Judges receive letters all the time from defendants who are about to be sentenced, but this letter, seven pages long and neatly handprinted, came from no ordinary prisoner.
“Good day to you, sir,” the letter to the judge began. “I am humbly asking if you could be lenient on me.”
David Karp/Associated Press
Christopher M. Coke
The writer was Christopher M. Coke , described by United States prosecutors as one of Jamaica’s most brutal drug lords. He led a trafficking ring from an armed stronghold in Kingston, moving guns and drugs between Jamaica and the United States, prosecutors said, and his soldiers patrolled the streets and guarded stash houses. He ordered murders, shootings and beatings, and, when one man stole drugs, the prosecutors said, Mr. Coke killed him with a chain saw.
Last year, Mr. Coke was arrested and sent to Manhattan, where he has since pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges. He could receive a 23-year sentence.
And it was in that context that Mr. Coke, 42, took it upon himself to send a polite letter to the judge, Robert P. Patterson Jr. of Federal District Court.
Addressing him as “Justice Patterson,” Mr. Coke said he accepted responsibility for his actions, although he did not apologize in the letter. And he asked that the judge use his “discretion” to sentence him “below the guideline range.”
In doing so, Mr. Coke offered a list of 13 reasons, with some broken into subcategories. For one thing, he said, he had lost his mother recently. “I was told that while she was on her deathbed, she was crying and kept calling my name.”
And his 8-year-old son had been traumatized by his arrest, he said. “I was told that he is constantly asking for his daddy,” Mr. Coke explained, adding “He cries all the times since I am gone.”
Mr. Coke also complained that because he would be deported after serving his sentence, he would leave the country “without the possibility of ever visiting” his brother or other relatives who he said lived here.
Mr. Coke also described “charitable deeds and social services” that he said he had provided to his community, including efforts for the elderly, the unemployed, parents and a “back-to-school treat” for students that included school bags, books, pens, pencils and uniforms.
He had even organized a parent committee, he said, which made sure that children and teenagers were off the streets by 8 p.m., Sunday through Thursday.
Federal prosecutors had no comment on the Sept. 7 letter, which was signed “Sincerely, C. Coke” and mailed from the Metropolitan Correctional Center, where Mr. Coke is being held. His lawyers said he wrote the letter without their assistance. One, Frank A. Doddato, said the letter “humanized” his client. The other, Stephen H. Rosen, said: “There are two sides to Christopher Coke. Everyone only talks about one side.”
Of course, Judge Patterson will hear about the other side, from prosecutors and victims. At least one victim has already written. Maxine Riley, who described herself as a resident of the western Kingston area, asked the judge to impose a life sentence.
She contended that Mr. Coke was personally responsible for the deaths of hundreds of Jamaicans, including her son, Dexter, who she said was killed by Mr. Coke’s gunmen when he was 16.
“I hope that you exercise your judicial discretion to put him away forever,” she wrote. “Mr. Coke is the Hitler of the Caribbean; this is an opportunity for him and his murderous organization to be permanently dismantled.”
A defendant’s decision to write to a judge can backfire, but such letters can also be effective.
Mark S. Dreier, a former prominent lawyer who pleaded guilty in a fraud scheme in 2009, sent a four-page, single-spaced letter to the judge, Jed S. Rakoff, calling his own crimes “inexcusable” and saying he expected and deserved a significant prison sentence. Judge Rakoff cited the letter at the sentencing, saying it reflected “a maturity that I was surprised to see.” Prosecutors had asked for 145 years; Mr. Dreier, then 59, was given 20 years. “In my view,” his lawyer Gerald L. Shargel, recalled, the letter “had a significant effect on the outcome.”
Douglas A. Berman , a sentencing law expert at Ohio State University, said there was debate among legal scholars about how much weight judges should give to a defendant’s comments before sentencing.
“Most defense attorneys, I think, would view this kind of correspondence, if done effectively, as a kind of sentencing chicken soup,” he said. “We’re not sure if it’s going to help, but it certainly can’t hurt.
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