Disturbing outcome to an insidious case
The Waco prosecutor in the infamous Baylor rape case says she offered the former fraternity president probation because she was afraid jurors would find him not guilty.
They might as well have, for all the punishment meted out for Jacob Walter Anderson on one count of unlawful restraint: a $400 fine, counseling and no requirement to register as a sex offender.
In college, one doesn’t normally have the option of not taking a test for fear of failing it. That shouldn’t be an out for a prosecutor, either — especially when the victim is resolutely against the plea deal, as this one was.
We fully understand that prosecutors, not victims, must make the final call on prosecutions. That’s one reason criminal cases are captioned “State v. Joe Schmoe”; society is a victim as well, and is the actual entity bringing charges on behalf of a victim.
But if a victim of an alleged crime, particularly a violent one, is willing to go all-in on a trial and risk a defendant’s acquittal, then that should weigh heavily on the prosecutor’s decision whether to go forward.
In fairness to prosecutor Hilary LaBorde, we understand why she might have been gun-shy about trying the case after she says a jury recently acquitted a defendant in a similar case. And in a statement upon Anderson’s sentencing Monday, LaBorde did express concern about conflicting statements and evidence in the case.
Moreover, prosecutors don’t take cases to trial based solely on whether they believe a victim or witness; they must also believe that the case can be proved beyond a reasonable doubt. The difficulty of such a decision has to be respected and likely can’t be imagined.
Still, it’s an awful outcome to an insidious case.
If it’s any consolation to the victim — and it’s probably not much of one — the court of public opinion has dealt the defendant a surer blow than the criminal court has. Having been expelled from Baylor, he now faces a petition for his ouster from the University of Texas at Dallas signed by over 18,000, and a second online petition expressing outrage at his plea deal.
Folks don’t expect a mob-mentality rush to judgment based solely on one person’s testimony. What we do expect is for credible claims of crimes to be tested by the courts. This one was not.
Even after several years of shocking revelations about the troglodyte treatment of women by powerful men in entertainment and politics, women still are struggling to get justice.
Look no further than the over-400 sexual assaults unearthed by a Star-Telegram investigation of a loosely connected network of autonomous fundamental Baptist churches across the nation. Of 168 church leaders accused or convicted of sexual crimes against children, 45 were allowed to continue in their ministry. Some were shuttled between the loose-knit churches, quietly leaving their jurisdictions with the disgraceful blessings of other church leaders.
Victims were shamed into silence, or at least forced to deal with the trauma on their own. By the time some grew to adulthood, the statute of limitations in many states had run out, and their abusers were in the clear.
As of Sept. 1, 2007, there is no statute of limitations in Texas on most child sex abuse crimes. The Tarrant County Criminal District Attorney’s Office is currently prosecuting five sex crime cases involving church pastors, leaders or volunteers.
Such cases are notoriously difficult to win.
But you will never know unless you try.