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Joshua Tupou, CU Buffs lineman, facing assault charges in University Hill brawl

Wonderful news. Josh had never been in a lick of trouble. Glad he could clear his name.
 
459d1fc0639d88ffb2239b8ed24a9aff.jpg
 
skibum said:
At least one poster in this thread needs to man up and admit tini was right.
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I will do exactly that when he clears CU's kangaroo court. This is a nice step, a very positive one, but CU has a way of ****ing things up.

Glad this turned the way it has, I would love to be completely wrong.
 
If the charges are dropped, how would CU's kangaroo court even be able to insert itself into this situation now?
 
TDbuff said:
If the charges are dropped, how would CU's kangaroo court even be able to insert itself into this situation now?
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Per Plati in the article they still have disciplinary hearings with the school to pass. Also charges were with drawn in a fashion they could in theory be re-filed at a later date.

I dug briefly around this settlement and didn't see a criminal filing, this is certainly a strawman but without a criminal charge it is an example of something that has happened.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/u...ent-accused-of-sexual-assault/article/2560652
 
Prosecutors are "still investigating the fact pattern very thoroughly." I take that as there are a lot of contradictory witnesses. I can't see how that is going to change all of a sudden.
 
DBT said:
Prosecutors are "still investigating the fact pattern very thoroughly." I take that as there are a lot of contradictory witnesses. I can't see how that is going to change all of a sudden.
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I have been a prosecutor in Colorado for 18 years (not in Boulder County) and I have seen lots of cases dismissed. I have dismissed lots of cases myself. Usually we do it under three circumstances: (1) it turns out that there is just no evidence; (2) it turns out that the person charged is actually innocent, or was more of the victim themselves; or (3) with the evidence you have, even though the defendant may very well be guilty, you just have no way of getting a conviction. Under any of these circumstances, a prosecutor will be ethically compelled to dismiss the case. The DA could have been confronted with any of these reasons, or a combination. One thing that I never recall seeing (and certainly never doing) is dismissing an ongoing prosecution where you think that the defendant is guilty so that you can conduct a thorough investigation. They have had more than enough time to do that. Way more than enough. I can only interpret the "continue to investigation" line as one of two things: (1) they are a looking at charging other people, or (2) they had to say that to mollify someone who would have been angry at the decision and maybe spoke out against the DA. It could have been a combination of the two.

I previously mentioned that the DA in Boulder does not ever want to be seen giving special treatment to CU athletes (probably no DA outside of some SEC towns wants to have that perception for their local collegiate or professional team), which can sometimes mean harsher treatment for not wanting to be seen weak. I think that observation is still valid, which to me means that the case must have been really, really weak, or they actually think that he is innocent of any criminal conduct.
 
Stan Garnet is a decent guy. I've met him on a few occasions and had the chance to talk about the perception that the DA targets athletes. He said that his office doesn't take that into consideration. While I would expect him to say that, I believe him a lot more than I would Mary KKKeenan had she said the same thing. That's a big part of the reason I didn't think this would ever really develop into anything. There are brawls on campus every weekend. Trying to decide who is at blame in those situations is nearly impossible. In the past, the big, bad football player would be charged because it was convenient to do so. That, and the fact that the football player probably got the best of the altercation. Objectively, you look at a brawl and there's really nobody to blame. Or more accurately everybody involved is equally to blame so it doesn't make sense to pick one side to prosecute. And that's what happened here, I think.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Great news! I can only believe that this will drive Tupou to excel on and off the field more, because now he knows how easily it can be taken away whether you are innocent or not.
 
