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October 25, 2014
"Jury Says Castrated Sex Offender Should Be Freed"
The title of this post is the headline of this notable AP story out of California. Here are the intriguing details:
A Southern California jury on Friday found that a castrated sex offender who preyed on young girls should no longer be considered a sexually violent predator and is eligible for release. Jurors in Orange County determined that Kevin Reilly, 53, does not need to remain locked up at a state mental hospital. He could be released as early as Friday, his lawyer said, but online jail records show he remained in custody as of mid-afternoon.
"There was simply no evidence he was likely to reoffend," said Holly Galloway, deputy public defender. "What the jury did was amazing because they followed the law and that's a hard thing to do with someone with his history, but it's the right thing to do."
Reilly served time in prison for sex offenses committed in the 1980s and 1990s and has been locked up in a state mental hospital since 2000 under a California law that enables authorities to forcibly commit sex offenders they believe will reoffend. He paid to be surgically castrated in 2003 to help control his pedophilia and completed a treatment program for sex offenders in 2010. State-appointed evaluators found he was not likely to reoffend, Galloway said, adding that Reilly also completed a bachelor's degree and master's degree.
Prosecutors argued that Reilly is still dangerous and that the effects of his castration, which aimed eliminate his sex drive, can be mitigated through testosterone injections. Michael Carroll, deputy district attorney, said Reilly did not confess to molesting one of his victims until three years ago and there were conflicting reports about what he told his evaluators and the court.
"I don't think he was honest during his treatment," Carroll said. "I think he continued to lie and attempted to manipulate because his ultimate purpose, I think, is to get out of the hospital, not necessarily to prevent creating any future victims." Reilly served time for committing lewd acts on four young girls over more than a decade, and later conceded he had abused at least three others, Carroll said. Most of the girls were between 4 and 8 years old.
He is required to register as a sex offender once he is released, and is planning to move to Utah, where he will participate in an outpatient treatment program for sex offenders and look for an accounting job, Carroll said.
Stories like this one provide support for my general view that juries, serving often as the conscience of a community, can and should be more often trusted to make difficult sentencing-type determinations and should not be relegated only to serving as a limited (and infrequently used) fact-finder in the operation of modern criminal justice systems.
October 25, 2014 at 01:07 PM | Permalink
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Comments
If juries are so good, why not make them liable for the damages caused by their carelessness? Juries were a major advance in accuracy in 1300 AD. Today, they are just feeling machines. hey liked the guy, that is absolutely the sole conclusion one may draw on, and nothing else. Because sociopaths are superfically charming, and likeable, juries today are worthless.
Posted by: Supremacy Claus | Oct 25, 2014 11:34:23 PM
I'm open to the idea of expanding jury's role, but not sure how much this story helps the movement much. Hard to tell if the jury is right here as a matter of facts -- that is, is he really safe. It is not just a moral question akin to "deserving" something alone.
Not overly impressed he "also completed a bachelor's degree and master's degree" -- that's nice and shows some advancement, but when it comes to child molestation and the like, not sure being educated helps as much as some other crimes. Also, think the castration -- which sounds big but as noted might not be -- influenced them. Now, they might be right.
Still, not sure what this story tells me.
Posted by: Joe | Oct 26, 2014 1:27:35 AM
While you are entitled to your opinion, Joe, I don't know what credible basis you really have to second-guess the jury or to draw conclusions about whether they got the facts right. Certainly, we should expect any conclusions drawn by this group of 12 people who viewed all the evidence, witnesses, etc. to be much more reliable than an opinion you or I might form based on a skimpy media account. That is the whole point of the jury system, not to mention the adversary system, rules of evidence, etc.
None of those structures are perfect, of course, so I guess it's true that we can't know for sure if the jury got it "right." But that is true in all cases involving juries - there is always some level of residual doubt. The larger point here is that unless we are going to just take the government's word for it and let them indefinitely hold anyone they deem dangerous (which experience teaches is generally a bad idea), we need some method of evaluating the facts and the risks, and Doug seems to suggesting that the jury system is likely to be as reliable or more reliable (and more democratic) than any of the other options. I agree.
Posted by: Anon | Oct 26, 2014 2:26:18 PM
Unless we presumptively assume the prosecutor is wrong here, there is a "credible basis" to think the jury might be wrong. I don't see why I can't, as I said, simply not that it is "hard to tell" if the jury is right or not. We only got a brief summary. They had a lot more. We don't now just take the "government's word" for it unless we consider judges, which check the prosecution here, as part of the government. That's, e.g., the point of habeas corpus, which puts the detaining party to the test.
When determining safety in the case of civil commitment, the general policy in this country is not to put the question to the jury. But, I'm open to giving the jury more power if it's worth the candle. So, I'll just repeat myself:
"I'm open to the idea of expanding jury's role, but not sure how much this story helps the movement much."
Posted by: Joe | Oct 26, 2014 3:10:22 PM
Unless we presumptively assume the prosecutor is wrong here, there is a "credible basis" to think the jury might be wrong. I don't see why I can't, as I said, simply note that it is "hard to tell" if the jury is right or not. We only got a brief summary. They had a lot more. We don't now just take the "government's word" for it unless we do not consider judges, which check the prosecution here, as part of the government. That's, e.g., the point of habeas corpus, which puts the detaining party to the test. Including the federal courts' oversight of the state.
