Former Governor Bob McDonnell and his team are appealing the verdict in the case of “Johnnie Williams did nothing wrong, but McDonnell is guilty anyway.” They have also asked that McDonnell remain free during that process.
Of course, the mountains of character support that led the judge to decide on a mere 24-month sentence when prosecutors had wanted up a decade or more of prison time speaks to why McDonnell should remain free during the process. He certainly is no flight risk, and there were rulings throughout the trial that will be under great scrutiny at the appellate level.
But to me, the most important point is that the shortness of the sentence makes it a denial of McDonnell’s constitutional rights to due process if he spends his period of appeal behind bars.
Attorneys have advised me that federal appeals average nine months to a year in this neck of the woods, and that’s the average. This is no average case. Some appeals last as long as a year and a half.
Federal guidelines to a 24 month sentences knock off up to 54 days a year for good behavior. That’s 20 months of jail time.
If McDonnell is denied bond pending the appeal, he will likely serve over half, if not most, of his sentence even if the appeal succeeds. That’s not due process.
If the sentence was 10 years, I’d probably have a different view about bond for an appeals process that admittedly denies 95% of the appeals that are heard. But it’s not Bob McDonnell’s fault the federal appellate clock moves so slowly.
To make McDonnell serve most of a prison term while his appeal is heard makes a mockery of the appeals process. Any successful appeal will be a hollow victory, since the decision will be changed but the punishment will have mostly been served.
Because to do otherwise would effectively deny McDonnell a true right to an appeal, he should be allowed to remain free on bond until the process concludes.
