I was infuriated to read about an extraordinarily lenient sentence in a child sex abuse case.
Just hours after her first day of high school, a 15-year-old girl sat in a Fremont County courtroom and told a full gallery of people, both known to her and not, about her life from the ages of 7 to 12, when she was being sexually assaulted.
Candon Dean Dahle, 22, was sentenced by District Judge Steven Boyce to a minimum of five and a maximum of ten years in prison. Boyce then suspended the sentence and placed Dahle on probation for eight years.
He was also given a 180-day local jail sentence that began on Tuesday. After that, he will be required to complete 200 hours of community service.
There's more at the link.
The source article contains sickening evidence from the victim and her family of what this man's abuse did to her, the psychological effects of which will probably continue for the rest of her life. I won't publish that here, because I try to keep this blog family-friendly, but if you can stomach that sort of thing, I urge you to click over there and read it for yourself.
For the life of me, I can't understand how such a monster in human form could be let off with so light a sentence. There are parts of the world - including many in Africa, from where I come - that wouldn't have left him alive after doing things like that. People there wouldn't wait for the courts to give him a slap on the wrist. They'd administer rather more than a slap on the wrist to make sure he never did it again, and so that anyone else with ideas like that would be given a graphic example of why they should never, ever even consider putting their ideas into practice.
Furthermore, I've never yet seen a single case where a child abuser was "cured" of his "disease" by any therapy, program or punishment. I've had to deal with far too many of them as a prison chaplain. Even those who'd sincerely, genuinely repented of their sin would tell me that they didn't know if they could refrain from doing it again after they finished their sentence. They said that for them, temptation sometimes grew so great that it amounted to an irresistible compulsion, so much so that some of them actively considered suicide as the only way they believed they could avoid acting on it. I somehow doubt that Mr. Dahle will prove any different.
I'd call him a complete and utter waste of oxygen, except that I'd then have to apply the same description to the judge who let him off so lightly, and the prosecutors who plea-bargained his offense down so greatly. I suspect society would be better off without any of them.
Peter
8 comments:
Judge was probably upset that the perp didn't invite him to get in on the action . . .
The judge is a pedophile.
No restraining order keeping him 1,000 feet from any minors? Time to investigate the judge and DA for NAMBLA associations.
There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of criminal law by an increasingly large portion of the legal profession.
Criminal law, at its core, is put in place to prevent the law-abiding citizenry from simply killing those who violate social norms.
Every time a judge imposes a "sentence" such as this we inch away from the idea of a civilized society where we impose mutually agreed on penalties meted out by civil authorities and closer to barbarism where we take matters into our own hands as a matter of course.
No one involved in this sentence should be walking the streets.
I started to comment, then thought better of it. It would either be redundant or, bring an uninvited knock on our front door.
He is much easier to get at on the street......just saying.
When the state refuses to execute the laws and provide at least a semblance of justice, the citizenry will eventually take up that role.
College athlete, a juvenile at the time the acts were committed, and a plea bargain. Yeah, I know exactly why the sentence was so light.
If I'd done something like this I would be lucky if my parents let me live to see trial.
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