P v. DeLeon

When you read enough California appellate opinions, you quickly learn you can predict the result when you see certain language.  To wit, if you see the words, "further burden our overworked and under-resourced superior courts", the defendant is going to lose.  

First consider the language.  "Burden", really?  Is it really accurate  to refer to judicial obligations as "burdens"?  It is a telling use of language when judges don't even fear embarrassment for using the word "burden" to describe judicial duties mandated by the law.  Does a barista have the "burden" of pulling espresso shots?  Of course not.  Do nurses have the burdens of distributing medications and charting patients' vitals?    

As a lawyer you learn that when opinions cite the "burdens" on a criminal court they really mean the products of the procedural and substantive protections individuals have under our federal Constitution.  To employ reductio ad absurdum, if we could just do away with all those darn Constitutional protections, we would very effectively reduce the "burdens" on the superior courts (here's a "guilty" stamp and an ink pad, you'll be done by noon).  Likewise for language of "judicial efficiency".  The individual is going to lose.  North Korean courts are very efficient due to the lack of any protections for the accused; likewise for their death penalty scheme, very efficient indeed.

Here, the First District has the occasion to decide whether the procedural protection of a preliminary hearing mandated under the old parole revocation system run by the Board of Parole hearings is required under the new system of revocation within the superior courts.  They answer "no", for some justifiable reasons which do not require the tosh discussed above.  The decision isn't unjustifiable or even necessarily wrong.  But to paraphrase the late Mr. Hitchens, "It's not so important what you think, but how you think."  And if the above language is reflective of how this panel thinks, maybe we should consider adding to their "burdens" a refresher course on Constitutional law.