MASON CITY – A Rockwell man who has had no less than 50 criminal cases brought against him by local law enforcement, one of which resulted in a death of a Mason City teen, has again escaped a potential jail sentence as a result of plea bargaining and a lax sentence by District Court Judge Colleen D. Weiland.
In the latest criminal charge Timothy Charles Cassady, age 37, was charged by Rockwell police with a Class D felony count of 2nd Degree Criminal Mischief for causing $1609.47 in damages to a vehicle he vandalized. The vandalism occurred on May 9th in Rockwell, with Cassady evading law enforcement for weeks before being captured in late May.
As part of a plea agreement between the County Attorney’s Office and Cassady’s public defender the original felony charge of 2nd Degree Criminal Mischief filed by law enforcement was amended on application to an aggravated misdemeanor charge of 3rd Degree Criminal Mischief. 3rd Degree Criminal Mischief according to Iowa Code is reserved for crimes involving less than $1,000 in property damage.
Despite the definitions under Iowa Code, Judge Colleen D. Weiland ordered the charge reduced at a hearing on Thursday, October 8th. At the hearing Cassady entered a voluntary negotiated guilty plea to the reduced charge. Cassady waived his right to wait to be sentenced at a later date.
Judge Colleen D. Weiland then sentenced Cassady to a two year suspended prison sentence and another two years of probation with the Iowa Department of Corrections despite a history of repeated probation violations. Judge Weiland also suspended a minimum $625 fine for the offense, ordering Cassidy to pay restitution to the victim in the amount of $1609.47. Cassady must repay $366 in court costs, lawyer fees, and surcharges in the case.
During court Judge Colleen D. Weiland also dismissed an aggravated misdemeanor count of Driving While Barred Habitual Offender from an arrest by a Cerro Gordo County Sheriff’s deputy in July.
It is unclear rather the victim’s restitution will take precedence to the tens of thousands in unpaid court fines, restitution, lawyer fees, and court costs Cassady has racked up over the last decade.
Cassady is no stranger to the court system and obtaining plea bargains to lessor charges in his 50 plus court cases.
In May of 2002 Cassady, then age 26, bought the liquor Everclear for 17-year-old John Nauss and his 14-year-old younger brother. As a result John Nauss died in drowning in the Winnebago River after consuming the Everclear Timothy Cassady had provided.
In that case Cassady was able to plea bargain the original Class D felony charge of Supplying Alcohol to a Minor Resulting in Death down to a serious misdemeanor count of Supplying Alcohol to a Minor. Then County Attorney Paul Martin recommended a one-year jail sentence for Cassady. Instead Judge James Drew (retained in the Nov 6th elections) denied Martin’s request and imposed a $1500 fine instead. Over a decade later Cassady still owes $5360.75 in the case.
Cassady’s criminal record is far too extensive to cover in one news article. Despite all his criminal activity he was once again allowed to plea bargain to lessor charges and once again receives a suspended prison sentence in a disturbing trend in Cerro Gordo County criminal cases.
SUBJECT IS INNOCENT UNTIL PROVEN GUILTY.
He stupid
This all stems from him having his ex play mind games with him, one minute she wants him the next she with her loser bf j.smith. She messes with his visitation of his son!!!! I’m sorry but your son should be able to spend time with his dad just because you can’t decide who you wanna sleep with today!!! Tim, Amanda is NOT worth all this!!!! She’s by far a skank and a liar. Smith probably did this himself and isn’t fixing his crap up anyways!! Tim, move on and just be done !!!
Charles Bronson died August 30, 2003.
That is the judicial system for you….
Looks like some of you forget the roles each person plays in a typical court case.
Evidence and information does not materialize out of thin air. And it is not the role of the Judge to collect said evidence and information. While they can request it, that role lays with the attorney for either side.
Our legal system does not provide that a case be judged on information not presented, either to the sitting justice, or a jury. If evidence was used to convict a subject, which was not properly presented or taken into consideration, the law provides for a judgement favorable to the defendant or a guaranteed appeal.
