So I went in front of the judge, and I had my St. Jude prayer book in my pocket and my St. Jude medal. And I'm standing there and that judge said I was found guilty, so he sentenced me to what the law prescribed: one to 14 years.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
I just spent 11 and a half months in a maximum-security jail, got shot five times, and was wrongly convicted of a crime I didn't commit.
My argument is not that I shouldn't have been punished, but that the punishment didn't fit the crime.
I was arrested in September 2011 and detained for nine months before I was found guilty in June 2012 under Ethiopia's overly broad Anti-Terrorism Proclamation, which ostensibly covers the 'planning, preparation, conspiracy, incitement and attempt' of terrorist acts.
I've been in jail a couple times. I've been caught shoplifting.
I was arrested three times and tortured once.
You have had indeed a fair trial. It is a shocking thing when a judge of your high office is shown to have betrayed the truth and his honor, and I sentence you to the penitentiary.
I was falsely arrested twice, slandered and defamed.
You never know when you lose a case whether it was because the facts were against you, or because the judges had already made up their minds, or if you could have done something differently.
I have done prison time for 13 years without any conviction.
Prosecution I have managed to avoid; but I have been arrested, charged in a police court, have refused to be bound over, and thereupon have been unconditionally released - to my great regret; for I have always wanted to know what going to prison was like.