Kan. Court Backs Harsher Sodomy Sentence

[rodbarnett]

<snip>

Judge Henry W. Green Jr. wrote in the 2-1 decision that legislators could justify differing penalties for heterosexual versus homosexual sodomy in plenty of ways, including higher health risks or an attempt to "encourage and preserve the traditional sexual mores of society."

The ruling rejected an appeal by Matthew R. Limon, who was sentenced to more than 17 years in prison for having sex when he was 18 with a 14-year-old boy in 2000.

Had Limon's partner been an underage girl, he could have been sentenced at most to one year and three months in prison under the state's "Romeo and Juliet" law.

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld/wire/sns-ap-sodomy-law,0,716764.story?coll=sns-ap-nationworld-headlines

[Hell Hath No Fury]

1. USSC...

here we come...again...

[NashVegas]

2. 17 years?

Wow. I'm tempted to make a sarcastic "Toto, I Don't Think ..." comment for the FoDs, but GEEEEEEZUS!

[David__77]

3. Wow, just like Southern segregationists.

They need to be metaphorically clubbed over the head enough times, then they'll finally comply with the law. These judges in Kansas should be harshly reprimanded. The Supreme Court has heard this and decisively rejected it.

[noonwitch]

4. Having sex with kids is wrong, whether it's gay or straight

This really bugs me. It's saying, in a way, that if you are a man and have sex with a 14 year old girl, it's less of a violation than having sex with a 14 year old boy. It's also saying that the girl is less of a victim than the boy.

But then again, Sergei Federov was f*#@ing Anna Kournikova when she was 15 and he was in his mid 20s, and the Detroit Police never did anything about it. The only person I ever heard publicly condemn the relationship was Martina Naratalova, during a tennis tournament. As long as Sergei was scoring goals, nobody cared.

[NashVegas]

5. But That's What Girls Were Made For

I'm so used to it.

[plurality]

6. well for one the guy was 18, think about it

When you were in High School were there any seniors there that dated freshmen? I know there were quite a few at my school. Would you have all of them thrown in prison?

[donco6]

7. Heck, when I was a kid, I knew a teacher dating a student.

They got married - so guess it was OK with God.

[Bertha Venation]

8. and both crimes should be punished EQUALLY

:grr:

[SquireJons]

14. Consensual Sex is not a Crime

There are millions of teenagers having sex. Are all of them criminals? The law usually considers sex between 2 people within four years of each other in age not to be abusive. So where is the crime? And 17 years in prison is so absurd I refuse to even comment on that part, other than to say what some DA is doing to both of those boys should be a crime. If I were king, first I'd kill all the DA's. They are the meanist people on earth.

[Exultant Democracy]

9. two things bug me about this

the first is the double slandered, the second is "one year and three months" for statutory rape? WTF. If it was a 21 year old with a 17 year old I could see a smaller sentence, but 14 year olds shouldn't be having sex with adults.

[plurality]

10. how much of an adult were you at 18?

As I said earlier, they probably were in the same school. Sorry, but if you're close enough in age to share classes, it's not statutory rape.

[toopers]

12. Enough of one to vote and drink,

sometimes at the same time!

[Bandit]

13. Let's see when I was 18 I was drafted and sent to a foreign land to kill

people of a different color. I was old enough to kill and be killed but not old enough to drink or vote. Go figure.

[proud2BlibKansan]

16. They were in the same institution

for mentally retarded kids. Here's a link to the whole story.

http://pitch.com/issues/2004-01-22/feature.html/1/index.html

[GOPisEvil]

11. Man...I thought Texas was bad.

:wow:

[saltpoint]

15. My pal Nietzsche urged us to --

“Distrust all men in whom the impulse to punish is powerful.”

[mike1963]

17. Well, from the story it isn't clear what who did to who and how,

but any time "sodomy" comes into the picture it's a pretty good bet that somebody is pandering to the far right wingnuts when any statute referring to it is applied.

To those who claim such laws are 'biblically based', I would recommend they support -all- the Levitical injunctions. Damn few would escape indictments under that scenario.
:grr:

[BattyDem]

18. So ...

if the victim is a girl, you get 15 months but if the victim is a boy, you get 17 years. So what does that say to the female victim? "Sorry young lady, but you're not worth as much as he is." And why stop at gender and/or sexual orientation? Why not sentence criminals based upon the victim's skin color or religion or education or political affiliation? :mad:

By the way, I don't know the details of the case (if it was rape or consensual), but when I was in school, seniors did date freshman and if that's what this was, the judge should be ashamed of himself. Yes, I know ... 18 is a legal adult, but there's a big difference between a teacher getting it on with a student and two students getting it on. I'll tell you why I feel that way: my parents began dating when she was 12 and he was 15, which means she was 15 when he was 18. However, it was back in the day when "nice girls" didn't have sex before marriage, so they never encountered this type of problem. But it never crossed anyone's mind that she was dating an "adult" ... they were just two high school kids.

JMHO