If you ever went there, they'd lock you away for life on general principles. And you'd never be able to post again.

...wait a minute...

There's an upside to everything if you just look for it.

Don't worry. I would pick up the slack in her absence.

I didn't even know it was possible to plan out a traumatic head injury.

Ummm, I don't know exactly what you and Knockers do during your special private time, but I don't like to play quite that rough, no matter what you may have heard.

Movin to the country, gonna eat a lot of peaches...

"eat a lot of peaches...peaches for free"

Ah yes, now that song makes sense..always did think it was kind of odd!

A Tribe original!

Here's the story of the case, which shows that Wilson was no choirboy (the sex happened at a New Year's Eve "sex party"), although he still didn't deserve what happened. Interestingly, and in contrast to the comments about "jury nullification" in my third link, the jury was never told that conviction on the charge of "aggravated child molestation" carried a mandatory 10-year penalty:

Outrage After Teen Gets 10 Years for Oral Sex With Girl

When looking for jobs, I refused to look at anything below the Mason-Dixon Line (Or think I refused. My US geograhy isn't all that great). Mr Bob kept asking why and I said "they are all crazy and religious"

I was right about the crazy.

like loons

Is this some email hoax where they ask you to donate money??

Clearly it MUST be a joke, although I wouldn't be so presumptuous as to call the entire state morons, even if it isn't. (Please tell me it's a joke.) I mean really, doesn't that kind of broad insult dilute your point and make you appear to be a little "nuts" yourself?

I mean really, doesn't that kind of broad insult dilute your point and make you appear to be a little "nuts" yourself?

Merely appear? I pride myself on being completely nuts.

As they say, it takes one to know one. That's why I'm able to recognize my brethren in Georgia so easily.

And no, state supreme courts usually don't perpetrate hoaxes. Just injustice, if it's the Georgia Supreme Court.

We're not all nuts but whoever drafted this legislation and let them send teenagers doing what teenagers do to jail for it definitely was nuts. I notice in the article and several others that the mandatory sentences and punishments seem to be handed out more often to minorities than others. I dont know what that says about our state, but I'm not too thrilled about that either.

I notice in the article and several others that the mandatory sentences and punishments seem to be handed out more often to minorities than others.

Where does it say that?

Another Mon Cherie masterpiece!

http://www.atlantamagazine.com/article.php?id=158

Superior Court Judge David Emerson decided to deny First Offender status to all of the six young men—a distinction that could have automatically lightened their sentences and removed the offenses from their records after they completed probation—because five of the six young men involved in the case had criminal records. McDade says it is “office policy” that no one convicted of child molestation should benefit from First Offender status....

McDade says he further supported the judge’s decision to treat Genarlow—the only one who had not had any run-ins with the law prior to this case—the same as the other boys because he does not believe in offering First Offender status in sex crime cases.

McDade’s tough stance on sex crimes seems reasonable, noble even, until a closer look is taken at several recent cases in Douglas County, including one indirectly involving McDade’s own teenage son.

At the time that Genarlow’s trial was underway, just down the hall in the same courthouse, Douglas County Judge Robert James Baker was hearing the case of Alexander High School English teacher and cheering coach Kari McCarley. The 27-year-old was found guilty of having a sexual relationship with a 17-year-old male student who attended the school where she worked. She was sentenced to three years probation and 90 days in jail.

McDade says he recused himself from that case because his then 17-year-old son, a student at Alexander High, had been interviewed by investigators about the case. The boy had told investigators that McCarley had called his cell phone nearly 30 times. McDade says his son was never romantically involved with McCarley. “I was pissed off as hell about the outcome, but <because the victim was 17> the maximum sentence she could have received by law was three years,” explains 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.”

But there are also other cases of adults—white adults—prosecuted by the Douglas County District Attorney’s office for sex crimes involving minors and received far lighter sentences than any of the teens in the Douglasville Six case.

Case in point: Jack Stewart, a 24-year-old volunteer coach at Heirway Christian Academy in Douglas County, who received 30 days in jail and 10 years probation for fondling the 15-year-old daughter of a couple whose house he was living at temporarily. McDade notes that he objected in court to the “inappropriately light” sentence.

In the case of 26-year-old George Tsimpides, First Offender status was extended in a sex crime. Tsimpides received 20 days in jail after he pleaded guilty to luring a 15-year-old girl he’d met on the Internet to Arbor Place Mall with the intention of engaging in sex with her. McDade says he publicly objected to that sentence.

The D.A. himself has not been immune to sexual misconduct charges. In 1995, two female employees who worked in his office claimed McDade sexually harassed them, creating a “hostile work environment.” The charges were later dismissed. McDade insists they are irrelevant. “According to the summary judgment, I won completely and they lost completely,” he says.

