depends on the victim's belief in why she was being transported. Seems to me her (mistaken) belief that it was to be a "vacation" only makes the crime more heinous.

But what do I know.

The USSC ruled that the victim's thoughts are not a factor.

My only point was that the USSC had, long ago, ruled that the victim's ideas of the nature of events is not a factor. The OP had noted the minor didn't think she was being trafficked for sex. While true, it was not why the DoJ didn't prosecte. As has been noted numerous times here on DU, there were other reasons why the DoJ under Biden could not prosecute under the Mann Act.

or I was not clear enough. It is my understanding that the 17 year was not the person involved in the alleged Mann Act violation.

Injecting facts into a perfectly good recreational outrage session! Who ever heard of such a thing?

Now you’ve gone and ruined Christmas for all the scapegoating Garland haters!

I hope you’re happy with yourself!





(Cheers from the reality based community)

Let the rapists walk free! As long as no one expresses anger or frustration, justice is served!

I’m just not so blinded by misdirected hatred that I scapegoat the wrong villain.

... is the statutory rape in the state of FL. Statutory rape is a state crime, not a federal crime. Garland does not have jurisdiction.

Just as a practical matter, I think you would generate a lot more watts from recreational outrage than you will ever get from the reality based community.

Meanwhile, 10 years of investigating about the freaking laptop. Special council, going back on a deal.

To uphold the rule of law.

Shameful!

... of a crime that could have been successfully prosecuted, they would have done so. Whether they cooperated with an "ethics and rules" investigation is not relevant to whether or not they had evidence that would stand up in a court of law.

The House report has ample evidence of ethical and house rules violations. There is nothing in it that suggests that he could have been successfully prosecuted of Federal crimes.

Is because Garland is a gutless wonder that I wish nothing good for.
I will always blame him for the second horror show 45 has in store for us.

Then he would have lost in court, so all the people complaining now would have complained then anyway because he wasn't convicted. Gaetz was and is a scumbag, that doesn't mean he did anything that the DOJ could have charged him with and gained a conviction in court. The level of madness here about this is insane.

... well, to whoever. Your efforts are appreciated!

this is one of those things where people have made up their minds - regardless of what is put in front of them.

Both the DOJ investigation and the Ethics Committee investigation came to the same conclusion - that there was not enough evidence of trafficking to gain a conviction. In fact the DOJ actually empaneled a grand jury who apparently failed to indict. Nothing nefarious on the part of DOJ - as big of a scumbag as Gaetz is, there just wasn't convincing evidence that his actions constituted sex trafficking.

Now as for his drug offenses, the report didn't really go into details with specifics of what he did. It's possible that he could have been charged with drug offenses but without more specifics, it's hard to tell definitively. Hopefully we will get more details.

The biggest thing that came out of the report (beyond confirming the statutory rape, unfortunately too late to prosecute), was the dozens (at least) of ethics violations he committed. It's pretty clear that many Republicans in Congress knew of at least some of these a long time ago, yet the covered up for him. He wasn't even reprimanded. The volume and severity of ethics violations he committed should have resulted in expulsion from Congress, and it should have happened a long time ago.

everything Gaetz did and it clearly says DOJ refused to cooperate. So it is wrong to conclude that there isn't more out there that DOJ knows about but didn't pursue. A huge question, for which they will never be forced to answer, is why they refused requests for cooperation and information from the Committee. It is not a matter of "Oh we thought we needed to protect our evidence for if we brought charges". Because if it was that then when they made the decision not to charge anything there was no longer any reason to continue to withhold that material from the Committee. Suffice it to say the DOJ files look different than the Committee files when in fact they should be the same. What is DOJ continuing to hide? Are they keeping their own questionable conduct in Florida over the years hidden from view?

Disclosures and conduct over the last many, many years clearly show improper actions within DOJ and the FBI. To think that all disappeared beginning in 2021 and isn''t still there is folly.

