Sometime yesterday I came across a news story about a man in Lincoln, Nebraska, who was convicted of sexual molestation of a child. What makes his particular story unique, unfortunately, is that the judge in his case, Cheyenne County District Judge Kristine Cecava, sentenced him to probation rather than prison; her rationale was that he was too short to survive a typical prison sentence for the crimes of which he was convicted.
The truncated version: she sentenced a short, convicted child molestor to probation, not prison.
Holy shit.
First, as to whether Mini-Me would survive in prison, I can't say for sure. However, this is not a guy who stole a car from a mall parking lot (well, he might have, but that's not relevant). This guy targeted someone smaller than him, someone, relatively speaking, who was helpless, and violated that person's trust and that person's body. So wouldn't it make some measure of sense to demonstrate to Little Molestor that Could how shitty and wrong it is for bigger people to take advantage of smaller people? There are people who say the death penalty is wrong because killing to demonstrate that killing is wrong doesn't make logical sense; those same people likely would respond to my "teach the little guy a lesson" theory above by suggesting that prison shouldn't be a place for retribution but instead rehabilitation. Well, as they say in France, fuck that. It would be one thing if a guy tried to rob a convenience store, slipped in a Frosty puddle and shot a clerk by mistake. Or the above-referenced stealing a car from a mall parking lot. But this is child molestation we're talking about here; this height-challenged turd cannot really be rehabilitated, from what I understand, unless he is castrated. So if Judge Cecava tied his probation to mandatory castration, I'd not only agree with her sentence but offer to wield the scissors.
MSNBC.com offers up a variety of reactions to this sentence here; I just don't understand, however, how anyone who has any experience or empathy for other human beings could, essentially, mock a molested child and his/her family by such a paltry, almost meaningless sentence. Cecava requires the convict to adhere to several ancillary restrictions and requirements, but when I first read the initial news about this story, I was shocked by this sentence. And while I understand our justice system tries to be human -- even if Justice is blind -- this was yet another example of misguided, foolhardy jurisprudence. And considering there is a little person out there who was abused by this guy and whose abuse will not be properly avenged is, to me, far more repulsive than making things a little too difficult for one short, sick asshole.
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1 comment:
He should have been sent to prison - then he would have seen what it is like to have much larger men accost, molest and rape you - kind of what he did to that poor child...
That judge should be removed from the bench.
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