These cases, according to the Douglas County chapter of the NAACP, point to a pattern of discrimination. The civil rights organization, which has led rallies in support of the Douglasville Six, contends that if the young men involved were white the charges would have been dismissed. “The D.A.’s office is caught up in that good ol’ boy syndrome, misapplying a law that was never meant for teenagers,” says chapter president Kimberly Alexander.

Statistics provided by the Campaign for Juvenile Justice, a nonprofit advocacy group based in Atlanta, suggest that Alexander’s assertions may not be far off the mark, particularly when it comes to trying teens as adults. According to the organization’s analysis of Justice Department statistics, African-American and Latino youth are 45 percent of Georgia’s youth population, but comprise 77 percent of the youth arrested under SB 440, a controversial measure that was passed by the Georgia General Assembly in 1994. SB 440 gives superior courts the power to charge children aged 13–17 as adults for committing the so called “seven deadly sins”: murder, voluntary manslaughter, rape, aggravated sodomy, aggravated child molestation, aggravated sexual battery, and armed robbery if committed with a firearm. Furthermore, the organization also found that 46 percent of criminal cases involving white youth were transferred back to juvenile court versus 25 percent of cases involving African-American youth.

Thank You

I know we live in an enlightened age but I'm still surprised at how many people think we're just crying wolf when we say that minorities often get a bad rap in court and with the law.

I'm black but I'm not just talking about blacks. Society is what it is and I dont have the luxury of ignoring that certain prejudices still prevail.

A southern state handing out harsher punishments to minorities (especially blacks)? That's MADNESS!

I saw this story on Dateline probably a year ago and I thought the same thing. What makes this really interesting is that Duke situation (see Ayaks thread) where the Prosecuter went after those students like nobody's business for raping a black woman. (As he SHOULD have, initially). Many people felt that this prosecuter was overcompensating, possibly for the hundreds of times a black individual went down hard for a crime (see Simpson, OJ). Plus he wanted to get re-elected and needed the minority vote!

Unfortunately, it looks like the victim in the Duke case lied. What a strange parallel.

Regardless, this kid doesn't deserve 10 years in jail for this. A life totally ruined and for what? I hope the booty was GOOD at least.

Yes. They are nuts in Georgia. Georgia is the nuts capitol of the world.

Jimmy Carter comes from Georgia.

Maybe that explains 1977-1981.

I know nothing about the law (not for lack of interest, just lack of time, I guess). What is the likelihood that something like this won't be overturned? Will this kid really, really have to go to jail? For ten years?

It just doesn't seem like this will be allowed to happen... Am I naive?

Femme

Oh, I have no doubt he'll go to jail.

He can appeal, certainly, but that doesn't mean he won't have to start serving his time while the appeal happens. And, of course, the appeal may not be successful.

The strongest man in the world is he who stands alone. — Henrik Ibsen
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. - Henry David Thoreau

According to AyaK, see post #4, the kid has already served nearly 2yrs (22 months) of his sentence.

More Tribephylanthropy!
Space For Rent.

LAST EDITED ON 12-20-06 AT 09:59 AM (EST)

He is older than the child, and he should have exercised restraint. It makes no sense that people want to exonerate him based on subjective viewpoints about the child's "consensual" involvement in the act.

Children have often engaged in these types of activities after having been molested. So it is fitting that there should be some punishment against the older party in the transgression.

--Singer

What? Based on their ages, I'm guessing this was a high school senior haveing consensual oral sex with a high school sophomore. I don't know how things worked among your high school classmates, but there was plenty of sex, oral and otherwise, that took place in my high school that was not coerced.

Children have often engaged in these types of activities after having been molested. So it is fitting that there should be some punishment against the older party in the transgression.

I don't follow this logic. I also don't understand who you think might have been previously molested: the "victim" or the "perpetrator."

Hi, HD.

Molestation and too-early sexual activity often go hand-in-hand. It would not surprise me if the girl was molested, though that is not a direct issue in this case.

My understanding is that boys are usually much more interested in early sex than girls are, though girls mature faster. Far-too-often girls get involved in early sex because of peer pressure or because they have been initiated into sexual activity by older adults (relatives, family friends) who have taken advantage of them early in their lives.

Add to that sorry mix the horrible messages modern media sends girls about appearance and about promiscuity being acceptable, and you end up with an array of social problems linked to these behaviours--pregnancies, abortions, cervical problems.

I remember meeting a girl during my first week of college who was 17. She had a 35-year-old boyfriend and she had also had cervical cancer. I now understand years later that too-early sexual activity may have contributed to this young girl's medical problem. I also firmly believe that her mother and her 35-year-old boyfriend, who happened to be rich, should have been put in jail. And I also believe that her too-early sexual activity was a form of child abuse by the 35-year-old boyfriend and by the mother.

The girl was gorgeous, pretty quiet, a good student, and had many attributes. Too bad her mother and that oaf did not let her remain a child longer. And he was her boyfriend long before she was 17.