.... the purpose of a (federal) criminal investigation is to determine if a (federal) crime has been committed and if so, is there is enough evidence to support a successful prosecution. That's it; if the answers is no, then it is done and over with.

It is NOT a fishing expedition into moral character or "house rules" violations. It is not to be used for character assessment, character assassination, or smear campaigns. To make it into such an exercise would turn it into a tool for harassment and grave injustice.

This is why grand jury investigations are conducted in secret and are sealed if an indictment is not returned. To do otherwise would be an injustice in any specific case and would undermine and errode justice overall.

in front of a Grand Jury. Everything they had for information or could have assisted the Committee with was not necessarily presented to the Grand Jury. They would only have presented what they thought might support an indictment. There is no such thing as a high level investigation in which every shred of information learned is used either in the Grand Jury process or at trial. The DOJ was not precluded therefore from yielding that to the Committee but it is even worse than that because they openly refused to help the Committee at any point on anything.

There may well have been names of people or pieces of information the Committee would have liked to have had that were nothing to do with anything given to the Grand Jury. The DOJ presented material to the Grand Jury that DOJ discovered. The Grand Jury did not run an investigation, hire investigators etc. Nobody went before the Grand Jury to testify without first having been interviewed and investigated by DOJ/FBI.

It is fallacy to allow DOJ to hide behind the excuse of the Grand Jury when they know very well they had the ability to share things not presented. This is the very same DOJ that stonewalled the 1/6 Committee for so long to the point it became a huge issue on the Committee.

... which holds for the entire investigation.

In fact, the Justice department tends to avoid even acknowledging that an investigation is underway, since that, in and of itself, could unfairly taint an innocent persons reputation.

Looking at news stories about the investigation, most of the information came from attorneys for the various witnesses and Gaetz himself. The DOJ refrain was "A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment". And they stuck to that, as well they should, when the House asked them to comment.

this may all be the case in a perfect application but is this how DOJ functioned with Hillary? Is this how they functioned with Hunter Biden? They had all kinds of things to say and disclose that were not a part of any charges ever brought. Good grief we can go back to the FBI under Hoover and COINTELPRO and subsequently. The FBI is part of DOJ and all of those files most certainly were investigations of those people. Damaging information was disclosed by the FBI in absence of any charges. So this idea that DOJ can "never disclose" or "doesn't disclose" is simply false. They do when they want to. They hide behind your reasoning when they don't want to disclose anything. Plain and simple and proven by decades of experience.

Furthermore to say the Committee was asking DOJ to "comment" is disingenuous. Investigators for multiple entities work behind the scenes with each other all the time. DOJ stonewalled the Committee period.

.... as well they should. As a matter of justice.

And, by the way, the committee did just fine without them. It was a good report.

could have been. I find 3 of the bodies of a serial killer and because of restrictions can go no further then you hardly have a "good " report. DOJ chose to stonewall in this case for this defendant while in other recent cases they have not. The question is why now and why for this subject of the investigation.

..... they didn't have any evidence that would stand up in a federal court against him. End of story. Anything else is "creative speculation" - that is, a conspiracy bullshit.

DOJ effort. I am talking about the Committee. What is bullshit is the DOJ selectively applying its "we don't talk" "policy".

.... the DOJ has some secret incriminating evidence against Gaetz that is unknown to anyone else and would be enough to put him jail, but instead they, for some reason, decided not to prosecute him? And that the fact that they did not cooperate with the house somehow proves this to be the case?

That seems pretty unlikely to me.

have demonstrated you don't want to but would rather mischaracterize what I'm talking about. Further interaction with you is useless.

that could have been brought by the Feds for using Federal resources to commit a criminal act. The facts are that DOJ interfered with the Committee investigation according to the report. The report is what everybody is citing but because of the interference it is wrong to conclude these are the only things Gaetz ever did that were known by DOJ investigators. In fact it is reasonable to conclude that there was more and that is what DOJ protected. It could also go to corruption within DOJ regarding years of soft deals for Federal investigations of people in Florida.

seems we have lots of information about the 2017 conduct so if that was when the cocaine possession occurred it was nearing or past the federal statute of limitations when Garland took office.

