Genarlow Wilson's Tragic Sentencing for Consensual Oral Sex

[DaemonSeid]

By Van Jones and James Rucker, Color of Change
Posted on June 19, 2007

http://www.alternet.org/story/54413/

Last Monday, June 11th, a judge finally dismissed the sentence of Genarlow Wilson-the honor roll student and homecoming king serving ten years in prison for having consensual oral sex with a 15 year old when he was 17. In granting Wilson's habeas corpus petition, Georgia Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson wrote that it would be a "grave miscarriage of justice" for Wilson to be kept in prison for the remaining eight years of his sentence.

Yet, immediately after the judge's ruling, Georgia's Attorney General, Thurbert E. Baker, filed a notice saying that his office would appeal the decision, leaving Wilson stuck in jail. Baker's actions have not only robbed Wilson of his long overdue freedom, they epitomize the insanity of a justice system that seems hell-bent on criminalizing young Black men.

At a New Year's Eve party in 2003, Wilson had consensual oral sex with another teen -- she was 15 and he was 17. Under an old Georgia law, he was convicted of aggravated child molestation, a charge intended for adult sexual predators. Sexual intercourse with the same girl would have been a misdemeanor under a "Romeo and Juliet" exemption for contact between minors; but because the exemption did not mention oral sex, Wilson, an honors student and star athlete with no prior criminal record, received a mandatory ten-year sentence without possibility of parole

__________________________________________________ _____________

and in that same building on the same day:

Yet right down the hall, Alexander High School English teacher Kari McCarley was standing trial for "carrying on a sexual relationship with a 16-year-old male student." She was married, with children. This wasn't a one-time sexual encounter. Her sentence? Three years probation and 90 days in jail.

Like the judge in that case, most of the posters at Free Republic thought her crime was no big deal.

District Attorney David McDade: "We suggested prison time, but the judge imposed a sentence that he felt was right. She [McCarley] was not having sex with a student directly under her supervision."

See, with sexual intercourse, the judge has discretion. With aggravated child molestation, the legislature set the minimum at 10 years. Nevermind that the intent of the legislation was to prosecute adults preying on pre-adolescent children, not two teens where the younger teen initiated the sexual contact.


http://uspolitics.about.com/b/a/207995.htm

[Rudey]

Female teachers that screw their students will never get in much trouble. It has nothing to do with race. Black, white, it's all pink on the inside and it's OK only if the older person is female.

-Rudey

[RU OX Alum]

GA's Attorney General should get a nice swift round house kick in the brain stem

[Kevlar281]

The other side of the coin...

1. Genarlow Wilson was charged with rape, contributing to the delinquency of a minor, aggravated sodomy and aggravated child molestation.

2. Wilson engaged in intercourse with the 17-year-old after she was passed out drunk and high on drugs and encouraged the others to join him. The 17-year-old that accused the young men of rape and has never recanted. The 17-year-old was locked in the bathroom in between the sex acts and this resulted in a "false imprisonment" conviction for one of the men involved that evening.

3. There were six men with 40 prior arrests among them in a hotel room with a semi-conscious girl and a minor. One of the men impregnated a 12-year-old while awaiting trial and has since been convicted of statutory rape. Five of the six men pled guilty to the lesser charge of child molestation instead of aggravated child molestation. All are serving time.

4. Wilson refused the plea bargain and was unanimously convicted by a jury of his peers. The sentence for his crimes is a harsh, but mandatory, 10 years in prison.

[1908Revelations]

Originally Posted by RU OX Alum

GA's Attorney General should get a nice swift round house kick in the brain stem

Following w/ Robert's rules:

I second!

[UGAalum94]

I think the biggest factor in the comparison presented is the willingness of the teacher to plea bargain.

If you have the kind of proof against you that they did in this case and you don't deal and insist on trial, you're choosing to put your life in the hands of a judge and/or jury (ETA: actually minimum sentencing guidelines, rather than either) because I don't think you can usually expect the prosecutor or judge to see justice for you once you're convicted as something lighter than the offer that you turned down. After you're convicted of the charge that earns the minimum sentence, a lot of hands are tied.

I'd be glad if the guy were released because the sentence was excessive, but don't forget he was actually guilty of a crime/crimes, and that he (and his lawyer, I guess) chose to gamble at trial with a crime that carried this minimum sentence.

We can all feel like he wasn't really a child molester, but as the law was written, he was.

[jitterbug13]

There's already a thread on this somewhere in this forum.

[Munchkin03]

Originally Posted by jitterbug13

There's already a thread on this somewhere in this forum.

It was locked not long after it started.

[jitterbug13]

That's right.

[DaemonSeid]

Originally Posted by jitterbug13

That's right.

I did a search on the topic and it was in the DST forum....so, I didn't want to step on any toes thus I posted here...but thank you for your diligence......

[KDAngel]

This story continues to amaze me. I signed the official petition online to release the guy ago. But, just last week I went a Senate mtg where this was being discussed (well, before the session anyway) and pretty much everyone thought it was ridiculous. The poor guy. Seriously.

[DaemonSeid]

Originally Posted by KDAngel

This story continues to amaze me. I signed the official petition online to release the guy ago. But, just last week I went a Senate mtg where this was being discussed (well, before the session anyway) and pretty much everyone thought it was ridiculous. The poor guy. Seriously.

I tell ya....if I or any of my friends got arrested on 1/2 the stuff we did when we were teens (video NOT among this of course!) I would still be in jail... if anythign for the stuff I DID get caught doing basically required a thorough shewing out by my parents and more chores than u can shake a stick at.

why do we wanna jail this kid for oral sex...when it's real child molestors we have to worry about?

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by DaemonSeid

why do we wanna jail this kid for oral sex...when it's real child molestors we have to worry about?

It's because the state legislature, in its infinite wisdom, has seen fit to not draw that distinction.

Also, I'm not sure, but have they perhaps robbed the judge of his discretion during sentencing by imposing mandatory sentencing for this crime? Reading through the articles, I don't think that's the case, but that is a big issue when it comes to mandatory sentencing. Sometimes, the shoe just doesn't fit.

[DaemonSeid]

Originally Posted by Kevin

It's because the state legislature, in its infinite wisdom, has seen fit to not draw that distinction.

Also, I'm not sure, but have they perhaps robbed the judge of his discretion during sentencing by imposing mandatory sentencing for this crime? Reading through the articles, I don't think that's the case, but that is a big issue when it comes to mandatory sentencing. Sometimes, the shoe just doesn't fit.

sigh....like me trying to fit my size 15s into a size 10....

This is a waste of taxpayer money...somebody had an axe to grind

[Kevin]

Originally Posted by DaemonSeid

sigh....like me trying to fit my size 15s into a size 10....

This is a waste of taxpayer money...somebody had an axe to grind

No. More likely, it's poorly written legislation. Legislators are so busy trying to close up the loopholes to catch the real bad guys that they forget that their laws might have unintended consequences.

The worst part is that a legislator who wants to brings common sense back to his state's criminal code will be accused by opponents as being soft on crime, a charge that the generally uninformed electorate will definitely find persuasive -- especially if any changes to the existing law allow child molesters to go free without serving what the public perceives to be a fair sentence.