While sentencing a former Mormon bishop to prison for rape, the judge became emotional, forcing himself to compose himself before finishing
The conduct of the (Mormon) judge is gathering criticism. There were two victims and the crimes extended over two years.
The judge allowed Vallejo to remain free on bail after conviction over the objections of the prosecution. Seemingly addressing the victims, the judge demonstrated his views of the justice system:
The newspapers didn’t report if the judge becomes emotional when sentencing lowlifes to prison, or reserves that for former bishops.
If he can’t put his emotions aside because the perpetrator is a mormon bishop and he’s also a mormon then he should have recused himself. A judge is supposed to be an objective interpreter of the law. This is not doing his job properly.
A judge ought to be able to do it, though. If they need to go to their chambers and cry afterwards, that’s their business, but they should be able to hold it together for five minutes. There are a lot of professions where people need to keep their own personal reaction to a situation in check, at least till they get to a private space: social workers, animal control officers, firefighters, and it’s really a pretty long list without the winnowing process of judges.
Sounds like this guy really did need to recuse himself, but maybe he didn’t realize it until well into the trial, then he tried to power through, and didn’t make it.
I just hope he learns a lesson, and if he ever has a similar situation in the future, will, in fact, recuse himself.
His statement to the victims was completely inappropriate. It would have been better if he had said nothing.
If the judge had let the guy go because he was Mormon bishop that would have been a failing in his duty. I think Smapti is correct in this situation. We have seen judges let guilty people off for lesser reasons than sharing a religious denomination. Remember Brock Turner, the Standford swimmer /rapist?
I am sorry, but WTF? He sentenced the guy to 10 years to life. Is there a shread of evidence to suggest that the sentence was somehow less than what would normally be awarded.
Try walking a mile a man’s shoe or in this case sit in his robes, before you judge(!) him.
Two points. First, there might not be any non-Mormon judges in Utah. They’d all ave to recuse.
Second, none of you know what is the correct sentence, unless you were at the trial and heard all the evidence, and had the judicial training and experience to evaluate it for sentencing. “What he deserved” is not empirically clear to the rest of us, absent detailed information about the circumstances of the events. The mere fact that they were “criminal” does not oblige any judge to the maximum sentence as provided by law, nor should it.
You’ve already got 2% of the adult male population of the USA sitting in prison, just serving plea-bargained sentences, a small fraction of that “maximum provided by law”… How much blind vengeance do you want?
The rape sentence is low; the groping sentences are high. 15 years ?
However in the old days English ( and Scottish, who were even more ferocious ) judges probably cried if they couldn’t sentence a man to death for rape because of some wretched lawyer trick.
You are actually familiar with what “concurrent” means, and simply didn’t read the entire quote, right?
The guy repeatedly raped / sexually molested two minors, over a two period, and was found guilty of 11 felonies.
He gets five to life, which means that he’ll be free in about two and a half years.
No. The sentence is not what the guy deserved and the judge is an ass for being more concerned about an "extraordinary, good man who just has this little weakness for preying on minors staying in his home, including his wife’s sister.
“Watching a man being taken away in chains isn’t the kind of closure this court is willing to endorse at this time.”
Well, what sort of closure would this court be willing to endorse? Forcing the two victims to marry their attacker?
“…have been heard and have been believed…”
It staggers me that so many people still think that the justice system is clogged with innocent men and the lying women who are accusing them of rape out of sheer feminist spite. It’s a theme I see often on this board, no less. It’s sickening.
I don’t know about “feminist” spite, but, yeah, rape has a much higher level of fabricated (that is the accuser knowingly made a false claim) allegations than other serious crimes (around 8% to about 1%).
That is irrelevant here. TokyoBayer, what expertise and experience do you have wrt to Utah sentencing guidelines and early release protocols? What familiarity do you have with the facts of this case beyond what you have read in the linked article?
Bottom line. Guy is IMO scum. Still does not make the act of sending someone down to a richly deserved fate easy.
What, this? It simply asserts that the FBI without giving sources. The best statistics on this matter are from the FBI back in 1996 and they found (on pg 20) to be about 8% as opposed to an average of 2% for other crimes.
Your problem is that you think both things, i.e false accusations are rare and that false accusation are much higher in rape than in other crimes cannot be true, when in fact that is the case.
You’re all missing the underlying point: the crying stunt could seriously screw things up on appeal, keeping the bishop out of slam until they have another trial. That judge knew exactly what he was doing, and should have recused himself.
And if that really is the source of the statement by Two Many Cats, then it would be more correct to say that a website with a stanford.edu address made that claim. In short, you’re giving the claim more respect than it deserves based on the domain.
Please explain the difference between “closure” and “revenge”, and how it advances the civilized human condition;.
No-one is more entitled to closure than Nelson Mandela, who himself said “Not forgiving someone is like drinking poison expecting the other person to die.”