Posted on 08/27/2013 11:58:51 PM PDT by servo1969
A judges conclusion that a 14-year-old Billings rape victim was as much in control of the situation as her schoolteacher rapist has sparked outrage across the nation.
Organizers have scheduled a Thursday rally and a petition drive against District Judge G. Todd Baugh, who Monday handed down a net sentence of 30 days in jail to former Senior High teacher Stacey Rambold, 54, who raped 14-year-old Cherice Moralez.
The sentence came after Rambold, 54, failed to meet sex offender treatment requirements and other conditions that would have ended the now six-year-old case.
Moralez killed herself weeks before her 17th birthday as her sexual relationship with Rambold became a criminal case.
Under state law, children younger than 16 cannot consent to sexual intercourse, which makes Rambolds crime felony rape.
However, when issuing the sentence Baugh said Moralez not only had equal control of the rape, but was also a troubled youth older than her chronological age. The remark sparked outrage, first from Moralez mother, Auliea Hanlon, and then from people calling for the judge to at least be censured.
Hanlon left the court screaming You people suck. The mother blames Rambold for Moralez suicide and told the court the former teacher belonged in prison.
Tuesday, Hanlon said in a written statement that she no longer believes in justice after Baughs remarks and sentence order.
As I looked on in disbelief, Judge Baugh stated that our teenage daughter was as much in control of the situation as her teacher was, Hanlon said. She wasnt even old enough to get a drivers license. But Judge Baugh, who never met our daughter, justified the paltry sentence saying she was older than her chronological age.
I guess somehow it makes a rape more acceptable if you blame the victim, even if she was only 14.
Public objection to Baughs remarks has prompted a protest planned for 12:15 p.m. Thursday at Veterans Memorial Park, which adjoins Yellowstone County Courthouse in downtown Billings. The story was recirculated on the Internet and drew comments on the websites of several national news publications.
Something is not right with our system when a judge can make that kind of decision, said Marian Bradley of the Montana National Organization for Women. Unless we show our outrage, none of our children are safe and no one will think of us. I think the judge needs to be reviewed and he needs to be sanctioned.
Bradley, who has worked with the victims of sexual assault, will circulate a petition calling for the state to investigate Baughs sentence, which county prosecutors Tuesday told the Associated Press was within statutory guidelines.
Protest organizer Sheena Rice said the suggestion that any 14-year-old child was on equal footing with a rapist in his 40s, let alone a person of authority, like a schoolteacher, was outrageous.
What angered me is that the judge said the victim was older than her chronological age, Rice said. I dont care if she wore makeup. I dont care if she dressed provocatively. She was a 14-year-old and he was in a position of power.
As a victim of rape, Rice said she thinks its strange that the justice system would have mandatory sentences for drug crimes, but that a rape conviction could involve a month in jail.
On Tuesday, Baugh stood by his comments that Moralez was a troubled youth who was older than her age when it came to sexual matters. That didnt make Rambolds sex with Moralez any less of a crime, he said.
Obviously, a 14-year-old cant consent. I think that people have in mind that this was some violent, forcible, horrible rape, Baugh said. It was horrible enough as it is just given her age, but it wasnt this forcible beat-up rape.
Baugh said Moralezs death complicated the county attorneys ability to prosecute Rambold. After Moralezs suicide, the prosecution and defense reached an agreement that Rambold would enter sexual-offender treatment. If the former teacher completed treatment and complied with other conditions, the case would have been closed.
But Rambold broke terms of the agreement by associating with teens who were his relatives and by becoming sexually involved with an adult, but not notifying authorities.
I think what people are seeing is a sentence for rape of 30 days. Obviously on the face of it, if you look at it that way, its crazy, Baugh said. No wonder people are upset. Id be upset, too, if that happened.
Judge G. Todd Baugh [idiot, fool, jerk, pr!ck, coot, moron, twit, dipstick, d!ckhead, schmuck, dork, dolt, halfwit, putz, dumb-ass, gobshite, dotard, f*ckwit, numbskull]
Provocatively?
It takes a bit of shopping around to keep your teenager looking demure. The clothes just aren't on the rack. Even the 'child stars' on TV are often dressed like tramps.
Bottom line is that the teacher is an adult, and should be old (mature) enough to refrain from abusing his position. Just say "no" and all that...
I figure the judge was hoping the teacher would give him a few leads....(yuck!)
I disagree. It is not the judicial system that is broken it is this judge and our educational system that is broken.
This judge has been so poorly educated in the basis of law, the application of law and the moral foundations of law that it made possible such a travesty of justice to be handed down from his bench.
