Judge: Sex offender too short for prison

I heard about this yesterday, but didn't have a chance to comment. According to the article, a judge in Cheyenne County, Nebraska decided that a man who stood at 5'1" tall is not tall enough to go to prison for his crimes. This is a 50-year-old man who is convicted of having

had sexual contact over a couple of months last year with a 12-year-old girl, said Sidney Police Chief Larry Cox. He was sentenced on two felony sexual assault charges.

Short people may have disadvantages that those of us who range in the upper scales don't face (gee whiz, ya need help reaching the gas pedal?), but then, so do people with astigmatism. Is this judge going to suddenly decree that people who wear glasses shouldn't be put in jail because they'll be taken advantage of the way nerds get picked on in school? And, what about girls with very large or very small breasts? Do we give everybody a pass just because they don't precisely meet the so-called normal measurements?

I'm sorry, but just because you're short or fat or stupid or ugly or were raised in the wrong neighborhood does not mean you should be given a "Get Out of Jail Free" card by some touchy-feely judge, if you've been convicted of performing some abominable act.

And, as several other people have pointed out, the 12-year-old girl wasn't "too short" to be molested, was she?

I agree with State Sen. Ernie Chambers:

"If shortness is an excuse and protection from going to prison, short people ought to rob banks and do everything else they would wind up going to prison for," Chambers said. "We're talking here about a crime committed against a child, and shortness is not a defense."

This judge needs to be recalled, if this decision is indicative of the way she operates.

Sheesh.


Lest anybody think I'm size-ist: I stand an inch shy of 6 feet tall, and have "disproportionate weight issues", but have no resentment toward skinny or short people, either as groups or individuals. In fact, one of the nicest memories I have is resting my chin on the top of a very special man's head as we pretended to slow dance (well, he was trying to dance. I have no skills at all in that area). I'm told he had no complaints about the view.

And he was the one who showed me that a man's height does not define his strength, either of body or of spirit.