When determining safety in the case of civil commitment, the general policy in this country is not to put the question to the jury. But, I'm open to giving the jury more power if it's worth the candle. So, I'll just repeat myself:
"I'm open to the idea of expanding jury's role, but not sure how much this story helps the movement much."
[sorry for the dupe -- saved too fast]
Posted by: Joe | Oct 26, 2014 3:13:34 PM
no offense joe but I had to laugh when I saw this!
" We don't now just take the "government's word" for it unless we do not consider judges, which check the prosecution here, as part of the government"
i'm wiling to bet most judges stopped checking the gov decades ago.
as for this!
"When determining safety in the case of civil commitment, the general policy in this country is not to put the question to the jury. But, I'm open to giving the jury more power if it's worth the candle. So, I'll just repeat myself:"
sorry but the sex criminals so-called "civil commitment" system is illegal on it's face and so anything covering it loses at the start.
YES I said ILLEGAL. Sorry we have a perfectly good civil commitment system that's been in place pretty much the entire history of this country. The fact that they created a brand new one with very little of the legal protections of the former in it.
You know why they have to drag the damn state in front of a judge? It's becase if they don't the state will NEVER release them.
look at Montana's system it is almost 20 years old and to date it's NEVER released anyone that didn't get a JUDGE TO ORDER IT.
Posted by: rodsmith | Oct 26, 2014 10:44:46 PM
My comment above is probably fairly clear but it is somewhat garbled. I apologize. I'll leave it be but thanks for the response rodsmith.
Posted by: Joe | Oct 27, 2014 9:51:54 AM
I think a contrary jury verdict should warrant a presumption that the Prosecutor is wrong. They're part of the adversarial system and never should be presumed to be correct anyway but, even if we do presume that, the fact that 12 people who looked at the evidence should at least cause us to doubt their version absent contrary evidence (and the media account is too sparse to really count as contrary evidence).
Posted by: Erik M | Oct 27, 2014 10:14:31 AM
"I'm open to the idea of expanding jury's role, but not sure how much this story helps the movement much"
I get it Joe!
Our States and Fed Govmt have taken away liberties (which should have been protected by them) and now the general public does not trust them (the State or the Feds)
Because they can no longer be trusted, we have to rely on a "jury of our piers" to act on the behalf of the accused to make sane decisions for the good of our community. Again...it's because the State and Fed Govmt can no longer be trusted.
I also agree that just because this jury had to make a decision, instead of the decision for community safety being decided by mental health professionals, does not mean that this one action will advance the cause of the movement.
Look into the work and findings Jill Levenson at Lynn university in Florida. You will get the correct prospective.
Posted by: book38 | Oct 29, 2014 10:54:51 AM
Got back to this a bit late. I see your point generally, Joe. Maybe we can agree that this is an interesting example but not necessarily proof of anything, vis a vis the effectiveness of juries versus other deciders in these type of cases.
Looking back, maybe what I should have said is that I took Doug's point not necessarily as an attempt to show that juries are superior, but more to combat certain intuitive biases against juries. I think many people might have been worried that regular, non-expert citizens would be so terrified of the underlying crimes, not to mention the "To Catch a Predator" media narratives that saturate prime time, that they would reflexively vote to keep someone like this defendant incarcerated no matter the evidence. So the fact that they voted for release -- while it doesn't prove they were right, or that their determination is likely to be more accurate or reliable than that of a judge or expert panel -- does at least seem to falsify the proposition that a jury would never be able to rationally weigh the case for release in a situation like this. And maybe in that limited sense, this story does advance the claim for using juries in this type of situation.
Posted by: anon | Nov 3, 2014 1:15:39 PM
"State-appointed evaluators found he was not likely to reoffend" That sentence always cracks me up. I wonder who "evaluated" these state appointed "evaluators"? These "voodoo doctors" have professional sanctions against them that would make you cringe. Thats why they are under the umbrella/Protections of the "state". I wouldnt let a "state funded" evaluator determine when to walk my dog, let alone guage the danger to society these freaks pose.
Posted by: Valerie Parkhurst | Nov 23, 2014 8:19:23 AM
""Look into the work and findings Jill Levenson at Lynn university in Florida. You will get the correct prospective.""
I almost fell off my chair with that one. Levenson is a Government funded witch doctor whose "findings" just happen to correlate with whatever policies and "budget constraints" the DOJ wants to implement this year. Florida is Levenson's home state and to date I havent seen any positive "foot print" she has left on the citizens of this state. If anything her position, title and wasted "grant dollars" have indicated she is completely "asleep at the wheel" and biding her time until she can permantly get to her vacation home in the Carolina's.. Jill Levenson is a complete HOAX in the world of sex offenders and their proclivities. Her tenure and contributions (?) in this arena is pure theft to the taxpayers at this juncture.
Posted by: Valerie Parkhurst | Nov 23, 2014 8:27:47 AM