Since a plea agreement is the result of negotiations between the two lawyers, and presented to the Judge, the only thing that can be done is to approve or deny it on it’s basis.
I am sure many of you would love to have Kangaroo Courts, until of course your ox is gored, and you are sitting in the defendant’s chair.
In the end isn’t Judge Wieland only approving the plea deal made with these criminals by the County Attorney’s Office?
I would like to see these trouble makers put to work. If they do.Go To jail they sit on their rear end and do nothing but think up new crimes. We need to find something they will hate to do, so they don’t keep doing this stuff”. maybe get the chain gangs going again, in this freezing weather, all day, in the ditches cleaning up trash. maybe they could help some farmer clean up his hog confinement buildings, I hear that is pretty nasty. maybe go north of town and hand dig the big hole the flood water went into, so if it floods again it will hold more water, and we won’t flood!! There must be some kind of dirty, nasty jobs around nobody else wants to do. We need to make it bad enough they won’t want to come back to jail. Maybe only give them bread and water. They have it too easy.
@Interested-the big hole you are talking about is completely flooded. Holcim turned off their pumps when they closed down and that quarry is now under 35 feet of very cold water. Better hope we don’t have another flood because it will have no place to go other than here in town. Also, I agree with you it would be good to put these people to work on a chain gang but every time it is tried the unions raise hell and say they are taking their jobs away. It is bull as they don’t want those jobs anyhow but they raise hell anyway.
If you people are not happy with Judge Weiland, do something about it other then complain on this site. Otherwise, be silent and let her do her job. Remember, there are other areas in the country where she doesn’t have jurisdiction, and you are free to move there any time you wish.
We should move because somebody does not enforce the law?
Problem is she DOES NOT do her job. She is being paid by tax payer funds, and that is who she is responsible to. Public Safety should be her #1 concern, which you can tell it is not!
You must be a criminal that has had the good fortune of being in her court room. As you can tell, the law-abiding, tax paying citizens are fed up with her lax handling of criminals. And, yes, we are trying to do something! Read the posts!!
@a citizen-I voted NO on every District Judge on the ballot. I guess I must have been about the only one. What about you? Telling people to move if they don’t like it is a chicken answer.
@LVS-I suggest you read my comment a little more unemotionally. I told people that if all they were going to do is complain and not do anything about it, then they might consider moving. It’s like the person complaining about the trash can being too full, but not having the discipline to change the bag.
I too voted no to every one of the judges on the ballot. Telling someone to move? Really?
So @citizen are you one of Weiland’s lucky ones who walked away?
Judge Weiland lets repeat offenders go free and those that have one unfortunate mark on their record get hit the hardest.
She needs to be investigated by higher authority.
Maybe a call to the state attorney general’s office and to Governor Branstad is in order.
@citizen-evidently I was not the only one who misinterpeted your comments. If you will read your post again it sure looks like you are defendeing the judge and telling people if you don’t like what she does you can move. How would you expect people to react??
Must be politically demokat tied –
She is by far the worst judge i have ever heard about. Heres a situation, one of these goons that she has sent free breaks into your house, you hear ir get up and grab your shot gun or 45 and place 1 shot into his useless brain. YOU WILL PROLLY GO TO JAIL FOR KILLING THIS JUDGES FRIend, lover or what ever these guys are to her. Hang onto your ass cause shes going to go after you as you are an honest person just trying to protect what you worked for..
You obviously never met one of Mayor Richard J. Daley’s judges.
Its very simple, When Judge wieland comes up for her time, VOTE HER OUT!!!! Really People get with the program
There are 2 ways to get rid of an Iowa judge. First is impeachment by the Iowa House of Representatives and then conviction by the Iowa Senate. The second is for the commission on judicial qualifications to investigate complaints of misconduct and then recommend to the Iowa Supreme Court that the judge be retired, disciplined or removed.