Additionally, I don't hate Gaetz for doing drugs or sleeping with 17 year olds. I don't excuse the latter but I've done my share of drugs. I hate Gaetz because he is an unserious person who has made a mockery of governing and is a shill for Trump. If the DOJ went after him for possession of cocaine while it let all the other members of Congress who have done the same thing it looks like a political hack job. YMMV

None of the alleged victims believed they were trafficked so their testimony would have killed the case. Without victims you're not going to win. I don't know why this is so hard for people to understand.

.... on the off chance that you might be able to get a jury to convict. You have the evidence to convict in advance.

Reading a bit further about this, the recommendation not to prosecute came from the DOJ's professional prosecutors. If they had a case they would have gone after him.

It's a dinosaur of a law, and IMHO was federal overreach to legislate morality, based on right-wing lies about immigrant and black men forcing white women into prostitution. It is not regularly used anymore, in part because of the racist ways it was applied over the years.

When it is used these days, it's in 'sting' cases where a fake underage girl gets some creep to send her a plane ticket so that she can come and collect more money and have sex with him. In other words EASILY provable cases where the shit is documented.

Just saying.

...from what I read. They even brought him the drugs they did and probably took a profit on that end as well.
The 17 year old was statuary, but she had a husband and didn't tell him her age. That's a tough one to get past a jury.

We have to understand, they were prostitutes, not innocent waifs that he conned into sex. He's not that bright. Gaetz is a sleazeball pervert, but criminal? That'd be hard to prove.

Should have never been elected to Congress, for a lot of reasons.

We keep hearing only about this incident, yet, my sense tells me there have probably been plenty of others afterwards. I suppose federal investigators just don't investigate like they use to. Can't charge for this, but what else has this goober been up to? He didn't all of a sudden go clean. It doesn't work that way.

.... admitted into evidence in a court of law.

That's kind of how investigations work.

And do you actually believe ole Matty led a sainted life after this one incident? No more blow and underaged prostitutes?

... they didn't lead to anything that could be successfully prosecuted in a (federal) court of law.

As detailed in the House report, Matty was certainly no Saint, and will probably will never be one. The DOJ, however, is not in the business of prosecuting sinners. Their job is to prosecute criminals, in accordance with the letter of the law, without a reasonable doubt, and with a moral certitude.

Having investigated, and found the evidence to be wanting, that's the end of it.

Perhaps this will spur others to come forth.
It seems they often do.

I pictured her with Gaetz 's underwear hanging off her outstretched marble hand.

I have spell check, but I could make use of dumb check.

And it would be up to the jury to determine whether or not the "it wasn't for sex, it was for vacation!" excuse was believable -- not the victim. And it would be quite easy to prove that beyond a reasonable doubt when you have numerous other incidents of Gaetz doing the exact same thing.

If Gaetz had been prosecuted by a team that wasn't interested in undermining their own prosecution, I have no doubt he would have been found guilty.

"3. The committee did not find evidence that Gaetz engaged in sex trafficking
While Gaetz was “did cause the transportation of women across state lines for purposes of commercial sex,” according to the report, “the Committee did not find sufficient evidence to conclude that Representative Gaetz violated the federal sex trafficking statute” because the individuals weren’t minors and the sexual activity did not occur through force, fraud or coercion"

But I guess you know more about the matter, somehow?

Let the jury decide.

why'ya' gotta go and be like that?

it should be damaging to Trump. We all knew what happened, the 17 has been talked about forever as has the alleged Mann Act violation and drug use.

But Trump decided Gaetz, with all that baggage, should head the DOJ which is not only over all federal prosecutors but over federal law enforcement. That's the scandal. Trump knowing and not caring.