sackman said:
Stan Garnet is a decent guy. I've met him on a few occasions and had the chance to talk about the perception that the DA targets athletes. He said that his office doesn't take that into consideration. While I would expect him to say that, I believe him a lot more than I would Mary KKKeenan had she said the same thing.
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Any DA, anywhere, is going to say that. And most actually believe it. Most will, in fact, make an extra effort to treat athletes fairly, but with that comes a desire to be seen as not taking the status of the athlete into consideration. If Stan, or any DA, gives marching orders to his staff not to take it into consideration, the staff are going to make efforts not to be seen going easy on an athlete (even if subconsciously), which can sometimes mean being extra careful with everything you do with the case, and that sometimes means harsher treatment, even when the DA does not intend to give harsher treatment. It can also mean dragging things out while you are extra careful. It could have been that had Toupou not been an athlete, the case would have been dismissed a long time ago--or even that felony charges would never have been filed, but that his status as an athlete meant that the Deputy DA or DAs handling the case were extra careful and took a long time. I have seen this happen personally on high profile cases. Even if the elected DA, like Stan, earnestly strives not to take it into consideration, and even if he calls the shots on high-profile cases, his staff are absolutely going to be extra cautious, slow, and methodical on a case like this, which is by definition being treated differently.
 
tsarbomba said:
I have been a prosecutor in Colorado for 18 years (not in Boulder County) and I have seen lots of cases dismissed. I have dismissed lots of cases myself. Usually we do it under three circumstances: (1) it turns out that there is just no evidence; (2) it turns out that the person charged is actually innocent, or was more of the victim themselves; or (3) with the evidence you have, even though the defendant may very well be guilty, you just have no way of getting a conviction. Under any of these circumstances, a prosecutor will be ethically compelled to dismiss the case. The DA could have been confronted with any of these reasons, or a combination. One thing that I never recall seeing (and certainly never doing) is dismissing an ongoing prosecution where you think that the defendant is guilty so that you can conduct a thorough investigation. They have had more than enough time to do that. Way more than enough. I can only interpret the "continue to investigation" line as one of two things: (1) they are a looking at charging other people, or (2) they had to say that to mollify someone who would have been angry at the decision and maybe spoke out against the DA. It could have been a combination of the two.

I previously mentioned that the DA in Boulder does not ever want to be seen giving special treatment to CU athletes (probably no DA outside of some SEC towns wants to have that perception for their local collegiate or professional team), which can sometimes mean harsher treatment for not wanting to be seen weak. I think that observation is still valid, which to me means that the case must have been really, really weak, or they actually think that he is innocent of any criminal conduct.
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So, we can rule out bribery?
 
sackman said:
Stan Garnet is a decent guy. I've met him on a few occasions and had the chance to talk about the perception that the DA targets athletes. He said that his office doesn't take that into consideration. While I would expect him to say that, I believe him a lot more than I would Mary KKKeenan had she said the same thing. That's a big part of the reason I didn't think this would ever really develop into anything. There are brawls on campus every weekend. Trying to decide who is at blame in those situations is nearly impossible. In the past, the big, bad football player would be charged because it was convenient to do so. That, and the fact that the football player probably got the best of the altercation. Objectively, you look at a brawl and there's really nobody to blame. Or more accurately everybody involved is equally to blame so it doesn't make sense to pick one side to prosecute. And that's what happened here, I think.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...

tsarbomba said:
Any DA, anywhere, is going to say that. And most actually believe it. Most will, in fact, make an extra effort to treat athletes fairly, but with that comes a desire to be seen as not taking the status of the athlete into consideration. If Stan, or any DA, gives marching orders to his staff not to take it into consideration, the staff are going to make efforts not to be seen going easy on an athlete (even if subconsciously), which can sometimes mean being extra careful with everything you do with the case, and that sometimes means harsher treatment, even when the DA does not intend to give harsher treatment. It can also mean dragging things out while you are extra careful. It could have been that had Toupou not been an athlete, the case would have been dismissed a long time ago--or even that felony charges would never have been filed, but that his status as an athlete meant that the Deputy DA or DAs handling the case were extra careful and took a long time. I have seen this happen personally on high profile cases. Even if the elected DA, like Stan, earnestly strives not to take it into consideration, and even if he calls the shots on high-profile cases, his staff are absolutely going to be extra cautious, slow, and methodical on a case like this, which is by definition being treated differently.
Click to expand...

It's a shame that politics has intruded into how the DAs office has to operate. If any office should be non-political the role of prosecutor is that office. You are dealing with decisions about justice for the victims of crimes and at the same time the future lives of those who are being prosecuted.

I have no question in my mind that if Mary Keenan was calling the shots they would still be trying to figure out how to get the nasty football player behind bars. That was her choosen ticket to political advancement.

