To the Editor,

Apparently, our attorney general, Peter Neronha, thinks judges are incapable of deciding the guilt or innocence of defendants who appear before them. Or, he at least thinks that juries made up of laymen without any legal training are more capable of making such weighty decisions.

Neronha's quest to have the General Assembly change RI law to require prosecutors' permission before a defendant can opt for a bench trial, a trial by judge instead of a jury, was stimulated by a judge finding a man not guilty for a "hate crime" that was clearly just an argument between neighbors over a property line.
Neronha, in his quest to become our next governor, sought to boast about getting a jury conviction for a "hate crime" had his prosecutors been allowed to rile up a jury with the kind of venom spewed by today's mob of leftist pitchfork carriers who insist that the First Amendment give way to prosecutions of any protected speech that offends their sensibilities.

Most of us trust a legally trained judge to decide guilt instead of a mob-inspired jury if a defendant chooses that path of justice. Let's not allow Peter Neronha to take that right away from us.

Lonnie Barham,
Warwick