nearly the danger to the community that Clemmons presented. I suspect they presented an equal risk of flight. And, I will not be at all surprised if in another 10 years we'll be hearing about some horrendous crime those punks committed.

IMHO, bail should have been denied in both cases. The warning signs were abundantly clear on what Clemmons would do if he was free. Quite frankly, it was abundantly clear that he should have been put in solitary to protect the guards in jail.

IMHO, the judge made an error in judgment because he doesn't take domestic violence seriously. He had a packed courtroom telling him abusing a stray dog was wrong. But, he didn't have a bunch of concerned citizens similarly outraged on behalf of Clemmons' daughter.

Yes, we're all innocent until proven guilty. But, the criminal justice systems knows that violent guilty offenders present a danger to the community as well as a flight risk. These guys know it is only a matter of time until they are found guilty and imprisoned. Those who are three-time losers like Clemmons have nothing to lose by engaging in further criminal activity while they await trial. That's why pre-trial bail to these folks should be denied.

I think Appalling's original point is that we need as a society to be as concerned about protecting abused children as we are about protecting stray dogs.

I don't have exact statistics at my fingertips, but you might be shocked to learn that about half of boys and girls are abused. The statistics are higher for boys. This means there are a whole lot of kids out there who are wishing some judge would protect them. And, I'm willing to bet that most of those kids are scared silent.

I was almost 61 years old before I found the courage to write about what happened to me when I was the age of Clemmons' daughter. I know exactly what it feels like to not be safe at home.