Continuously serving Kosciusko County since 1854
The other day I saw a story on the wire that surprised me.
A 46-year-old school bus driver in Anderson was convicted of one count of child molesting and six counts of attempted molesting.
He was sentenced to 50 years in prison.
Apparently the 9-year-old girl he was fondling was the first student on his bus route. The fondling occurred on the bus before other students were picked up.
With time off for good behavior, the bus driver will be out in 25 years - when he's 71 years old.
It caught my eye because it seemed pretty severe a sentence. Now granted, I have no further knowledge of the case.
I compare and contrast that to what I see going on in the court system in our county.
Following are a few recent cases and their dispositions.
• A 23-year-old forcing a 15-year-old to have sex at knifepoint, Class B felony, 4 years.
• A 57-year-old fondling a 6-year-old, Class C felony, 4 years.
• A 56-year-old fondling a 15-year-old, Class D felony, 3 years suspended.
• A 17-year-old fondling a 10-year-old, Class C felony, 4 years.
• A 29-year-old fondling a 9-year-old, Class B felony, 10 years suspended, served 6 weekends.
• A 22-year-old having sex with a 14-year-old, Class C felony, 90 days.
• A 51-year-old fondling a 6-year-old, Class C felony, 10 years.
Keep in mind that the presumptive - or suggested by statute - sentence for a class B felony is 10 years, to which 10 years can be added or subtracted depending on circumstances of the case.
For a class C felony, the sentence is four years, plus four years or minus two years depending on circumstances.
The wire story didn't say whether the molester was a repeat offender and it didn't say if there were any aggravating circumstances.
So I called a staffer at the Anderson Bulletin. The cops and courts reporter wasn't around, but another reporter checked his story for me.
Here are the aggravating circumstances noted by the judge in the case.
First, the acts occurred on a school bus. A place where a kid should be safe.
Second, there was more than one occurrence.
These weren't the aggravating circumstances I expected. I guess I have become anesthetized to this sort of thing. After reading about molesters in our court news, I guess I just assumed that's the way those cases are handled everywhere.
I figured the Anderson bus driver must have been a multiple repeat offender or something.
Not so. He had one prior brush with the law - a check deception charge 12 years ago. No previous sex offenses.
The bus driver professed his innocence to the bitter end.
Apparently, it's just the way they do business in Madison County.
And there was something else that the wire story didn't say. The man was sentenced to 50 years on each count with the sentences to be served concurrently.
"Normally, they get 'em pretty good," the Bulletin staffer told me. "From what I've observed, if you mess with a kid around here, you get hammered."
A spokesman for the Madison County prosecutor's office confirmed that. He said once someone is charged, unless there are mitigating circumstances - a victim recants or can't remember, for example - the case generally goes to trial.
And when molesters are convicted? "Generally, we're talking some pretty harsh sentences," the spokesman said.
Even though this simple, anecdotal evidence is far from comprehensive, doesn't it beg the question: Why are we so easy on child molesters around here?
And it's not just child molesters. It seems as if you beat up your kid or your wife you pretty much get a pass, too.
I understand that there are stumbling blocks for the police and courts in many of these cases.
Many times victims are young and their testimony difficult to obtain and corroborate. In domestic violence cases, many times victims often refuse to pursue charges or testify.
I understand that those circumstances make the cases more difficult to handle.
But on the flip side, I'd bet a paycheck that if the bus driver from Anderson happened to be a bus driver from Warsaw, he would have received a much less severe sentence.
Some might argue 50 years is too harsh. But I would argue that probation or six weekends is far too lenient.
Without getting into specifics of each case, some of ours sounded worse to me than the one in Anderson. In one case, the offenses were committed by someone entrusted as a babysitter.
I think crimes committed against children are some of the worst. And sex crimes committed against children are the worst of those. Children are innocent. Those crimes strip that innocence from those children. That innocence can never be regained.
I see convicts getting longer sentences for smoking dope, forging checks or stealing CDs than for putting an indelible stamp of shame on the life of an innocent child.
It makes me wonder if maybe our priorities aren't a bit out of whack.
I wish our county had that "mess with a kid around here, you get hammered" reputation.
