PNJ Saturday April 19, 2003
PNJ, 4/30/03, A right to defense, Letter to Editor
A right to defense

I'm writing this letter concerning the Daniel Carter case. I totally agree with Charles Horn that Carter's charges should be left up to the judge, since he is a juvenile. It should be left up to the judge to decide Carter's punishment, not left up to a jury and power-hungry prosecutors to decide his fate.

He was clearly justified in defending himself from his uncle. He was defending himself in his own home from a very vicious attacker and now the state attorney wants to charge this young juvenile with first-degree murder.

Daniel clearly has a defense, but now prosecutor David Rimmer wants to offer young Daniel a plea bargain of 12 years in adult prison. There is clearly something wrong with that. He's only 15 years old. He is not an adult and should not be treated like one.

It is clearly time that the judges in Pensacola be given back the decision of what to charge juveniles with in criminal cases, not a jury or the prosecutor. Juveniles have a right to defend themselves from their attackers. - Buddy Newman, Pensacola

Letter to the Editor

Hard to believe; another young teen charged with murder as an adult, facing life without parole, when he was clearly defending himself. A 15 year old, Daniel Carter has been sitting in Escambia County Jail in isolation for several months. David Rimmer is prosecuting a young boy who was attacked by a violent uncle; the boy acted totally in self-defense against a vicious attack in his own home. The Uncle's act was not disciplining the child but engaging in a gratuitous and mean-spirited beating. .

This paper reported that Daniel has a defense that even Rimmer concedes could work in a jury trial, prompting Rimmer to offer a plea bargain of 12 years in adult prison!. Rimmer is fast becoming known as a serial child abuser who uses the courts to brutalize children - the sort of man who feeds off of the weaknesses of abused children.

The boy's condition has significantly deteriorated in jail where if he is not immediately sent to a juvenile psychiatric facility he is in danger of doing harm to himself; given his psychiatric condition, he will be abused in an adult facility . Wake up Florida, who's child will be next?