Elvis Presley, idiot that he was, got involved with Priscilla when she was very young as well. He and her parents should have been put in jail.

As far as this Georgia case is concerned, fifteen-year-olds should not be having sex. Period. End of sentence. That's my subjective view, FWIW.

It doesn't matter that lots of kids are engaging in early sex. They are still too young to understand the emotional gravity of doing so without commitment and love and all of those other nice things that should go along with it. At least there is now a vaccine that can at least partially protect girls from getting cervical cancer.

BTW, it is entirely plausible that the older boy was molested or even encouraged to engage in early sex by society, his peers or just his own hormones. From my vantage point, it doesn't really matter that he was interested in it. It matters that he did not have the good sense to exercise restraint.

--Singer

Well, then according to your logic, my high school boyfriend should have spent the 10 years after we first had sex in jail. Even though I agreed to do it and we were both still minors. It simply doesn't jive with reality that a teenage boy is going to say no when it's being freely offered.

I was never molested by anyone. I gave up my virginity, happily, at an even earlier age than this girl was when this all happened. Pretty much every girlfriend of mine in high school was no longer a virgin by the day we graduated. Though, statistically speaking, some of them probably were molested at some point, I hardly think that hundreds of girls were all sexually traumatized and dealt with it by acting out with their boyfriends in high school.

Teenagers have sex. They always have. They always will. And we now have a study that shows that to be true:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/health/2006-12-19-premarital-sex_x.htm

And, funnily enough, looking at my age group bears out my assertion about my high school classmates. The median age of the first sexual experience is 18. So, obviously lots of us had ours earlier.

The strongest man in the world is he who stands alone. — Henrik Ibsen
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. - Henry David Thoreau

Actually, I recall reading that alot of these teen sex studies can be somewhat innaccurate. (Don't ask me where, Newsweek maybe? I can't recall, sorry!)

When teenagers are given these surveys, they tend to lie about the answers. They omit some things that they have done and increase their ages on others. The reason given was that even though they are supposed to be anonymous surveys..somewhere in their minds, the kids feel like someone is going to find out, so they lie!

Actually, most people tend to embellish on surveys, that's why there is always a differential (+ or - whatever %) in results. Why this happens, I don't know. I'm sure there has been a study!! Although I do recall in Psychology class, that certain types of questionaires/personality profiles have built in questions and answers to weed out inaccuracies. You work in a college, so I am sure you know what I am talking about!

Seriously, why wasn't the "victims" opinion considered in this case? Something VERY similar happened to my loser ExBF's niece and the police told her father, they could arrest the guy, but there was no case. Maybe things are different in Jersey?

If you read the article, you can see that the vast majority of participants are not teenagers nor were they when they were surveyed. Many surveys of teens are believed to underreport sexual activity. I'm not aware of any that over-report, though they may exist. In this particular study, it is being published in a peer-reviewed journal, so you have to assume that there was rigor used in designing the survey and in interpreting the results.

We have statutory rape laws here in PA, but it is a rare case that is prosecuted when both people involved are underage.

The strongest man in the world is he who stands alone. — Henrik Ibsen
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away. - Henry David Thoreau

I a big fat lazy butt and didn't read the article. Please feel free to beat me.

That's what I meant though, about those surveys they DO underreport, especially if teens (or anyone) is not being honest about their sexcapades. Maybe I didn't articulate it very well! Again, I'm lazy.

The LEXBF's niece situation was that she was 15 and the guy was 20. She was willingly with him (without Mom or Dad's knowledge, duh!)and was having sex with him and such. She got pregnant and had to come clean to mom and dad (and no, she didn't have the baby). Dad hit the roof, rightfully so, and called the police. His daughter was 1/2 hysterical, completely defended the guy and ultimately the police told her dad, that even though she was underage...it was obviously a consenual relationship. Therefore it would be a very tough case. After much round and round, it sort of died on the vine and the guy was never arrested. Eventually she stoppped seeing him on her own.

Now, I knew this girl pretty well and she was never raped, abused or otherwise physically hurt in her life. The family is kinda WT, but that's neither here nor there. This 20 YO never forced her to do ANYTHING she didn't want to do and from what I gather treated her well. (Even if I personally belive that any 20 YO hanging around with and boinking young teenagers has serious issues.) She made a choice and that's that. Thar's why I am curious as to why GA pursued it. Different states, different laws I guess!

I'm afraid that I haven't read all the serious legal stuff, but isn't this a fairly clear case of statutory rape. This isn't about the act, rather the age and the girl was not of the age of consent and therefore legally this could not have been a consensual act. True it seems that they have taken it a bit too far, but if the interaction were coital and it were my daughter, I'd want the SOB in jail too.

Some businessmen are saying this could be the greatest Christmas ever. I always thought that the first one was." - (Art Fettig)