After serving more than five years for the VCR offense, a federal judge released Ramirez in 2002 under reasoning the appeals court affirmed Monday.

The reporter probably wrote: "After serving more than five years for the VCR offense, Ramirez was released by a federal judge in 2002 under reasoning the appeals court affirmed Monday." But some editor tsk-tsked the use of the passive, and it was changed. Whenever somebody deprecates the usa of the passive, I wonder aloud how come so many languages developed one in the first place? Now ergative languages have an anti-passive. Cool.