Drug use is relevant if he lied and said he was inexperienced with mind altering substances.
Considering his attorney and family portrayed him as an inexperienced kid with drug and alcohol use, it certainly raises doubts regarding the validity of those claims .
I agree Consolation. Kinda ironic I think. It was quite a few years after the fact that I learned one of mine, who never got an MIP, never got an MIP because he smoked pot in HS and never drank at parties and I knew he’d been at parties that were busted and had alcohol available. I always wondered how he managed to blow zero and he was a very, very sneaky one and one that left no trace so I could never call him on anything no matter how much I tried to outsmart him. He doesn’t smoke pot anymore, but now he drinks (he’s in his mid-twenties). When I saw the points about his cell phone I wondered if his parents knew about HS or knew about his MIP. Some parents are pretty blind to what’s going on and you have to be one step ahead of your kids to keep everything in check or lock them up until they are 21 and that’s not possible. There were moments that I would have liked to lock them up. Give me three screaming toddlers anyday over three young men age 17-20 which I had at one point in my life and when my hair turned gray.
Thinking back it was reading momofwildchild’s posts that kept me from pulling my gray hair out from the roots.
Really @momofthreeboys ? Turners statement sounds like it was written by a 12 yo, not a student at a school with a 4% admit rate.
I cannot fathom how you can get a MIP without your parents knowing about it, but I know laws vary considerably by state.
The victim was 22 and I believe a college graduate so I would assume that she wrote the letter by herself without any help.
@wisteria100, thanks for that great link.
@treehaven, that is a fantastic link too.
I hope posters are reading these links.
Oh it’s easy for a kid to get an MIP without telling their parents if they are 17 or older. in Michigan. The law says they only notify the parents if they are 16 or younger. Their parents never know if the kid can comes up with the money for the fine, the probation and all that is easy to hide. $100 fine, court costs, maybe some community service…you can get a deferred sentence with a lawyer, but if they simply go to court and pay the fine, it’s easy to deceive a parent. The penalties go waaay up with a second MIP, they can get jail time and their driver’s license is suspended. So Michigan goes easy on the kids for the first one, gives them a chance and then wacks them if they get a second. That probably forms my opinion about a first offense for a young adult. Like I said, I was not aware that young Mr. Turner had an MIP which does change my thinking slightly. He’s got a problem with alcohol and he needs to deal with it.
Looks like he may have used acid (lsd) too. He was definitely enthused by the idea.
Brock was a busy boy…
@dstark #706: Well, the Santa Clara Public Defender and others in her office have issued statements strongly supportive of the judge and the sentence. These are the defense lawyers who are in his courtroom every day and know what kind of judge this is.
Thus, the blogger’s statement that you won’t find defense lawyers defending the judge or the sentence is demonstrably false.
The public defenders are the lawyers who defend the poorest, most marginalized defendants. They are saying, based on their own experience with the judge, that their own non-privileged clients have been treated fairly by this judge, and that in their view this sentence was not based on the race of the defendant or his privileged status. I think that should be given weight in any thought as to whether to try and unseat the judge.
Look, I don’t like the sentence any more than anyone else does. But when both the District Attorney and the Public Defender, whose deputies are in his courtroom every day, come out strongly in favor of the judge’s retention on the bench, you have to give their opinions some weight.
Or he was talking big. I don’t really know how prevalent acid use in these days. Have to ask my youngest who is still in college. Interesting Link stark. I’ve heard defense attorney say their clients were **** lucky, but I’ve never heard one express some internal concern over the outcome. But, I know from hearing the conversation that defense attorneys, especially ones I know that take PD cases have a tough go emotionally defending some of their clients, some of the stories oh my goodness, but they can somewhat intellectualize it I think.
The district attorney in the Brock case thought the sentence was way too lenient.
The district attorney doesn’t think the judge should be recalled. That is a different issue.
I’m talking about the recall effort.
I realize the DA thought the sentence was too lenient; they argued for 6 years and lost.
@Pizzagirl I agree that we don’t know if Brock Turner was coddled. However, my children grew up in a fairly affluent suburb, I always let my children take the punishment doled out by the school. I thought that was being a good parent. As early as First grade I realized that some parents would fight any and all punishments from schools, or sport teams, or the like. As the student aged so did the likelihood that any punishment would be opposed. It also became far more likely that the student would be represented by counsel at the school hearing.
When my children were in high school there were cases where:
-A student plagiarized an entire 12 - 15 page paper. (Peer editing proved the charges) The case was expunged and the student now attends a top 25 university.
-A girl bullied another girl to the point that the police would press chases but the victim declined, which I guess happens if the victim is a minor. Again the matter was expunged and the young lady is a student at a top 25 university.
Really, I could go on and on. The fact is that I agree that students in affluent communities are often coddled.
Again I state that we have no reason to believe that Brock Turner received preferential treatment at any time.
I really questioned my parenting skills when my children had to list on the common app that they chewed gum in school when far more serious crimes were expunged. Live and learn.
I’m not sure it would behoove the Santa Clara PDs to speak out too vehemently about the judge as their (disadvantaged) clients will be appearing before him. His reputation is as a lenient sentencer----which often can be a compassionate fair position and something PDs can appreciate.
Nevertheless, Ken White’s (criminal defense attorney with significant experience) comment linked above is a valid–and insightful–perspective.
Leniency is one thing; double standard is quite another.
At least one article cites experienced prosecutors with sex crimes of this nature, and basically they say this would generally get someone 6 years in jailhttp://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-judge-stanford-rape-20160607-snap-story.html
If you want to question whether privilege was involved, do some research on what the sentences have been for other students convicted of similar offenses, especially if they happened to be black, the typical sentences have been in the 10 year range and up.
The other thing? Ya think having a judge who was captain of the lacrosse team at Stanford just, maybe just, influenced him to give a member of the swim team there a break? Or that if he had been a black kid from the local community with no criminal record instead of someone who was at Stanford, that the perp would have gotten what the DA wanted, 6 years?
After this debacle I would not want to be standing in the shoes of the judge who is sentencing Corey Batey on July 15th. He’s like a “bubble in a briar patch.” If he gives him the 15 years or anything close there is going to be outrage at the disparate treatment for black males. And if he pulls a “Persky” he is going to illicit the response we are witnessing now.
Batey will get the 15 years. And he deserves it.
IMO, in his letter to the judge, Turner portrays himself as an unsophisticated kid from a small town who came to Stanford with little experience with partying or booze and was lead astray by the party atmosphere and his older teammates. These were the people he looked up to and he tried to emulate them to fit in.
If Turner was drinking, using weed, and LSD before he began Stanford, then he wasn’t the naive kid desperate to fit in who was lead astray by the example of his older teammates as he portrayed himself.
He may have put on some lip service towards showing remorse, but it is belied by the fact a sizable chunk of his statement is about how HIS life won’t be the same, his future irrevocably altered, and how he’s suffering. The whole tone of the statement shows how he still believes despite that bit of lip service that the universe revolves around him and how HE’S impacted.
In short…the letter clearly conveys that “It’s all about him”…not his criminal actions and their severely negative impact on his victim, witnesses, and society at large.
Worse, his father is reinforcing that by being seemingly more concerned about his son enjoying a piece of favorite steak and even blaming the victim rather than his son’s criminal actions, negative impact on the victim, whether his son demonstrated the appropriate level of remorse/taking full responsibility for his crime, etc.