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In Alan Dershowitz's novel Chutzpah, he devotes an entire section to the
issue of, and his personal feelings about James Pollard. He begins this section
with a description of the way in which this man was caught selling classified
government documents to the nation of Israel. Basically this man was a Jewish
American spy for the Israeli government because of a duty he felt stemming from
a secret loyalty he felt toward the nation of Israel.
Over an extended period of
time this man sold thousand of secret documents which in the eyes of Weinberger,
the Secretary of Defense for the United States was a Òserious breech in national
security.Ó Dershowitz emphasizes in great detail how in order to avoid a trial
in which the declassification of these documents would be required, Pollard was
pressured to accept a plea bargain in which he would plead guilty, give full
disclosure pertaining to the information he handed over, and release all rights
to any of his future published material that pertained to the case. In exchange
for these things he would be granted a formal request by the US government to
the judge of the case which would call for a restricted sentence for him and his
wife. Pollard agreed to this deal and was satisfied with it until he received a
sentence of life in a maximum security prison and his wife received 5 years in
prison. The evidence that Dershowitz presents suggests that Pollard did get an
unfair deal, and a much harsher sentence than others in the past have received
for similar crimes. Dershowitz stated in no uncertain terms that in his opinion
the reason for for this discrepancy in the sentencing process has to do with the
fact that Pollard is a Jewish man who betrayed America for Israel. He states: I
am convinced that if Pollard were a non-Jew who had spied for a non-Jewish
country, he would not be in prison today.Ó Dershowitz finds fault in the way
PollardÕs lawyers handled the case.
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