People tried to intervene and help Tim when he was a teen and first got into trouble. A police officer spent personal time to mentor him, but this kid was useless way back then. What a waste. Peer pressure cannot be overcome in some cases.
http://globegazette.com/news/local/man-accused-of-stabbing-out-of-jail/article_f28b6d98-9f8a-11e1-8f58-001a4bcf887a.html
the information on here is slightly wrong as well.. its a 50,000 dollar CASH BOND and 150,000 is surety. can you guess who is responsible for this? apparently weiland works with murderers and thinks it is okay to let someone out of jail that committed premeditated murder for the low price of 50,000 dollars.
No punishment for being involved in the death of a 17 year old. The courts have put people in prison for life for selling drugs, of which I don’t condone, but you can take someones life and get very little time or none at all. There is a difference if you break the law and do time, and learn something from it. But this guy, he has to be a professional criminal, and gets away with it. Where’s Charles Bronson when you need him.
Just found this, answers some questions for sure
http://globegazette.com/news/local/if-you-do-the-crime-will-you-do-the-time/article_3dae5d04-0822-11e1-947f-001cc4c002e0.html
That might answer some questions, but I still don’t buy these answers as applicable to every case that goes through Judge WEILAND’S courtroom. The criminal in this story is a habitual offender. If he hasn’t learned his lesson by now, chances are he never will. This criminal has no incentive to even try to reform himself, as the penalties for his crimes are slap on the wrists.
I think it just comes down to judges who are afraid to enforce for law. Who is the sheriff in Arizona that throws the book at criminals? He seems to be able to enforce the law and he’s not even a judge. I just think as tax-payers of this county, we’re getting screwed for what we are paying these judges to do…protect the tax paying citizens!!!!!
It’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Arizona. He has the right idea. I like how the prisoners have to wear pink!
Thanks for the info. I love Sheriff Joe Arpaio. So, if Sheriff Joe can lay down the law, why can’t our judges!!!
@ An Eye For An Eye..as tax paying citizens, do we have any power to get either one of these processes started? I’m really sick and tired of seeing criminals run scott free. Why is she so lenient with these criminals, what is she afraid of??? If she’s afraid to use the law, then she’s in the wrong job.
Write to your State Representatives and let them know your concerns. Maybe if they get enough letters with information, they will do something. Also complain to the commission on judicial qualifications. It’s their job of investigate complaints.
@An Eye For An Eye…Thanks for the info. I’m going to check into these options. Hopefully, other disgusted tax payers will take action as well. One person won’t be enough. It would be a sad day for the criminals if Weiland was removed from the bench. Maybe this would be a wakeup call to all of the judges, that we are sick of criminals getting away with a slap on the wrist.
Her name should be changed to “Judge Weiland 4 the crooks”
You got that right! Could this judge be any more worthless!!!!
How much does this guy owe for all his cases and why can’t they make him pay or lock him up? Can’t they garnish wages or doesn’t he have a job?
NIT or readers…Do you know if there’s anything we can do as citizens of this county to have the judicial decisions rendered by COLLEEN WEILAND investigated? Are there some type of checks and balances for judges??? She has to go!!!
This judge’s best interest is for the criminal, not for the tax paying citizens who pay her wage. She is a horrible judge!!!!
Welll, on Nov 6th I marked NO on my ballot to retaining any of the judges. Not much else we can do. I had no idea this was going on until NIT started reporting it. I’ll bet most people don’t have a clue how lax our judges are on criminals, so they probably marked yes to retain.
Ever notice the Globe only prints the judges name if they send somebody to prison, but never when they let them off.
I voted NO to retain the judges last week, too. I hope everyone that reads what a lousy job Judge Weiland does of protecting us votes NO to retain her when her seat on the bench comes up.
Ok..Isn’t there anything we can do before her seat comes of for retention??? Do any readers know if there is any legal recourse??
What in the HELL is wrong with these judges and prosecuting attorneys to let a scum bag like this loose again7 What does it take to put people like this away from Society?
To answer your question…..maybe a bullet to the head??
Ridiculous!!!