There’s a lot to say about the ruling itself, and we’ll get to that. But the upshot is this: the judge ruled against Jake. He’ll stay in prison, definitely for at least another year, possibly for the rest of his life.
I’m going to skip a thorough recap here because the backstory is long and complicated, and if you’re listening to this update, you probably already know it. If you haven’t listened to Violation, or our last update, please go back and listen to those first or this update won’t make much sense.
But, long story short, Jake was waiting on a Maricopa Superior Court judge to rule on his second special action — which, because you can’t technically appeal a parole board’s decision, is a sort of sideways way to argue before a judge that the board’s actions were unfair.
This time around, he was arguing that his second parole revocation hearing, which was ordered by a different judge in 2019, had been just as unfair as his first. Last year, Jake filed another special action, arguing that the second hearing had also been unfair, and actually the whole process raised red flags. Jake and his lawyers used that phrase, red flags. “The evidence shows” — and I’m quoting here — that the Arizona corrections department “was actively searching for a reason to violate Wideman” — that means to revoke his parole — “and suggests it may have even deliberately orchestrated the violation.” The oral arguments for that second special action were held in August, and that’s when we brought you our last update. (sound from hearing)
Remember we told you that, broadly, the judge had three options? The first was to release Jake altogether. Jake and his lawyers knew this was a long shot, but they made the argument anyway. They said that when it comes to Jake’s case, the parole board has acted in a way that’s quote, “arbitrary and capricious” and “vindictive” and that because they can’t be trusted to be fair, the judge should take the decision making out of their hands and just reinstate his parole and release him.
The judge’s second option was to order a second do-over of Jake’s parole revocation hearing, with or without some additional guidance or guardrails. This is the outcome Jake thought he had a real chance of getting.
The judge’s third option — the worst-case scenario as far as Jake was concerned — the one he says he didn’t even spend much time thinking about, because he didn’t even think it was possible for the judge to find that he’d been treated fairly under the law. Judge Mark Brain chose that third option. He said that Wideman “failed to demonstrate a basis for relief.” The entire decision, header and all, was two-and-a-half pages. Just as a point of comparison, the first judge’s ruling on Jake’s last special action was 16 pages.
Daniel Medwed: The brevity of this opinion was a little bit like an emphatic period at the end of a sentence. Reading this made me feel as though the court was signaling enough is enough. Daniel Medwed is a professor of criminal law at Northeastern Law School. He has no connection to this case but I asked him to read the judge’s ruling and some of the related documents. Jake’s legal arguments to Judge Brain were 87 pages, the board’s reply was 101 pages with appendices, plus the parties went back and forth in additional dozens of pages about whether the transcript of the revocation hearing was reliable and accurate — all of which is to say, there were a lot of complex legal arguments to consider.
But Judge Brain agreed with the Board that the reasons they had provided to support the idea that Jake was returning to “criminal ways” were good enough. In fact, at the hearing in August, it was almost as if he invited the board’s lawyer — her name is Kelly Gillian-Gibson — to explain why they were good enough.
Dr. McCain is that therapist who Jake was supposed to make an appointment with. And so, Jake and his attorneys are back to square one. Except for the nine months he was out on home arrest, he’s now been behind bars for 37 years — and he has very few avenues out.