And takes much criticism as a result, of course. Pretty shocking story, even to me. I can’t stand Lynne Abraham, she was a stain on the city’s reputation and I’m glad she’s gone:
“There’s an enormous inequity in a system that permits a police officer’s testimony to be unassailed and have absolutely no repercussions,” he warned. “No one man’s testimony should be elevated by any status in his life. It’s a charge we give regularly to our juries.”
Betts was not the first officer to have his testimony called into question by Rau. After taking the bench in 2001, she quickly became, the Inquirer reported, “one of Philadelphia’s most controversial judges — developing a reputation for refusing to believe sworn testimony from police officers and for throwing out key evidence.” It’s a reputation that’s rare among city judges.
District Attorney Lynne Abraham’s office, according to media reports, began to collect a “dossier” on her objectionable rulings. In 2002, she criticized Rau’s conduct as “horrible” and “grotesque,” accusing her of having an “institutional bias against police officers” and for handing out lenient sentences.
In one case, Abraham contended that Rau had not sufficiently explained her decision to suppress evidence of a handgun allegedly seized from a 23-year-old West Oak Lane man. But the two officers’ accounts of the incident differed, and Rau questioned their credibility.
“Judge Rau and others, they show no safe haven for any citizen in the city,” Abraham told the Daily News. “Sometimes the only thing to do to get them to do the right thing is to embarrass them.”
Critics say that Abraham wanted to instill fear in judges like Rau who dared to cross her and question police.
