Utah Sen. Mike Lee was a federal prosecutor when he first heard about Weldon Angelos.
Angelos, a 23-year-old music producer and father of three young children, was arrested in Utah in 2002 for selling dime bags of marijuana to a police informant while carrying a gun. He was sentenced to 55 years in prison.
Judge Paul Cassell wrote a blistering opinion disagreeing with the harsh sentence he was forced to impose: “The court believes that to sentence Mr. Angelos to prison for the rest of his life is unjust, cruel and even irrational. It is far in excess of the sentence imposed for such serious crimes as aircraft hijacking, second-degree murder, espionage, kidnapping, aggravated assault, and rape.”
The judge said something else: “Only Congress can fix this problem.”
At www.deseretnews.com
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