Judges

At the Trial

The Tenant represented himself in the trial.
With a Lease, this should have been an "open and shut" case.
There should have been no way to lose.

Every law school and even high school graduate knows
that a lease is a document authorizing someone
to be on a property during a specific time period.

The Judge even held the Lease in her hands
and heard Pappas describe himself as the landlord.

She heard the landlord say that there was no dispute
regarding rental payments and that the tenant was not late.

She heard Marshall Kenneth Kent testify,
that after a fire investigation months earlier,
he gave the keys back to Shaddock
because he was the tenant.

Yet the Judge STILL pronounced a guilty verdict
to the shock of the court room
and the citizens of Virginia
 

Dorothy C l a r k e
First Judge
to find a tenant
guilty of
"Unlawful entry
with the intent
to destroy property"
in his own home

- despite being
given all the
relevant facts
including the
Lease

At Sentencing
The Prosecution did not submit all the evidence it had
and deliberately did everything to keep from admitting
the Lease, utility bills and other relevant documents from
The Honorable Judge Paul S h e r i d a n
which may have cast reasonable doubt
on the merits of the "trespassing" charge.

The zeal of the prosecution to win the most number of cases,
and the Debate Team Syndrome (focus on winning a quantity of cases
regardless of the quality of the merits of the cases) caused an honorable Judge,
a man who served his country in the US Marine Corps to defend democracy
to have a decision on his record that could be interpreted as
being counter to basic American Constitutional rights.

Not even in communist North Vietnam were tenants accused of trespassing.
Upon seeing the Lease, Judge S h e r i d a n would have thrown the case out of Court.

The Prosecution owes an apology to The Honorable Judge S h e r i d a n,
and to the Arlington Tax Payers, for knowingly pursuing this dubious charge
and bringing before him witnesses with obvious bias, and poor reputations
for telling the truth - the tenant's business competitor and Louis Pappas.

The Honorable
Judge S h e r i d a n

The Sentencing Judge
was not given
all the facts