Judge admits he made mistake in sentencing Misty Roberts, who faced up to 17 years in prison after conviction
The former Louisiana mayor Misty Roberts has completed the 90-day jail sentence she received for raping a 16-year-old boy while still in elected office and been released from custody, according to state corrections records.
The 44-year-old finished her jail term on what was the Labor Day holiday in the US, one week after the judge who presided over her case rejected a request from prosecutors to force her to serve a harsher sentence.
Judge Kent Savoie nonetheless acknowledged in court he was mistaken to have based Roberts’ sentence off of a list of more than 30 cases that were resolved through plea deals, unlike her prosecution, which culminated in a jury trial and guilty verdict, the Louisiana news station KPLC reported.
“I asked someone to get me a list of cases similar,” Savoie was quoted as saying on 31 August. “I made an assumption, and that assumption was wrong.
Why it didnt happen to me when I was 16 😔 I wish I was that boy.
When I was 16 it would have been a dream of mine to be raped by this teacher.
And just remember, 30-50 years of you print zines and protest.
“I asked someone to get me a list of cases similar"
I’ll bet that “someone” goes beep boop and uses emdashes
What a clever observation, dhork! ✨
At least they used the word “rape” this time instead of seduce or something.
Judge admits he made mistake
A 17 years mistake yes, does he still have a job after that blunder?
At least they used the word “rape” this time instead of seduce or something.
They are doing that here because the charge she was convicted under is colloquially known as statutory rape, which they mentioned in the article. The media has to be very careful about how they refer to people, who have not been convicted or otherwise admitted to something, because everyone here is presumed innocent until proven guilty.
And even when a ruling is made, the type of ruling matters. Der Gröpenfuhrer was found liable in a civil suit for sexual assault and defamation, but it was not a criminal case. And even the sexual assault didn’t meet NY State’s archaic standards for what is “rape”. And even the judge there admitted that the sexual assault, while not meeting NY State’s definition, was for an act that most people would call “rape”. Yet, the idiot can say “The court found I didn’t rape her”, and still be technically correct, even if they statement misses the point entirely.
You can say someone was charged with rape, you can say someone was convicted of rape and awaiting sentencing, you can say the convicted rapist was released. All of those are statements of fact at various points of the timeline this trial took place on whic, in America, releases you from libel.
If you search for Misty Roberts in the news, you will see a number of articles. Some say sex with a child which, while not saying ‘rape’, isn’t exactly stigma-free. A number of them used rape, both before and after the conviction. Others use sexual abuse, one used the phrase ‘romping with teen’ which isn’t even necessarily a crime in many places.
The chosen phrase used isn’t an accident, and in plenty of circumstances uses a less damning term than is legally required to avoid libel, even in this one.
Former Mayor indicted for having intercourse with a child
None of that’s incorrect.
They are I think elected, we can only assume now, by rapists.
That’s draconian. Not all mistakes should lead to termination. This judge made an honest mistake when sentencing and admitted it. Give them some grace for showing other what being the bigger person look like. They also have personal and professional embarrassment to live with and through - they understand what’s at stake. People have to be given a chance to learn and improve or else they will be afraid to do anything. And this judge will not make this mistake again soon because it is so fresh in their mind.
Stop falling into the authoritarian trap of “only good or only bad” professionals. There’s a lot of gray area in between and MANY people who do worse without citing their own failings.
Your right it is draconian. Show them the grace and mercy of a slow agonizing death via strangulated hanging. Mentally acute adults don’t rape children, it’s not hard to not rape someone.
The 44-year-old finished her jail term on Monday, the Labor Day holiday in the US, one week after the judge who presided over her case rejected a request from prosecutors to force her to serve a harsher sentence.
You seriously believe this was an honest mistake?
if you are a judge, you should not be allowed to make mistakes.
Everyone makes mistakes. Firing someone for making one is how you end up with a system full of judges with no more than 5-10 years experience and making more mistakes because you start to run out of qualified people and need to start picking at the bottom of the barrel when looking to fill the vacant seats that need to be constantly replaced.
He rejected the prosecutors pleads for harsher sentence, and couldn’t be bothered to look up previous cases. This wasn’t a mistake.
Everyone makes mistakes.
But there are some mistakes egregious enough that it falls into reckless territory, and in a job where people’s lives hang in the balance - sometimes quite literally life or death - you can’t just get a mulligan for those mistakes. That’s a Do Not Pass Go, Do Not Collect $200 kind of mistake.
This isn’t an unusual standard, we do this for other important jobs like piloting or medicine; if your mistake was something reckless where it could be predicted something very bad could result, that’s often not just a firing, but actually losing the ability to practice that occupation anymore at all.
At first blush, this sounds more like a case of reckless behavior, not a simple mistake.
how about we create a state where the monopoly on violence is run by people who do not make fucking mistakes.
People who do not make mistakes do not exist.
then i reckon the state should not have a monopoly on violence then huh? ;)
A free for all on violence is too Mad Max for me.
I’m sure her victim is down to listen to honest mistake bullshit. Whoopsie!
They used “rape” because the preparator was not a while man, and the victim not a girl.
You’re joking, right?
News outlets very rarely use the word rape when talking about a woman doing it to a male child.
Even judges themselves.
There is a deeply female-chauvinist and misandric stigma, by which women and girls receive lighter sentences for the same crimes (or receive no sentences at all), and which is even worse if the victim is a man or a boy; there is also a stigma that is both male-chauvinist and female-chauvinist, both misogynistic and misandric, by which it is not accepted that we men and boys can be raped, sexually abused, or sexually harassed, due to the “Women are wonderful” bias and the deeply rooted false idea that we men and boys are potential criminals.
The judge guessed on her prison time? Opposed to waiting 30 seconds for the court clerk to pull that information he said, “Look here little white lady pedo, I’ve got a child wedding to preside over in 30 minutes. Let’s say you get… I don’t know, say 90 days and a promise to only rape adults going forward. Deal?”
“Look, I know I screwed up and waaaaaay undersentanced this diddler, but how tf you think I’m gonna change my mind now? Just change my ruling? I don’t make the rulings, I just think them up and write them down! It’s out of my hands”
Fixing the sentence definitely feels like the moral thing to do, but this is a good example of how “fair” in the legal system means something different than normal life. In this case, I don’t think there’s a process for a judge to adjust their own sentence.
In some jurisdictions you can appeal based on sentencing
Yes, but the judge can’t appeal. Maybe prosecution can?
The 44-year-old finished her jail term on what was the Labor Day holiday in the US, one week after the judge who presided over her case rejected a request from prosecutors to force her to serve a harsher sentence.
Didn’t even have to open the article - it’s in the body text of the post.
Now that the original sentence has been fully served, I don’t think there’s any avenues for further appeals by either the prosecution nor defence. I could be wrong though as this may vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction.
Yeah, I was about to say the prosecution did do that. But the pro rape judge seems to think that it was fine to have a convicted rapist serve less then 100 days in jail.
Judges typically aren’t allowed to just make sentences harsher after a ruling.
They could have let the appeal for a harsher sentence though however. That is something that typically happens.
I guess there are just different laws with different penalties depending on your status.
We have a rich white lady issue in America. Swap her race, gender, or income bracket and she’d be buried under the prison by now. It’s alarming to see happen in real time. Maxwell gets to live better than most middle class Americans. This women gets a laughable prison sentence. There are other high profile cases that wouldn’t be nearly as controversial if the demographic of the individual wasn’t White, wealthy, and woman.
<insert Peter Griffin in a Fez meme here>
Dont pay 2 ct taxes, live long unless, you are rich. Raping a child, 90 days
