OKLAHOMA CITY — A plea deal that sent an ex-convict accused of raping a 4-year-old girl to jail for only a year has prompted outrage across Oklahoma, where lawmakers are calling for the removal of the judge who approved the deal and the attorney general is investigating a new set of abuse allegations.
Under the deal, David Harold Earls, 64, of the southeastern Oklahoma town of McAlester, pleaded no contest last month to first-degree rape and forcible sodomy. Normally, the rape charge carries a sentence of between five years to life in prison, but the deal he struck with prosecutors called for 19 years of his 20-year sentence to be suspended.
I actually heard about this story yesterday on the morning news as I worked out. I didn't post about it yesterday, because, honestly, the only thought I had at the time was "HULK SMASH". I'm not doing a hell of a lot better today, because this is just mind-bogglingly bad. Rape of a child nets a ONE YEAR sentence? WHAT. THE. HOLY. FUCK???
The story's a little thin on details, which does give me a little pause here. The media's not exactly known for presenting all the applicable facts, and they have been known to blow stuff out of proportion. Sure, it looks bad - this dude's done time for sexual assault before; he had access to the child in question; and there was evidence of a rape. Oh, and HE FUCKING PLEAD GUILTY.
I do have to wonder about this, though:
District Attorney Jim Bob Miller said Tuesday the plea deal was both necessary and accepted with the approval of the girl's family. A medical examination of the girl found evidence of a sexual assault, but no DNA evidence tying Earls to the crime.
There's only one reason I'd accept a one year plea bargain from the man who raped my child:
That is all.
14 comments:
Jay, you might want to recheck the story. It might have been updated since you read it. The version that's there now explains pretty clearly why prosecutors and the judge accepted the plea-bargain: they probably would have lost at trial. No DNA or other direct evidence tying the suspect to the crime, only the testimony of the victim -- a 5-year-old girl who could not be relied on to testify accurately about the assault.
The guilty plea means nothing; many a suspect has pleaded guilty to a crime he didn't commit because his lawyer told him he was sure to be convicted in any case, and a plea-bargain would get a lighter sentence.
Hopefully he'll get shanked in prison.
The thing I hate about these stories is, regardless of the reason for his plea deal, lawmakers will start calling for insane "zero tolerance" and "minimum sentences". These are typically poor laws.
I prefer the ol' mob with pitchfork and torches approach.
I might tend to side wth wolfwalker. I've served on one jury trial (sexual assault of a minor) where the evidence was flimsy and relied upon the testimony of the girl years later - found the perp guilty (15 years). That said, if it were my kid, you would not find enough of the dirtbag to fill a shoebox.
Jay-
He didn't plead guilty. He pled 'no contest.' There are probably significant differences in the consequences. He might not even have to register as a sex offender when he gets out.
The dilemma Jim Bob Miller had here was whether to try the case, with a significant chance of losing, or whether to accept a plea with an absurdly light sentence, although one that would get the defendant off the street for a while.
We weren't there, so it's hard to say whether Jim Bob made the right call.
Here's the question, Jay: If you were the DA, would you try the case and/or what sentence would you accept in a plea in this case in these situations:
(1) the victim was completely refusing to testify, and your assessment was that you had a 1% chance of a guilty verdict after trial
(2) you had no idea what the victim would do on the stand, but thought you had about a 30% chance of a guilty verdict, and
(3) the victim seemed to be a reasonably strong witness (for a five-year-old), despite the prior inconsistent testimony, so you thought you had a 60% chance of a guilty.
I wrote about this story and there are a few other facts.
Travesty of Justice
First, the DEFENSE attorney approached the DA with the plea bargain. To me that sounds like the Defense didn't think they could win, not the DA.
The DA could have pushed for a longer prison sentence.
The other aspect is that that the scum may not even serve a year. With time served and his medical condition, he may be out in less then 3 MONTHS.
I also don't want anything to happen to the scumbucket in prison. If we continue to rely on prison justice to solve the problems, we will never fix the justice system.