Unfortunately the people who support that attitude still exist in Boulder county and the DAs office has to tread lightly to prevent getting them fired up.

You are also right that the simple fact that you have to make the statement that not take the status of the athlete into consideration means that it is in the back of the mind and will influence how things are handled. Unlike the kid from Aurora who is there majoring in accounting and working part-time in a restaurant, whatever is decided in a case like this has a much bigger chance of ending up in the newspaper and drawing the attention of those who have their established positions regardless of the facts.
 
MtnBuff said:
It's a shame that politics has intruded into how the DAs office has to operate. If any office should be non-political the role of prosecutor is that office. You are dealing with decisions about justice for the victims of crimes and at the same time the future lives of those who are being prosecuted.
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At the risk of derailing the thread, I have to (sort of) disagree with you. While the political implications of prosecutorial decisions should never impact decisions (and, in fact, I have never seen political implications--i.e. how a decision would play at the ballot box--impact prosecutorial decision making), there is a good reason why we have local prosecutorial control and locally elected DAs. DAs are, and should be, accountable to the public for how they carry out their jobs. In making a decision, many of which have impacted lives, I have often asked myself what would my friends, neighbors, and the rest of the public expect of me. Of course, that is not the end all and be all, and sometimes you have to make decisions that are unpopular, but prosecutorial discretion is a public trust. The public wants (at least in my experience) prosecutors who are tough and fair, at the same time. Every good prosecutor that I have known tries to live up that ideal, and wants the public to know it. Sometimes that means really taking your time and being thorough on cases for which the public takes an interest, at the very least your instincts as a prosecutor tell you to do that. Whether any of that played a role in the case of Toupou, I can only speculate. If a CU player really were a violent criminal and really committed a crime, I think that every right thinking person here would want the case prosecuted aggressively and fairly. If a CU player were wrongfully accused, I think that most of us would want the DA to decline further prosecution, even right thinking Rams fans would hopefully agree with that.
 
tsarbomba said:
At the risk of derailing the thread, I have to (sort of) disagree with you. While the political implications of prosecutorial decisions should never impact decisions (and, in fact, I have never seen political implications--i.e. how a decision would play at the ballot box--impact prosecutorial decision making), there is a good reason why we have local prosecutorial control and locally elected DAs. DAs are, and should be, accountable to the public for how they carry out their jobs. In making a decision, many of which have impacted lives, I have often asked myself what would my friends, neighbors, and the rest of the public expect of me. Of course, that is not the end all and be all, and sometimes you have to make decisions that are unpopular, but prosecutorial discretion is a public trust. The public wants (at least in my experience) prosecutors who are tough and fair, at the same time. Every good prosecutor that I have known tries to live up that ideal, and wants the public to know it. Sometimes that means really taking your time and being thorough on cases for which the public takes an interest, at the very least your instincts as a prosecutor tell you to do that. Whether any of that played a role in the case of Toupou, I can only speculate. If a CU player really were a violent criminal and really committed a crime, I think that every right thinking person here would want the case prosecuted aggressively and fairly. If a CU player were wrongfully accused, I think that most of us would want the DA to decline further prosecution, even right thinking Rams fans would hopefully agree with that.
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Sure. I think what people are saying is that we don't want to see any more Duke Lacrosse situations where a prosecutor is pandering for local support to set up an election campaign -- destroying innocent young people in the process.
 
