Never Forget

Could it possibly be true that 40% of the agency’s sworn officers was devoted to chasing down people at the Capitol on January 6th, anti-abortion protesters, and Trump’s lawyers? For a period of four years? I’m not recalling much in the way of signs of discontent among the agency’s personnel. Were there an abnormal number of retirements and resignations? If so many of them tolerated being put on such details, that’s an indicator that the agency should be dissolved, its employees discharged and anyone once there employed subject to MMPI tests before they could even be considered for federal employment again.
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IMO, the pursuit of justice demands a number of measures.
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One is to have the barnacles blasted off the federal penal code (and other codes which have sections defining criminal offenses) and the penalties re-calibrated so they resemble the median of the states for comparable offenses. It’s just amazing at times the cases in which federal prosecutors are permitted to intervene.
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Another might be to replace grand jury proceedings with preliminary hearings (some with adversary proceedings) which might provide some screens which check the prosecutor’s will. Another is to require the U.S. Attorney’s office indemnify defendants for a large share of the cost of private criminal defense. You have a bill, points are assigned by statute to each count which sum to a value ‘i’. You have the eventual conviction, and points are assigned for each count which sum to ‘f’. The U.S. Attorney’s office forks over N x (1-(f/i)).
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Another might be to have sentencing formulae in the statute. If arguments in the formulae require a formal factual determination, it’s done at a sentencing hearing and the decisions are made by a panel consisting of the trial judge and two assessors, with the assessors drawn at random from an apposite roll of professionals in fields other than law. (E.g. pharmacists and pharmacy technicians in drug cases, bookkeepers and accountants in embezzlement cases, occupational therapists &c in assault cases). Once the standard sentence is determined, the sentence can be adapted to take account of the defendant’s point accumulation from prior convictions, to take account of his age, and to take account of the type of plea.
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Another might be to limit jury vetting to a set of questionnaires – some filled out at home and then sworn to in front of a notary and some filled out at the courthouse after having been sworn in by the commissioner of jurors. One set of forms would inquire as to one’s state of infirmity, one’s previous convictions, one’s occupation, one’s work responsibilities, and one’s child care responsibilities. Some answers would mean one is categorically excused, some one can be excused on examination by the judge. These exclusions would be from the pool for any pending trial. Another set of questionnaires would ask the prospect, under oath, to state his personal relationship to each of a menu of persons identified (e.g. the defendant[s], the supposed victim[s], the counsel for the prosecution, the counsel for the defense, and anticipated witnesses. The judge then ruffles through these to exclude particular persons from the pool for specific trials. Once you have the pool for each trial, you pick 16 names at random and swear them in, with the last four names picked as alternates. The lawyers might be present for the judges questioning of the ambiguous prospects, have copies of the questionnaires, and make suggestions in re certain cases, but there would be no voir dire proceedings.
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Another might be to redraw federal trial jurisdictions so that core cities are invariably subsumed in larger catchments and the ratio of jurors residing in a given territory therein to those from other territories cannot exceed the ratio of the population of that territory to the remainder by more than a certain factor – i.e. the federal trial jurisdiction around New York includes 19 counties in New York and New Jersey and no more than 2 jurors are residents of Manhattan. The federal trial jurisdiction around Washington includes about 30 counties and stand-alone municipalities in Virginia, Maryland, DC, Penna, and WVa and no more than two jurors are residents of DC.
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Another might be to place the U.S. Attorneys, division chiefs, and Attorney-General in a department separate from that of investigators and debarring them from initiating investigations. They take referrals from agencies in their bailiwick, advise investigations as to what can be accomplished with evidence collected so far, and make representations in court. Members of the public with evidence to present are referred to the appropriate investigatory agency.
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Another might be to distribute investigatory agencies between seven or eight departments, and require each agency to have a specialized book which corresponds to specific provisions of the U.S. Code. No more omnibus agencies like the FBI. Also, make it the prerogative of state police to request federal assistance with an investigation, not local police.
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Another might be a rotation-in-office rule for lawyers employed in U.S. Attorney’s offices and the like. You are limited to 12 years so employed in any bloc of 14. In re the Attorney-General, the division chiefs, and the U.S. Attorneys, they’re limited to four years in any bloc of eight.
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Another might be to require that salaried line employees in inspector-general’s offices be at least 55 years of age and debarred from working for the federal government outside of inspector-general’s offices once they have passed their probation therein. The inspectors should be people who have no further ambitions from federal employment. The inspector-general himself would by default serve until retirement (some point between age 67 and 76). He could be dismissed, but a lawful dismissal could only be undertaken at a public hearing with both the president and the inspector-general in question present.

When the people are afraid of the government, it is tyranny. When the government is afraid of the people, it is freedom. (Anon)