Jim McGreevey: Don't make Dharun Ravi our anti-gay scapegoat

[closeupready]

Sentencing is scheduled for Monday, May 21.

I do have to confess that I continue to be torn about this case, and what to do.

I certainly don't think Ravi intended Clementi to kill himself. I do think he is partially culpable, however, for what happened. I'm just glad I'm not the sentencing judge because I think I would end up crying, no matter how I ruled:

>>-----------------------------
After Ravi’s conviction, the jury’s verdict showed how far we have traveled from the hateful, homophobic past. The verdict was a vindication of American justice. The criminal justice system worked, this time for a gay victim, but there was something disquieting about the prospect of retributive punishment being meted out on behalf of a gay young man.
-----------------------
Ravi, who faces up to 10 years in state prison, is scheduled to be sentenced May 21. It’s wrong to send Ravi to prison for two reasons: 1) Prisons don’t work and won’t cure Ravi of any bias against the LGBT community, and 2) Ravi isn’t the only one to blame; and America, particularly the gay community, ought to be a force for transcendent change, not merely eye-for-an-eye punishment.

The notion of learning the evils of homophobia in prison is absurd. Prisons are brutal places where gays are routinely enslaved; homosexual acts are frequently the product of violent rape, and healthy sexuality is replaced by coercive deviancy. Studies have documented the substantial incidence of sexual violence in American prisons.

The myth that any good comes of prison is obliterated by Virginia prisoner Jens Soering’s thoughtful treatise, "An Expensive Way to Make Bad People Worse." With 5 percent of the world’s population and 25 percent of its incarcerated population, America is now caging one of every 99 Americans in correctional settings — places that are simply amoral, soulless chambers. Sending Ravi to prison will accomplish little good.<<

http://blog.nj.com/njv_jim_mcgreevey/2012/04/jim_mcgreevey_dont_make_dharun.html

What do you think the sentence should be?

2 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Maximum allowed
	1 (50%)
	Some prison, but not maximum
	1 (50%)
	No prison, but probation and community service
	0 (0%)
	Other? Respond below.
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
Show usernames Disclaimer: This is an Internet poll

[William769]

1. I know I'm in the minority here, but I want to see the maximum allowed.

[closeupready]

2. See, I'm torn because I can see all arguments.

I'm angry and can empathize with Clementi's frame of mind, but I can also see Ravi's family being torn apart, and not really understanding how that will help matters.

There are no winners here, as the prosecutor stated after the guilty verdict.

[William769]

3. Your right there are no winners here.

But there was definitely a loser.

[Fearless]

4. Ten years in a non-prison rehabilitation setting.

Punitive sentencing doesn't work.

[Zorra]

5. Sentence: 2 yrs. Community Service, 8 hrs/day, on weekends,

in an AIDS hospice. Must maintain other steady employment. Failure to comply, Ravi goes bye-bye.

Plus 5 yrs. probation w/community supervision.

[Smarmie Doofus]

6. We already won. We proved the point.

To go beyond that would be overkill.

No prison sentence.

Community service instead .


He's 19. (?)

We're better than they are.

Let's advertise that fact. ( We really ARE, ya' know?)

[JI7]

7. why didn't he take the deal which meant only community service ?

my problem with this guy is he was offered a deal where he would only get community service . but he didn't even want to do that.

[LostinRed]

8. The fact that he turned down the plea deal changed my mind

Ravi stated he turned down the plea deal because it would have required him to admit that he taped Tyler to intimidate him. The fact the Ravi said that makes me think that he did it as a stupid prank and regrets his actions.

[JI7]

9. people know these things are not so black/white

he could ahve taken the deal. done community service. and proven he wasn't anti gay, sorry for what he did to Tyler and that he never intended to intimidate him by doing other things like talking about how people need to consider other people's feelings. how he should have thought about what it would have felt like if someone did the same thing to him.

for me he came off as not wanting to give anything.

[Creideiki]

12. The stupid prank thing doesn't really hold

He did it because he saw a weakness in Tyler and chose to act cruelly.

I'd rather keep a dozen of my former students who would have been covered by the DREAM Act and were great kids over one kid on a student visa who is a sociopath.

[JI7]

10. i think prosecutors already said they don't think he should serve maximum but that he should do some

jail time.

[Creideiki]

11. How about just deportation?

[Bluenorthwest]

13. The author is not even mentioning the charges of which he was found guilty...

Many of the charges were for actions after the fact and those are crimes no one should want to leave unpunished, such as of lying to investigators, trying to influence a witness and tampering with evidence. Those are attacks not on his fellow student, but on the justice system itself. In all of those cases, it is not 'us' the gay community that is in charge of his punishment, and I do not know of any jurisdiction that takes witness tampering and evidence fixing lightly, nor should they ever do so.
Of course our prisons are awful. We, you, the author of this blog, we put people in prison for pot. For stealing a loaf of bread. Why this guy, with a string of fairly anti social crimes is seen as too good for prison when so many others are placed there for doing no harm to another at all is really sort of disgusting.
If you ever face a jury would you want your opponents to intimidate, tamper, and influence witnesses? Yes or no? Should that become the way of our courts? 'Well you lied, cheated and threatened others in an attempt to subvert justices, but hey boys will be boys! Let's forget that evidence tampering!'
It is extremely telling that the author leaves out the actual charges he was found guilty of.

[closeupready]

14. These are good points.

You kind of have to wonder if McGreevey was motivated to write this out of sense of guilt about his own personal history?

[Bluenorthwest]

15. I do question his framing, and that of a few here which seems to suggest

that 'we' the gay community is making this decision, when it is the local District Attorney who prosecuted and the convicted man's fate lies with a judge. And from what I know of judges, and it is not that much, they tend to take the tampering with the trial thing sort of personally and I do not expect those convictions to get glossed over. To lie to the court is to lie to the judge, and most people of any ethics do not cotton to being lied to under any circumstances. Make a mockery out of a judge's courtroom and you take your chances.
I hear he is in seminary, training to be a priest. Many of the religious types think it is good to protect the guilty and deride the innocent, as they feel this shows they are hugely compassionate, and like Jim, they forget the compassion for the others in the situation, in this case the victim and the court system. Does Mike consider the perils of allowing such tampering and interference with justice? Does he care for the next person, convicted with fixed evidence and influenced witnesses? No, he does not. He cares to put on some sack cloth and play the saint. While claiming that we, the gay community, hold the fate of a man who is facing a judge, not a room of gay people, a judge.
I find Mike's comments to be suitable for a defense attorney making a plea, I sure do not see why he is not making that plea to the judge if he feels so strongly about it. We are not in charge, this was not 'gay court'. It was court.

[joeybee12]

16. I say maximum because he was offered a very generous plea bargain...

simply community service...he refused probably because he is convinced he did no wrong and is in no way responsible...leniency in this case will not make him change at all.

[stevenleser]

17. I vascillated all over the place before deciding.

I started out at the maximum, and I think William's points were pretty persuasive, then closeupready and several others convinced me that no prison time was the way to go, then it was Bluenorthwest with the additional crimes after the fact and others who wrote about how this person refused a plea deal that would have given him no jail time but required some sort of statement of guilt that really got me convinced that he must serve some time in prison. I ended up with some time but short of the maximum.