tsarbomba said:
At the risk of derailing the thread, I have to (sort of) disagree with you. While the political implications of prosecutorial decisions should never impact decisions (and, in fact, I have never seen political implications--i.e. how a decision would play at the ballot box--impact prosecutorial decision making), there is a good reason why we have local prosecutorial control and locally elected DAs. DAs are, and should be, accountable to the public for how they carry out their jobs. In making a decision, many of which have impacted lives, I have often asked myself what would my friends, neighbors, and the rest of the public expect of me. Of course, that is not the end all and be all, and sometimes you have to make decisions that are unpopular, but prosecutorial discretion is a public trust. The public wants (at least in my experience) prosecutors who are tough and fair, at the same time. Every good prosecutor that I have known tries to live up that ideal, and wants the public to know it. Sometimes that means really taking your time and being thorough on cases for which the public takes an interest, at the very least your instincts as a prosecutor tell you to do that. Whether any of that played a role in the case of Toupou, I can only speculate. If a CU player really were a violent criminal and really committed a crime, I think that every right thinking person here would want the case prosecuted aggressively and fairly. If a CU player were wrongfully accused, I think that most of us would want the DA to decline further prosecution, even right thinking Rams fans would hopefully agree with that.
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I don't disagree with any of this and I agree that local accountability and responsibility is the best way to go. In the large majority of situations the prosecutors are quality individuals driven by a strong sense of ethics and a desire for real justice for all involved. The nature of the job is that sometimes this involves making a decision which is right rather than popular, it may even mean making a decision which is neither right nor popular but is the decision required by the available facts and circumstances. As a member of the public I may not like these but I do respect them.

At the same time we also know that there is always that percentage who see the job as a steppingstone to bigger and better things regardless of who gets hurt in the process. I unquestionably believe that this was the case with Mary Keenan. I also would be willing to bet a substantial wager that at least some prosecutors in Lincoln, Austin, and some other selected cities have gone the other way and decided that following the evidence against a high profile player wasn't worth the damage to their careers.

Fortunately the number of these people is in my view fairly small but when we are talking about human lives one is more than we want to accept. I also know that perfection is an impossible target to attain when dealing with humans in an adversarial situation but that doesn't mean we shouldn't strive to get as close as we can.
 
MtnBuff said:
I also would be willing to bet a substantial wager that at least some prosecutors in Lincoln, Austin, and some other selected cities have gone the other way and decided that following the evidence against a high profile player wasn't worth the damage to their careers.
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Hmm. You mean, like, $10? I'm thinking your hypothesis would be hard to prove.
 
DBT said:
Hmm. You mean, like, $10? I'm thinking your hypothesis would be hard to prove.
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Granted, very hard to prove. But my level of confidence is very high. We know that Dr. Tom had "contact" with the DA regarding his players. We have heard plenty over the years about players at UT, aTm, Free Shoes U. etc. etc. who had run ins with the law that at minimum would have put anyone else into the system but they somehow got sent home to run some laps.

How far do you think a politically ambitious prosecutor would get in Nebraska if he were known as the guy who was unfriendly to the football team and maybe cost them some wins by prosecuting a star player or two.

Same question in Alabama or even Penn State?
 
tsarbomba said:
At the risk of derailing the thread, I have to (sort of) disagree with you. While the political implications of prosecutorial decisions should never impact decisions (and, in fact, I have never seen political implications--i.e. how a decision would play at the ballot box--impact prosecutorial decision making), there is a good reason why we have local prosecutorial control and locally elected DAs. DAs are, and should be, accountable to the public for how they carry out their jobs. In making a decision, many of which have impacted lives, I have often asked myself what would my friends, neighbors, and the rest of the public expect of me. Of course, that is not the end all and be all, and sometimes you have to make decisions that are unpopular, but prosecutorial discretion is a public trust. The public wants (at least in my experience) prosecutors who are tough and fair, at the same time. Every good prosecutor that I have known tries to live up that ideal, and wants the public to know it. Sometimes that means really taking your time and being thorough on cases for which the public takes an interest, at the very least your instincts as a prosecutor tell you to do that. Whether any of that played a role in the case of Toupou, I can only speculate. If a CU player really were a violent criminal and really committed a crime, I think that every right thinking person here would want the case prosecuted aggressively and fairly. If a CU player were wrongfully accused, I think that most of us would want the DA to decline further prosecution, even right thinking Rams fans would hopefully agree with that.
Click to expand...

Then you're not looking very hard! Or ignoring the implications of what goes on in the Denver DA's office or in Arapahoe County. I suppose those sweet deals Pat Sullivan got were all just "sound prosecutorial discretion", eh? And the "agricultural trespass" plea deals for illegal immigrants in Denver? Just more well-grounded , non-political exercises of discretion, right?

As long as DA is an elected office and an obvious springboard for higher elective office, political considerations will shape prosecutorial stategies. There is no way around that.

And we won't even mention the Roger Larsons or Myrl Serras of the DA world!
 
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