As the mother of three small girls, I can actually understand the thinking behind approving a plea deal rather than going to trail. No way would I want one of my girls to have to relive what happened to her in front of a room full of strangers, especially sans DNA or other evidence that would assure conviction.
Of course, my ex-husband would also make sure he disappeared shortly after getting out of prison, so there's that.
I know that the story has holes and such. I'm stipulating that this guy actually did it (personally, I think he did).
I have to wonder, though, how these judges approach murder trials?
"Gee, the accused can't face the person he killed, so we have to let him go..."
And yes. If, G-d forbid, this were my kid, they wouldn't find enough of the dirtbag for DNA analysis...
Hanging's too good for that kind of scum.
Any dirtbag ever pulls something like that with one of my loved ones, I'll be borrowing a page from either Vlad Tepes or Saddam Hussein.....
I'm with WolfWalker on this.
We hear abotu these cases here and there, but with 300 million people in the country, they occur nationally more than very rarely, even though they might happen in a given state only once in a decade.
And every freakin time it happens you have CNN (All Sensationalized Crime, All the Time) Shouting this stuff out, convincing people there's a rapist behind every tree.
The next thing you know some Jackasses in the legislature pass minimum mandatory sentences and we have people doing 10 years in prison and forever on the sex offender list who's great crime was boffing their 17 y/o GF when they were still in HS together.
the FACTS are that crime is so much lower than it was when I was growing up it's incredible. Our kids are safer than they've ever been.
If it's an injustice then it's an injustice (We don't know). But frankly out of 300 million people, I'm not going to get too worked up over this one case.
There are much bigger problems facing all of us these days.
"First, the DEFENSE attorney approached the DA with the plea bargain. To me that sounds like the Defense didn't think they could win, not the DA."
Actually, that's pretty much the normal procedure in criminal cases - the Defense attorney asks what the DA will offer for a plea, then presents that to the Defendant along with his opinion of what will happen if the case goes to trial. Not asking for a plea offer is negligence, because the attorney can't advise his client of all his options.
For the DA to offer only 1 year served for such a horrible act means he was extremely uncertain about his ability to get a conviction otherwise.
It makes me pretty certain that there's something to this case that the media's not telling us.
The judge and DA screwed the pooch on this one plain and simple.
The judge, even though he legally could have, refused to let the little girl testify on video.
She was forced to face this guy and lost it. The judge should and DA should be horsewhipped and run out of town.
The family is severely poor, and their lowly spot on the totem pole may have had something to do with this.
It is a terrifying story all the way around. The offender has done this before I believe too.
Oh yeah I forgot something.
Bill, respectfully, you are wrong on this one.
The new laws being passed often specifically exempt the situations you are talking about. Anyone who molests a young child should be executed on the first offense. Period.
You seem to think that child rape is something that we should just ignore and sweep under the rug. When you have a little girl that gets raped let us know if you still feel the same way.
Here is a quote from the four year old girl.
“It had hurt a little at first,” she told her grandmother, “until I got used to it.”
This is the most terrible thing there is.
Jay: "I have to wonder, though, how these judges approach murder trials?"
Not a problem. The Constitution requires that a defendant be confronted with the witnesses against him, not the victim(s).
Oh, and lest anybody misunderstand: meself, I think rape should always be a crash-and-burn crime. Give 'em a fair trial and hang 'em. Hard to be any harsher if the victim was a kid ... though I suppose you could choose some other, less pleasant method of execution. Hanging is, after all, relatively quick and painless.
I just wanted to point out that in this specific case, the DA and judge may have been facing a "lesser of two evils" choice: jail for one year, or no jail time at all.
Lucky it wasn't my daughter. Because both the rapist and judge would be dead.
Yes, I'll take the consequences of implementing my own justice for the fact of knowing that said predator would never harm another child.
(Of course, maybe I could plea bargain for a 1 yr sentence for justified murder.)
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