Justice Still Denied for Kate Steinle

Last week, federal judge Vince Chhabria, a 2013 Obama appointee, ruled that Jose Inez Garcia Zarate, a Mexican national illegally present in the United States, suffers from “mental illness that is not presently being treated” and is therefore incompetent to stand trial on federal gun charges. Those are the only charges remaining from the killing that made the repeatedly deported criminal famous.

On July 1, 2015, on Pier 14 in San Francisco, the Mexican discharged a firearm and the bullet claimed the life of Kate Steinle, 32, walking with her father and a friend at the time. In November of 2017, a San Francisco jury of six men and six women, including three “immigrants,” found Garcia Zarate not guilty of the murder of Kate Steinle. The jury also found the Mexican national not guilty of manslaughter charges and guilty only of felony possession of a firearm.

“For those who might criticize this verdict – there are a number of people who have commented on this case in the last couple of years,” the Mexican’s attorney Matt Gonzalez said after the verdict, “the Attorney General of the United States and the President and Vice President of the United States. Let me just remind them, they are themselves under investigation by a special prosecutor in Washington D.C. and they may soon avail themselves of the presumption of innocence beyond a reasonable doubt, so I ask that they reflect on that before they comment or disparage the results of this case.”

“From day one this case was used as a means to foment hate, to foment division and to foment a program of mass deportation,” added defense attorney Francisco Ugarte. “It was used to catapult a presidency along that philosophy of hate of others. I believe today is a day of vindication for the rights of immigrants.” The travesty of justice would soon get worse.

California’s First District Court of Appeals ruled that the judge had improperly instructed the jury and overturned the Mexican’s gun conviction. Garcia Zarate still faced federal gun charges, and the case was strong.  The Sig Sauer pistol used in the killing was stolen from a federal Bureau of Land Management ranger. The Mexican claimed he found the weapon, and that it discharged when he picked it up.

Judge Chhabria now invokes mental illness to put the case on hold. A criminal illegal criticized by President Trump cannot be allowed to face the music. That is a tough act to top but a strong contender might be federal judge Dolly Gee.

Gee was born in Hawthorne, California, in 1959 and graduated from UCLA, where she also earned her JD. She worked as a labor lawyer and arbitrator before applying to be a judge, as one report explains, “in what she saw as a chance to diversify the court.” Strictly speaking, female gender, Asian ancestry and a desire to diversify the court are not qualifications to be a federal judge, but President Bill Clinton thought so.

In 1999, Clinton nominated Gee to replace John G. Davies in California’s Central District. Senate Republicans never gave her a hearing and President George W. Bush later filled the post with John F. Walter. POTUS 44 duly nominated Dolly Gee and in 2010 she became a U.S. District Court judge in the central district of California.

In 2013, Gee ruled that mentally disabled immigrants have right to legal representation if they were detained and facing deportation. It was the first time a court required legal assistance for any group in immigration courts. Judge Gee also ordered the return of an Iranian who was removed from the United States under President Trump’s ban.

Dolly Gee may have surpassed that performance in her ruling on California Assembly Bill 5, by San Diego Democrat Lorena Gonzalez. This measure restricts freelance writers to 35 submissions per publication a year and targets independent contractors such as drivers for ridesharing companies. The drivers charge that AB 5 restricts their independence and damages their ability to earn a living, but Dolly Gee isn’t having it.

“The Court does not doubt the sincerity of these individuals’ views,” Gee said in a February 10 ruling, “but it cannot second guess the Legislature’s choice to enact a law that seeks to uplift the conditions of the majority of non-exempt low- income workers rather than preserve the status quo for the smaller subset of workers who enjoy independent contractor status.”

Judge Dolly Gee thus trashes workers’ rights to free choice and voluntary association and appraises Democrat legislators on their intentions alone. With this destructive leftist bill in play, Virginia Democrat Bobby Scott has authored The Protecting the Right to Organize Act, “which many compare to California’s Assembly Bill 5” as Michelle Mears notes in the California Globe.

Dolly Gee denies justice for independent workers targeted by leftist Democrats. Vince Chhabria protects a repeatedly deported criminal from standing trial on federal gun charges. For Kate Steinle, shot dead by this criminal in 2015, justice is once again denied. This is what happens when a “composite character,” as proclaimed by his own biographer, David Garrow, gets to pick the judges.