Do all agree that "priest deserves to be treated like any other criminal"?

The question in the title of this post is prompted by this local commentary discussing today's upcoming federal sentencing for a priest whose gambling habit turned him into a federal felon.  The commentary by Jane Ann Morrison is headlined "Thieving priest deserves to be treated like any other criminal," and here are excerpts which providing background on the case and the sentencing debate:

The thieving, gambling monsignor who stole $650,000, mostly from his church's votive candle fund, has his supporters who want him to receive probation Friday.  I'm not one of them.

Nor is the U.S. Department of Probation, which recommends he spend 33 months in prison, which is the low end of the federal sentencing guidelines.  The high end would be 41 months. U.S. District Judge James Mahan won't be bound by the probation recommendation when he sentences Monsignor Kevin McAuliffe at 10 a.m. Friday.  He can show leniency. Or not.

McAuliffe's attorney, Margaret Stanish, has an uphill battle when she argues his gambling addiction and his mental disorders and depression are reason to give him clemency.  She's arguing for probation, so he can stay an active priest and help other gambling addicts. Why should an addicted priest get a pass from prison when other gambling addicts don't? That's unfair.

Nevada federal judges haven't been forgiving with others who steal because they want to gamble with money that's not theirs, partly because sentencing guidelines say gambling addiction is no reason for a judge to reduce a sentence.

Elizabeth "Becki" Simmons, a paralegal in the U.S. attorney's office with a fondness for gambling was sentenced to 30 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Johnnie Rawlinson in 1999. Simmons creating a scheme in which she was able to steal more than $1 million from the U.S. Marshals Service witness fund between 1988 and 1998 by creating fake witnesses. She did the time but never paid restitution.  The prosecution noted the divorced mother of two had a pattern of gambling four hours a night, four times a week.

In May, U.S. District Judge Kent Dawson sentenced Ely City Councilman Stephen Marich, a cashier at the First National Bank of Ely, to 78 months in prison.  Marich admitted to stealing at least $3.7 million over 12 years. (Auditors estimated it was actually about $5.9 million.) Dawson rejected the "compulsive gambling disorder" defense, noting that Marich was gambling using the bank's money and not his own.

McAuliffe was doing the same.  He wasn't gambling his savings, he was gambling money mostly meant for St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Catholic Church in Summerlin, where he was the pastor.  Most of the theft was from looting the votive candle fund.  He also created false financial records so that St. Elizabeth was underreporting its financial condition and shortchanging the Las Vegas Diocese about $84,500.  That's why he pleaded guilty to three counts of mail fraud; he mailed fraudulent documents.

Despite his theft, McAuliffe "left the parish and school debt-free and in excellent financial health," his attorney wrote.  A more deceitful image of McAuliffe emerged from Assistant U.S. Attorney Christina Brown's sentencing memo.  She noted the priest lied to the FBI when first asked why his income hasn't matched his expenses since 2002....

Should the monsignor be treated different than the thieving Las Vegas paralegal and the thieving Ely bank cashier?  Absolutely not.

Though the Catholic Church teaches forgiveness, McAuliffe should be treated like any other criminal, because that's what he is.  In court, McAuliffe shouldn't be held to a higher standard because he is a priest.  But the priest doesn't deserve a pass from prison.

Without knowing more of the facts, I am disinclined to assert that either probation or nearly three years in prison is a fitting sentence in this case.  That said, though I agree that a priest does not "deserve a pass from prison" in all settings, I also resist the notion that a priest "should be treated like any other criminal."  

For a wide variety of reasons, I do not think that a priest really is similarly situated to all other federal criminals.  In this setting, I would be especially interested to know about, and be responsive to, the "victims" of his crimes: if this priest's parishioners are among his supporters urging a probation sentence (presumably because they genuinely feel he can do more good for them on probation than in prison), my commitment to victim interests at sentencing pushes me toward thinking this man of the cloth ought to get at sentencing some of the very forgiveness that the church preaches and that his parishioners may be eager to demonstrate.  (But, then again, maybe my sympathetic sentencing judgment in this case is being unduly influenced by my deep (tongue-in-cheek) concerns about the enduring "War on Christmas" and the "War on Religion" that I hear is being waged in the US.)

UPDATE:  This AP story, headlined "Gambling Priest Gets 3 Years Prison in Vegas Case," suggests that the federal district judge sentencing Monsignor Kevin McAuliffe might have considered the occupation of the man he was sentencing an aggravating factor.  Here are the interesting details:

Muffled sobs erupted Friday in a courtroom packed with supporters of a Roman Catholic priest who was sentenced to more than three years in federal prison and ordered to repay $650,000 he acknowledged embezzling from his northwest Las Vegas parish to support his gambling habit.

Monsignor Kevin McAuliffe, 59, stood straight and offered no reaction as U.S. District Judge James Mahan credited him for accepting responsibility for looting parish votive candle, prayer and gift shop funds for eight years, but faulted him for "hedging his bet" by blaming it on a gambling addiction....

Defense attorney Margaret Stanish asked the judge for probation so McAuliffe could continue getting counseling for his gambling addiction, keep practicing as a priest and pay restitution to St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Church in Summerlin.  He won't get treatment in federal prison, Stanish said. "Is it all about retribution?" she asked the judge.  "This court has the ability to fashion a punishment that takes into account not only the offense but the individual.  He would not be here but for a gambling addiction."...

But Assistant U.S. Attorney Christina Brown characterized McAuliffe as an opportunist and thief who didn't exhaust his own savings before taking church cash to fund gambling, cars and travel.  She accused him of grasping at gambling addiction as "a hollow excuse offered now, when he's desperate for leniency from the court."...

The judge referred to a parish rift over McAuliffe's crime when he said he received approximately 100 letters of support through the priest's defense attorney.  Mahan also made part of the court record a stack of letters parishioners sent straight to the court saying McAuliffe should be punished.  "I expect the church to forgive him, and the parishioners by and large to forgive him," Mahan said from the bench.  "That's different than the justice system."...

Mahan handed down a 37-month sentence — midway between the 33-month minimum and 41-month maximum recommended by federal probation officials — along with the restitution order. The judge also sentenced McAuliffe to three years of supervised release following prison and banned him from gambling. McAuliffe was ordered to begin serving his sentence April 13.

Outside court, longtime parishioner Regina Hauck, 80, called the judge fair but the sentence unfair.  She said she wanted forgiveness.  "I know him. He's a wonderful priest," Hauck said of McAuliffe.  "But I think he's a sick man, and everyone makes a mistake."