Re: Extra extra read all about it...Dwight not goi

Posted By: willie survive
Date: Thursday, 29 May 2003, at 4:26 p.m.

In Response To: Outwitted Again (pharonic)

Extra extra read all about it...Dwight not going to sentencing

Just prolong the pain ...dwight is still in jail...

Sent to me from a friend

Posted on Thu, May. 29, 2003 From the macom telegraph

Sentencing delayed in York case
By Rob Peecher
Telegraph Staff Writer

Cult leader Malachi York, who was scheduled to be sentenced today in
federal court after admitting in January to molesting 13 children of
his followers, has been granted a two-week continuance, his attorney
said.

York is the leader of the United Nuwaubian Nation of Moors, a mostly
black quasi-religious sect based on a 476-acre compound in Putnam
County.

Attorney Ed Garland declined to comment Wednesday on why he had
asked for a continuance after York signed a plea agreement with
federal authorities that would have sent him to prison for 15 years.

"I have asked for a two-week continuance to determine where things
stand," Garland said. "That's about all I'm going to say right now."

U.S. Attorney Max Wood also declined to comment on why Garland asked
for a continuance the day before York was to be sentenced by U.S.
District Court Judge Hugh Lawson.

"I'm not at liberty to comment on anything right now," Wood said.

In January, York pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of
transporting children across state lines for sexual purposes and one
count of attempting to evade financial reporting requirements.

The next day, he pleaded guilty in Putnam County to 77 state
charges - 40 counts of aggravated child molestation, 34 counts of
child molestation, one count of child exploitation and two counts of
influencing a witness. He confessed to molesting 13 boys and girls
who were among his followers.

York pleaded guilty within days of when his trial on the state
charges was to begin.

Though a defendant can withdraw a guilty plea at any time before
sentencing under Georgia law, a defendant who pleads guilty in
federal court is typically bound to that plea agreement. If a
federal judge refuses to accept the plea agreement, the defendant
can withdraw the guilty plea.

Under York's plea agreement, he is to serve 15 years in federal
prison and 14 years in confinement for the state charges, to run
concurrent with the federal prison time. The state sentence, though,
requires him to serve an additional 36 years on probation as a sex
offender and banishes him during the time of his probation from the
eight-county Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit, which includes Putnam
County, and from the two-county Alcovy Judicial Circuit, where the
trial was to be held.

Ocmulgee Judicial Circuit District Attorney Fred Bright said if
Wednesday's continuance suggests there is a problem with the federal
plea agreement, the state plea still stands unless York decides to
withdraw the plea agreement.

"We fully intend to stick to our word in this agreement," Bright
said. "For some reason, the federal sentencing hearing has been
continued. Because the state sentence was to run concurrent with the
federal sentence, and he still has not been sentenced in federal
court yet, our sentencing hearing has also been continued."

York was to be sentenced Friday on the state charges.

Typically, there are three reasons a federal judge might refuse to
accept a plea agreement. The judge might decide he or she needs more
information based on a pre-sentence investigation. If a defendant
was indicted on a multi-count indictment but a plea agreement
dropped some of the charges, the judge might decide the counts
should not have been dropped. Or, a judge may take issue with the
punishment and reject the agreement.

York founded the Nuwaubian Nation in the early 1970s in New York
City. The group was then known as the Nubian Islamic Hebrews and was
an Islamic sect. In the 1980s, the group moved its base from the
Bushwick Avenue neighborhood in Brooklyn to a camp outside Liberty,
N.Y., in the Catskill Mountains. In 1993, York and his followers
moved to Putnam County, where York claimed to be from the
planet "Rizq."

Beginning in 1998, the Nuwaubians and Putnam County officials were
engaged in a public battle about county zoning requirements. The
Nuwaubians erected Egyptian-style statues and pyramids on the
compound, often without any building permits. The county sued York
and some of his followers about the illegal building.

In May 2002, after a lengthy investigation into allegations that
York was molesting children on the compound, the Putnam County
Sheriff's Office and FBI agents arrested York while he was at a
grocery store in Milledgeville and then raided the group's compound.

Messages In This Thread

Outwitted Again
pharonic -- Thursday, 29 May 2003, at 3:28 p.m.

Re: Extra extra read all about it...Dwight not goi
willie survive -- Thursday, 29 May 2003, at 4:26 p.m.

Re: Outwitted Again
Isis1 -- Tuesday, 3 June 2003, at 11:14 p.m.

Re: Outwitted Again
pharonic -- Tuesday, 3 June 2003, at 11:55 p.m.