Editing 76-03-A6 (section)

=== Transcript ===
Congress, in its desire to solve a problem, sometimes passes bills that create new problems. I'll be right back.

A basic principle of our system of criminal justice is that a defendant has a right to a speedy trial. As crime rates have gone up, court calendars have become more crowded. In some parts of the country, it may take months for a case to come to trial. So, Congress passed the Speedy Trial Act which requires that a defendant in a federal court must be released from custody if he has not been brought to trial within 90 days of his arrest.

Sounds reasonable, and in most cases it is. But there are exceptions that can cause serious problems. Chief Justice Warren Burger explained it this way in a recent speech: "A bill which emerged as the Speedy Trial Act was introduced some years ago, and on every occasion it was submitted to the Judicial Conference of the United States it was unanimously disapproved. Of course, that was not because speedy trials were disapproved (of), but because we had already developed our own speedy trial rule (Rule 50 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure) .....

"We opposed the legislation," he continued, "because we were apprehensive that the rigidities it contained would lead to unfortunate consequences, particularly in those cases that, by their nature, do not lend themselves to trial in 90 or even 180 days or into any such inflexible patterns. It does not seem unreasonable to me that judges should be thought to be as capable of drafting sound rules of management as the Congress is capable of making rules for its internal affairs and procedures ... "

"The bill became law, and even with the deferral of the effective dates of some of its provisions, the cost to date has been about $5 million . .... One specific, concrete example of what we feared has now come to pass, and it is worth noting." --UNQUOTE

It certainly is worth noting. It is the case of United States versus Tirasso, involving two foreign nationals who had been arrested and indicted for attempting to smuggle drugs into the U.S. They were not brought to trial within 90 days and, when the federal district court refused to release them, they went to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals to invoke the Speedy Trial Act. The court had no choice but to let them go. I quote from its ruling:

"We are fully aware of the dangers inherent in today's decision. The charges against these defendants are serious. We are not dealing with a haphazard attempt by amateurs to run the border with a small quantity of controlled substance, but rather with a sophisticated enterprise for importing wholesale quantities of dangerous drugs ... the value of the 20 kilogram shipment alleged in the indictment was estimated between 500 and 600 thousand dollars. The government's case ... alleges a series of six such transactions involving these two appellants. (One) has been identified as the head of a huge organization responsible for sending large quantities of cocaine into the
United States.'.....

"In light of these facts, the wisdom of the result Congress has decreed is questionable. We release a man alleged to be the head of a foreign criminal organization dedicated to the smuggling of large quantities of illegal drugs, so that he may quickly cross the border and resume operating his business. We are also releasing his alleged right-hand man, as if to make certain that the enterprise continues to operate at top efficiency . But this result is the only one open to us under the plain terms of the statute."--UNQUOTE

The court's prediction came true. One day after he was released, the principal defendant fled across the border to Mexico. It's time that Congress took another look--thorough look--at its Speedy Trial Act.

This is Ronald Reagan.

Thanks for listening.

</TD>
<TD WIDTH="10%" ROWSPAN="2">&nbsp;</TD>
<TD VALIGN="TOP" HEIGHT="250">