Judge Larson denies motion to arrest George W. Bush

By Ed Felien
published July 14 2008

As Rochelle Olson noted in her article in the StarTribune Friday, July 11, my “Plea to charge Bush with war crimes fails.” [Although, technically, I was charging Bush with crimes against the citizens of Hennepin County. War crimes are a matter for an international tribunal, and I am sure that will happen when Bush leaves office, but that is not a matter for Hennepin County District Court.]

The full transcript of Judge Earl Larson’s Order is available at www.southsidepride.com where joins my Appeal to County Attorney Mike Freeman, the Writ of Mandamus, the response from the County Attorney and my answer to their response.

Briefly, the principal reason for denying the writ is that the County Attorney’s powers are discretionary. The County Attorney is the sole authority to determine who should and should not be prosecuted. In general I agree with this characterization, but (as I noted in my answer) there must be exceptions to this absolute power and there must be access for citizens to appeal the County Attorney’s decision not to act. State law does provide such an exception, but Judge Earl Larson argued that my writ does not meet the necessary standard to justify overruling the County Attorney’s decision.

I believe there are grounds to appeal this decision on the basis of Larson’s arbitrary assignment of the County Attorney as an officer of the Executive branch of state government and not as an officer of the court, but his thorough research and breadth of citation supporting his argument for discretionary power makes further litigation seem futile.

I cannot shake the feeling that somehow, in this process, I’ve been tricked. They did not consider or rule on my arguments that George W. Bush has committed serious crimes against the people of Hennepin County. They dismissed my case because they have the discretionary power to do so. They dismissed my case because they didn’t want to deal with the criminality of George W. Bush.
Let me say clearly, I have the greatest respect for the hard work that Michael Freeman does as County Attorney. He has been fearless in defending our communities from murdering marauders. And I am grateful for the time and consideration that Judge Earl Larson gave my plea. The congestion of the courts is a scandal, and district judges are overworked and under-appreciated.
But, I must say, in this case, justice has not been done and it will not be done until George W. Bush is held accountable for profiteering on the carnage in Iraq; for conspiring with the Saudi royal family and oil executives to raise oil prices; and for delivering opium and heroin from the killing fields in Afghanistan to the streets of Hennepin County.