Man sentenced to 20 years for pictures on phone and inappropriately touching child

But the unusual thing was the "new evidence" did not actually have to do with anything directly tied to the crime scene; it had to do with further insight into the suspect's character, guessing at what his intent and motivations in the past may have been.

You don't see any possible problem with guessing at a person's intent based on physical evidence discovered 5 years later that is not directly even connected to that same earlier crime?

For all we know, there might be a small chance that his behavior towards that girl on that day really wasn't actually really sexually motivated, but now everyone just assumes it was.

 

Not really. Most people agree with me. Given that justice is a social construct rather than a natural law, I'd say it's you who are mistaken.

 

That is probably true, but most people are very wrong.
This is an injustice.

It's sad human nature is so emotional and unable to always view every type of thing purely logically.

The punishment should not exceed the severity of the actual crime.

It seems this suspect is being put in prison so long mostly because of what he MIGHT have done or MIGHT do, not what we know he did.

 

No, I am saying that he pleaded guilty to fondling the little girl and apologized for it. While the US justice system is less than perfect, the basic idea behind it is that it is better to let some of the guilty go free than to convict the innocent. He had a free lawyer if he wanted one. Absent compelling evidence or actual guilt, I can't imagine why he would plead guilty to a crime he didn't do.

Your logic seems to want it both ways: "He didn't do it, and even if he did, it wasn't that bad." You are trying to make a defense that asserts he both did a thing and did not, that admits what he did was a crime (for which there are established penalties) and claims factors in mitigation that are based only on your feelings, not actual facts.

 

I'm saying there are different levels of fondling, some of them much worse than others.

Did he apologize before the judge handed down the sentence?
You do realize that many times defendants apologize to try to get a less severe sentence. That often goes down better than trying to minimize what you did, when you have done something wrong.

I bet there are even a few defendants who have apologized for something they did not do. Knowing they would be found guilty either way, and so their best chance at less prison time was to take responsibility and apologize for something they didn't do.

 

He was present in both places. His intent is really irrelevant; he touched a little girl's groin and wouldn't stop when asked. Then he removed her means of escape. It can be safely assumed that the removal was done in preparation for further assaults.

No, actually I don't. Not when the evidence fits a general pattern of behavior. Face it, the guy was a pedophile. His treatment of the girl is evidence he was beginning to escalate his behavior. He needed to be stopped.

Given that he's a pedo, I would say the burden of proof is now on him. And rightly.

 

Don't take part of a quote and present it as the whole thing. I also said that justice is a social construct. That would mean that society-at-large decides what is just and what is not. The fact that most people agree with me means that most people- meaning most of society- is right. Which means you are wrong.

 

Think about it. You touched a girl inappropriately, but it wasn't too bad, or in too bad of a way. But everyone thinks you're a monster, and if you try to tell them how what you did wasn't as bad as they are imagining, they will not believe you.
So your best chance at trying to spend less time in prison is to act like they are right and profusely apologize for it. Apologize as if you had done something much worse than you actually did.

That is why an apology is not necessarily an indicator of level of guilt.

Just like some defendants are pushed into pleading guilty when they are not guilty, or some people voluntarily pay out settlements in lawsuits when they were not actually responsible and should not have had to pay.

 

The pool was surrounded by witnesses.
No actual blatant assaults out in the open would have been possible. You're being unrealistic.

 

Given that he was looking at 90+ years, I'd say if it was a ploy, it was successful. Which of course would call his apology to the victims of his kiddie porn collection into question and justify a longer sentence on those charges. Face it, your not going to win here. your facts are bad. No one feels much mercy toward a pedophile who may be preying on little girls.

 

That is true, but I don't see anything that he actually did which deserves 20 years in prison.

There is no evidence of rape or attempted rape.

 

Your main problem here is that he didn't stop and took steps to continue with the assault.

Fact: this guy had kiddie porn on his device.
Fact: this guy assaulted a young girl. Touching her there was an assault. Period. She didn't like or want that. Given that the evidence in the above fact points to him being a big time pedo, I'd say it's up to him to disprove the allegation.
Fact: this guy was punished for the above two facts in accordance with the laws of the society in which he lived. He's got no right to complain.

 

No, that is already explained.

It seems like you're just using loaded words to try to win this argument.

 

Do the sum of two crimes add up to greater than each of the parts?

I think we all know if two separate people had been punished for each of those crimes, the two sentences would not have added up to 20 years.

 

He is not being punished for rape or attempted rape. He is being punished for what he did. He is being punished in accordance with the law. All he had to do was exercise some self control and none of this would have happened to him. He didn't. And so we come to this sorry pass, for him, his family, and his victims.

 

Not to my satisfaction.

Which word is loaded? Young? Girl? Are they false to fact? By the way, I won this argument before we started. He's in prison.

 

It seems awfully harsh, considering what he actually did.

I just simply do not see a very strong connection between his crimes and any tangible damages being caused or actual harm done.

 

No, they would have added up to more. The judge was actually pretty lenient in my opinion. Certainly had two people divided the pictures between them and they assaulted the girl together, they'd be looking at huge time, I'd guess more than twenty years each. Guilt is not diluted by being shared.

 

If your issue is with the law, try to change the law. Good luck with that. Society sets the law. When you form your own society, you get to say what the rules will be. For now, you live in this one. We protect our children. Through them we pass on the ideas that make up our society. When those ideas stop working in our favor, we change the ideas. Sometimes that change is through violence, like the way the Civil War freed the slaves. Usually it is more peaceful as in the way same sex marriage came to be.

In any case, unless your brave new world adequately protects its kids, your community is doomed to failure.

 

He threatened society at its base: protection of children. That simple.

 

The law allows a huge amount of discretion to judges in setting the sentences and level of punishment.
The law doesn't do a very good job of telling judges what to do in specific situations. Usually judges get it right, but in some types of situations, like this one, there is a high probability of an unjust outcome.

We as a society haven't really come up with a good way of tailoring laws for very specific types of situations, so oftentimes one judge just has to use their best judgement.

 

If a person did something very despicable, that deserved to be punished with 10 years, but instead they were punished with 20 years in prison, would anyone care? Probably very few people would have any sympathy for that person.

Black & White mentality. That's human psychology. This guy is "evil", so we don't really care whether he is punished with 8 years or 30 years.

Guess that's just how society goes. It is not justice, but human apathy is part of the equation.

 

Not harsh at all

it MAY have been and a case could be made about accidental touch during playBUT HE TEMOVED HER MEANS OF ESCAPE

That shows intent

I also remover a certain thread about the raped 11 year old in Argentina who was asking for an abortion. Your responses then were not exactly condemning of the man who raped her

 

Paedophiles tend to get given long sentences

 

Because that was not the issue in question.