I believe we can expect more of the same from our judges in the future. But it is not the system of justice that is broken. Our founders built on a foundation of British common law the best system of justice in the world. But Liberal Socialist have infiltrated the Law colleges of this country and are systematically destroying our law by subverting our up and coming lawyers.
Judges have from the beginning of judicial courts been given latitude over sentencing so that miscarriages of justice could be prevented. For example as when the father of a teenage girl kills his daughters rapist in a fit of uncontrollable rage he might that father might be given a suspended sentence.
But this judge abuses that power in essentially freeing the rapist while stating with out evidence that the child was as much in control of the relation ship as a man more than 3 times her age.
This judge is not worthy to be on the bench of a traffic court.
Your words are probably truer than you think. We live in a sick society where the whole LGBT crowd is just a step a way from pedophilia being accepted as “normal”. You have to wonder how low society can go and I don’t think we’re anywhere near bottom.
Methinks Judge Baugh has some skeletons in his own closet.
His remarks are legally without foundation or defense, and he needs to be removed from the bench.
His remarks reek of a dangerous untreated pathology
BTW,he's the grandson of NFL Hall of Fame QB Slingin' Sammy Baugh..
Is it any wonder these adult/child encounters are becoming more commonplace? It's by design!
Yes, the communists set a goal to promote loose sexual more in the '60s have worked on it through today (they or their students).
100 years ago both the rapist and this judge would have been hung with the same rope to save money.
I despise this judge’s sentence for the adult rapist.
I see the problem being that some States only allow juries to decide on guilt, letting the judges then set the sentences. In most of those States, the judges are liberal.
I prefer the system in Texas where, after deciding guilt, the JURY determines the punishment; not some dumb-ass judge. The jury here knows the facts and is given the range of possible sentences, within the law, and usually does the right thing in setting the punishment.
Judges should only sit at court to ensure that procedures of law are followed during the trials.
Instead of taking advantage of an opportunity to mentor and help out a kid, the SOB just took advantage.
Any adult who touched my kid (grand, great-grand, niece or nephew) had better pray for a long jail term.
Those funny “educators” are at it again.
I was on a jury in Texas that sentenced a 21 year old mother to 11 years to prevent a judge from probating the sentence just because it was a first offense. If a man had committed the same aggravating actions, we probably would have sentenced him to 20 or more years.
our culture is a toilet and our children and young people reflect if perfectly....
this rapist and this judge should be sitting side by side in the federal prison IMO....I hope the mother sues the pants literally and figuratively off this rapist.....pathetic loser that he is...
You perhaps remember the story about the boy who goes to confession in the long ago days, and confesses to fornication.
The priest tells him that he has to tell who the other person was to make a complete confession. The boy refuses.
“Was it Mary Mahoney?”
“No Father.”
“Was it Susan Siren?”
“No Father.”
“Was it Ester Hanrahan?”
“No Father, I won’t give you her name.”
“Then your Penance will be more severe. You have to pray 10 Our Fathers, and 100 Hail Marys. Think on the corruption you bring to your immortal soul, and go and sin no more. Te absolvo.”
As he leaves, another boy waiting in line asked him “What did you get?”
“10 Our Fathers, 100 Hail Marys, and three good leads.”
The Jury only knows the facts that are permitted into evidence.
In many cases, past offenses are not permitted to be referenced. Evidence that had an error in the chain of custody is suppressed. The prosecutor and defender take turns kicking people off the jury, so the people who look the kindest or smartest are gone.
Jury trial is indeed better than the French system where judges both run the court, and decide, with noone on the side of the defendant.
In many cases, past offenses are not permitted to be referenced. Evidence that had an error in the chain of custody is suppressed. The prosecutor and defender take turns kicking people off the jury, so the people who look the kindest or smartest are gone.
In Texas, that information would be excluded from the guilt phase of the trial but not the penalty phase.
In the case of the jury for which I was picked, they almost ran out of people on the jury pool. Due to the circumstances of the case, we had to be willing to consider any punishment from probation to 99 years. There were about 20 people who were dismissed due to being unable to consider such a wide range of punishments. It's interesting that both I and another person who were able to serve for the week but not beyond, got picked. The guy who ended up being the jury foreman couldn't be there if the trial had to go on for a second week due to work out of town. I didn't want to have to spend the weekend deliberating, because I was going out of town to see my college roommate who was in the US for a few days before heading back to Europe where he works.
And yet we have some FReepers on other threads about this case that are trying to justify what the teacher did by saying that this 14 year old consented. My eyes have been opened as to just how pervasive the decay is when FReepers are justifying this behavior. Disgusting!
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