Guilty

I am following up on the story of the pastor of New Dawn Ministries, the last church I belonged to. After a number of delays, his case crossed a threshold on October 5.

There were 8 charges. According to a county website, he was charged with 4 counts of lewd and lascivious molestation on a child under 12. It says he was charged with 4 counts of lewd and lascivious conduct (different thing) with a child under 16.

Last Friday, he was adjudged guilty on one count of lewd and lascivious conduct with a child under 16. He was also convicted of one count of lewd and lascivious molestation (not conduct) with a child under 12. He took a plea, which means he said he was guilty.

“Molestation” is a worse crime than “conduct,” and it carries a much heavier punishment.

A person guilty of L&L conduct has:

Intentionally touched the victim in a lewd or lascivious manner; or
Asked the victim to commit a lewd or lascivious act…

A person guilty of L&L molestation has:

“In a lewd or lascivious manner, intentionally touched the breasts, genitals, crotch, butt, or clothing covering those areas of the victim; or
In a lewd or lascivious manner, intentionally forced or enticed the victim to touch the breasts, genitals, crotch, butt, or clothing covering those areas on the defendant…”

I thought he was accused of rape, but that may not be the case. The prosecutors may not think he committed rape, or they may think it’s too hard to prove.

I am not a criminal attorney, so I am not completely sure how the process works at this point. I worked for the PD in Miami very briefly, and then I put in some time as an intern with the legal aid people in domestic violence. What I recall is that people who took pleas were sentenced immediately, because part of the plea process is negotiating a sentence. There is no point in having hearings to decide on a sentence when a defendant has already agreed to a punishment. Perhaps that isn’t always the case, however. Maybe my former pastor hasn’t been sentenced yet.

The clerk’s site says he will have to surrender on December 5, so he must not be in prison or the county jail right now. Maybe he got a break because his wife is dying from a brain tumor. Maybe the court is giving him time so he can be present when she dies. I’m just guessing. There has to be an explanation.

The site also says something about a probation agreement being unsealed. Certain sexual crimes require post-incarceration probation.

Florida has a number of mandatory minimum (“man-min”) sentences on the books, and child molesters are among the targets. Lewd and lascivious “molestation” of a child under 12 carries a man-min of 25 years followed by probation. That’s not the maximum; you can get life. Once you’re in prison in Florida, the best outcome possible is to shave 15% off your sentence through “gain time.” It’s not clear to me whether a molestation defendant is allowed this option. Some courts have said they are not.

The punishment for L&L conduct is not as bad, but it’s still very severe. It’s not like you can pay a fine.

One would assume that a convicted child abuser would do serious prison time no matter how well things went for him in court. Thing is, man-mins are pure fiction, at least with regard to certain crimes. My sister was charged with two man-min offenses, and she was convicted of one. She never spent a day in prison. She put in a fair amount of time in the county lockup because she paid little attention to her felony diversion conditions before her trial, but the county lockup isn’t prison.

Although convicted, my sister was sentenced to probation, not prison, and she failed to comply with the conditions. After she disobeyed the court, she went to prison, right? No, the court simply said she had “failed.” Apparently, this means she will not be eligible for probation if she is convicted of new crimes. Basically, it means she was not punished at all.

All this shows that mandatory minimums don’t always have teeth. Whether they’re enforced uniformly in molestation cases, I could not say. Florida has the nation’s harshest child-protection laws, so it’s not a great place to live if you’re a molester. Maybe molesters never get what are called downward deviations (sentence reductions) in man-min cases. A Florida Supreme Court case (Rochester v. Florida) suggests they do not.

I could figure this stuff out and provide a certain answer if I were being paid and took the time to do quality research, but that’s not happening, so I’m making a fair effort and hoping I’m right.

I don’t think I’m going out on a limb when I say that a middle-aged man who molests his own niece for years, in Florida, is absolutely sure to do multi-year prison time. Surely there is no way the courts will allow him to avoid incarceration.

The grapevine (relatives of the pastor) says his sister is pushing for 7 years, and that his wife is somehow involved in a sympathetic filing asking for no more than 2.5. The relatives don’t really know what’s happening, however. It’s gossip. If the state websites are correct about his status, my former pastor is looking at over 25 years, no matter what.

I don’t like rooting for someone to go to prison, because I’m a bad person myself, and I certainly don’t want to be exposed or held accountable. I believe it’s important for this man to be imprisoned, however, because child molesters often have multiple victims. We don’t know who else he has hurt or will hurt. We don’t know whether he can control himself. Also, I think his niece would be harmed by the knowledge that the justice system cared about her so little it allowed her molester to remain free. I don’t know how she could feel safe in that situation. She should be able to associate with her family and friends, secure in the knowledge that she won’t see her uncle walk in the door. She shouldn’t have to worry about seeing his car creep by while she stands in her yard.

Whether society really needs to put him away for 25 years (or even 85% of 25 years), I could not say. He shouldn’t be able to be near her until she’s an adult, at the very least.

I have told all I know. It’s a very sad story. If the man-min means anything in his case, his family is in for an extremely rude awakening, and the free world may never see him again. For a 51-year-old, 270-pound diabetic who absolutely refuses to eat vegetables, 85% of 25 years could well equal a life sentence.

This is certainly a different outcome from the one we used to hear about from Jorge, our “house prophet.” He told us we were all going to mount unicorns stuffed with gold bars and ride them into the gates of the Emerald City, more or less. One rosy prediction after another. We would have a big building. There would be miracles. None of it happened. And I was the jerk because I was “negative.” I didn’t buy into everything that was said.

I may have been less than positive, but the bad things I thought would come to pass, did. Those things happened, and it didn’t stop there. The end of the church and the destinies of the pastors were actually much worse than I thought they would be.

The strange thing is that the pastors did give us truths from God. He spoke through Pastor Albert many times. I benefited a lot from listening. It goes to show you that you can’t assume a person is right with God simply because God speaks through him. Consider Balaam.

In other news, it looks like Hurricane Michael is going to miss me and everything I own. That’s a relief. I can’t tell you how many hours I spent last year, cutting, moving, and burning trees my myself. I didn’t enjoy using buckets of pool water to bathe, either, and caring for a dementia patient without electricity or water pressure is an ordeal I wouldn’t wish on anyone.

On the down side, Michael is headed for an area not too far from Milton, Florida, where some friends of mine live. Milton is on the east side of Pensacola. It seems like the Gulf Coast gets whacked a lot these days.

If the forecast is right, Milton will only get tropical storm-force winds. That’s a lot better than 125-mph winds, which have 4 times as much energy.

Ocala is wonderful, but Michael has me thinking about Tennessee. I can’t lie. It seems like I go through the hurricane waiting game every year, and it gets old. Eastern Tennessee has no real natural disasters to worry about. I’m sure they have occasional tornadoes and floods, but it’s not like living in a hurricane zone, and they don’t get frequent earthquakes or tidal waves. Also, it’s maybe 6 degrees warmer than Kentucky in the winter, and there is no state income tax.