Judge Drops Rape Charges Against Liberian Over Lack of Interpreter
This is one of those “over ride the brain and common sense” moments in our defunct judicial system. Sure, let’s put a rapist back on the streets because no one speaks Liberian, his native language. Let’s also forget the fact that he speaks English!!
ROCKVILLE, Md. — The prosecutor in the case of a Liberian native charged with repeatedly raping and molesting a 7-year-old girl said Monday that he is filing an appeal of a controversial judge’s ruling that dismissed all charges because an interpreter who spoke the suspect’s rare West African dialect could not be found.
Montgomery County State’s Attorney John McCarthy called the ruling last Tuesday by Judge Katherine Savage “improper,” adding that his office has “requested that an appeal be taken to reverse the court’s order.”
Savage ruled on July 17 that Mahamu Kanneh, a Liberian who received asylum in the U.S. and attended high school and community college here, was denied a speedy trial after three years awaiting a court-appointed interpreter who could speak the tribal language of Vai. Linguists estimate that only 100,000 people speak Vai.
Savage called her decision one of the most difficult she’s had to make in a long time, especially since she was aware of “the gravity of this case and the community’s concern about offenses of this type.”
Det. Omar Hasan wrote in the charging document that the victim “attempted to physically stop the behavior from the defendant, but was unsuccessful,” the Washington Post reported. Kanneh threatened the young girl “with not being able to leave the apartment unless she engaged in sexual behavior with the defendant,” Hasan wrote in his report.
McCarthy charged the delays cited in Savage’s order to dismiss the “result of the court locating a qualified interpreter,” and not the fault of the prosecutor.
“The fact is on four separate occasions this court provided Vai interpreters,” McCarthy said, adding that one of the interpreters had agreed to participate in further proceedings.
Court records, meanwhile, show that an interpreter was “sworn” by a Maryland court on the same day Savage dismissed the case, FOXNews.com has learned.
Loretta Knight, a clerk with the court system in Montgomery County, Md., claimed she had been unable to find an interpreter to stay on the case, even after an exhaustive search that included the Liberian Embassy and courts in 47 states.
But a look at the court docket for July 17, the day the case was dismissed, shows the entry “Interpreter sworn.” Several items below in the docket, Judge Savage “grants defendant’s oral motion to dismiss case based on a speedy trial violation.”
A review by FOX News of the audio from that hearing shows, however, that an interpreter was present throughout the entire court proceeding, during which time Kanneh’s lawyer, Theresa Chernosky, argued that her client had not been able to get a good job because of unresolved rape charges.
Chernosky is heard also telling Savage that her client works at a gas station, and has not signed up for school because of the uncertainty about his future.
The translator can be heard throughout the entire hearing.
Savage, however, notes to that the events in the case were “unforeseeable, truly difficult in terms of the interpreter issue.”
She then tells the court that “in spite of herculean efforts on the part of the state’s attorney … time has become the enemy.”
“What we come back to, then … too much time has passed, is that it’s the defendant who hold speedy trial rights.”
The Washington Post reported, however, that Kanneh had waived his rights to a speedy trial.
Why Savage dismissed the case when records indicate an interpreter had been sworn is just one of several questions raised by an examination of records by FOXNews.com.
