Comments about ‘Activist's 'necessity' defense may get the boot’

I can't believe this guy's lawyers are actually seriously arguing a "necessity" defense. Is it necessity that Bernie Madoff absconded with billions of others' people money? Is it necessity that drives drug addicted people to lie, cheat and steal to get their fix? Where does this slippery slope end? If this succeeds, then it will completely undermine the criminal justice system and politicize the courts based on environmental ideology. It's an abuse of the court system and process, just like their client did. The ends do NOT justify the means. The guy planned and intentionally broke the law, and he should pay for that crime.

I suppose one could steal a car and wreck it. Same defence.

They should make this guy pay the $1.7 million from his own money. And cover the costs of the court. He has wasted more resources than what he claims to be protecting.

. . . at issue here is the necessity of stopping this kind of domestic terrorism.

This gentleman proudly claims he knowingly chose to commit his crime. Now he should proudly welcome the consequences.

Anything else is weasly cowardice.

The "court ruled that "direct" harm to the defendant must be proven, not theoretical or future harm".
So ol Tim and his lawyers can't prove that the leases would do harm to the enviroment or add to Global Warming because......???

Because they do not exist!!! Its all just a theory!

Enjoy Jail Tim.....see ya!!!

The judge should ban his access to any power source,and modern mode of transportation. He must walk everywhere, no matter the weather. Also he would be restricted to eating cold veggies/fruit only, fires are naughty! He is like the man eating a fine meal, and then complaining about other people wanting to live well also. Arrogant snobs, these socialists!

Utah should be ashamed at it's dismally educated public when it comes to constitutional issues and the courts.

"I can't believe this guy's lawyers are actually seriously arguing a "necessity" defense." Who went to law school?

We have a constitutional presumption of innocence. You have a right to a deference and your day in court. It's a long road from using a defense in court and having the court accept it.

In my opinion, this is a very weak defense because the courts don't like establishing precedences like necessity.

Only Utahan, who whine about the cost of government sees spending $200,000 to prosecute this and $45,00 a year for imprisonment as a good deal. There's little cost to benefit here. This case should have been plead out.

In a Utah known as America's Fraud Capital, this is a small fish to fry.

In Utah you can steal off government land and never out to prison. The double standard is an Utah cultural icon.

It's Utah. Obama should pardon him. Like making new national monuments, what does Obama have to loose from Utahans? They won't like him.

When it comes to civil disobedience in Utah, there is clearly an unfair double standard. A college student disrupts a rushed oil and gas lease auction (where BLM failed to pre-qualify bidders), and he faces two felony counts. A hundred or more people near Kanab openly violate a recent federal court ruling and a proper BLM route closure decision to brazenly drive off-road vehicles up the Paria River in the Grand Staircase Escalante National Monument, and no enforcement action of any kind is taken against any of these riders (including the protest event organizers). Given this double standard, I guess there are only consequences to civil disobedience in Utah for those who actually care about the environment.

This is a clear case of civil disobedience being done to justify an unproven agenda. The same thing being done in the name of global warming. The books and data are being doctored and changed in the name of the unknown CO2 god in order to convince the world that something is happening that really isn't happening, namely climate change due to CO2. The greatest hoax I have ever witnessed in my life time. A great example is seen in Gore's lying "An Inconvenient Truth", and the great hockey stick lie. It can be shown that environmentalists will go to any length, including civil disobedience, including fudging the data, to promote their great lie.

If you don't think your cause is worth going to jail for then don't commit civil disobedience. Do your jail time like a saint or stop pretending to be one.

Where did this nutcase go to school?