A badge should not be a mitigator at sentencing.
Douglas Berman at Sentencing Law and Policy asks “Should law enforcement service be an aggravator or mitigator at sentencing?”. He asks the question in connection with the upcoming sentencing of ex-Sheriff Mike Carona for urging his ex-assistant sheriff to lie during a grand jury investigation of charges that Carona took gifts in exchange for favors while in office.
Law enforcement service per se sure as shootin’ should not be a mitigator. Carona’s defense attorneys are asking the judge “to look beyond Carona’s conviction and see the public servant with 32 years behind the badge – years spent advancing the cause of children and homeland security.” Big freaking deal. Carona got paid well by the taxpayers for being a “public servant.” He is entitled to no more consideration than a hamburger-flipper at McDonald’s who likewise “serves the public” for pay. It would be exceedingly wrong and unseemly for a government-employee (i.e. a judge) to give special treatment to a fellow government-employee based simply on his status as a fellow government-employee.
I’m more ambivalent about whether being in law enforcement at the time a crime is committed should be considered an aggravator at sentencing. If you choose as your job to enforce and inflict the laws on others, there’s an added element of hypocrisy when you yourself break the laws. Or is there? You’re certainly a hypocrite if, like ex-Sheriff Carona, you think you should get better treatment than the common criminal simply because you used to be a cop. That’s the real aggravator here.
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