There has been some conversation about prosecutorial vindictiveness in Ravalli County in your paper and in the courts. Anyone who has been awake during the last several years knows that it is alive and well, whether or not it reaches the “legal” level. What happened to Christ would probably not even meet the “legal” level in Montana because the law was put in place to protect prosecutors and judges.
In the December 13th issue of the Ravalli Republic, there is more strong evidence that that paper goes along with the vindictiveness, working hard to make it look like a person was involved in much worse crime than what was true. (I have seen this happen many times before). On reporting on the arrest of Jeb Bryant and his extradition they wrote: “His partner and fellow pastor, Hamilton Pastor Harris Himes, was convicted in 2013 on felony securities fraud charges that involved them bilking their fellow Christian.”
The fact is, Harris Himes defended himself in the jury trial of September 2013. The jury acquitted Himes of all the counts that could be considered “bilking” and one of the counts of fraudulent practices was reversed on appeal and dismissed. He was convicted of failure to register as a salesperson and failure to register a security. That is all. In other words, he is not guilty of any “bilking” but only licensing laws. He spent time in jail and has refunded over half of the money which was given to Bryant for construction work in Mexico.
It would be good to see the news media become more responsible in their reporting. I wrote a letter to the editor of the Ravalli Republic right after the vindictive article came out, and tried to lay out the truth as I am doing here. They refused to print the letter to even though I reminded them about it several times.
It is one thing to see prosecutorial vindictiveness and another when the media joins in. Their fake news is harmful but they don’t seem to care and they don’t seem to want to right wrongs.
Dallas D. Erickson
Stevensville