Former Billings teacher gets 30 days for rape of student who killed herself

[redqueen]

A Yellowstone County district judge Monday ordered a former Senior High teacher convicted of raping a 14-year-old female student who later committed suicide to spend 30 days in jail.

Judge G. Todd Baugh sentenced Stacey Dean Rambold to 15 years in prison, with all but 31 days suspended, for sexual intercourse without consent.

Rambold, 54, will be given credit for one day already served. He was handcuffed and led to jail at the close of the hearing.


...

Baugh said he listened to recorded statements given by Morales before her death and believes that while she was a troubled youth, she was "as much in control of the situation" as Rambold

...

http://missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/former-senior-high-teacher-gets-days-for-rape-of-student/article_4b88caee-0f1f-11e3-ad06-001a4bcf887a.html

[seabeyond]

1. just another disgusting group of privileged men feeling their right to take.... even if that take

is rape. it is justified in their mind, cause just pathetic, out of control, man after all. the very epitome of the rape culture. that all of us are making up.

we see these examploe time and again, and yet.... we continue to have duers telling us, lecturing us, taunting and mocking us that it is isolated and there really is not a problem.

another girl fuckin DEAD. got that men. and the women that support this. another GIRL dead.....

[ismnotwasm]

2. Assholes

What to you actually say to shit like this? Words aren't enough

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

3. Not fit to be a judge...

...IMO. His record is replete with light sentences that often don't fit the crime.

"As I looked on in disbelief, Judge Baugh stated that our teenage daughter was as much in control of the situation as her teacher was," Hanlon said. "She wasn’t even old enough to get a driver’s license. But Judge Baugh, who never met our daughter, justified the paltry sentence saying she was older than her chronological age."

"I guess somehow it makes a rape more acceptable if you blame the victim, even if she was only 14."

I was ready to when I read this and was going to post this item myself.

I feel this judge failed in EVERY sense to respect the laws he is sworn to uphold, the legislators who wrote and passed them, the people who are otherwise living by them, the family that didn't deserve to lose a daughter and the victim. Who is he to imply, with his barely passing familiarity with the victim, that he is qualified to make a determination on her maturity?

[ismnotwasm]

4. +1000

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

5. thanks

i consider that as one of my better posts; it took about 15 minutes to develop the feeling i wanted to convey and another 20 to put it into civil language

[seabeyond]

6. Judge Sorry for Comments on Teen Rape Victim

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023551268


A Montana judge has apologized for comments he made about a 14-year-old female rape victim that seemed to take the "blame the victim" approach to a new level. "I don't know what I was thinking or trying to say," Judge G. Todd Baugh tells the Billings Gazette. "It was just stupid and wrong." In ordering a former high school teacher to spend just 30 days in jail for raping a student, Baugh explained on Monday that she was "older than her chronological age" and was "as much in control" as teacher Stacey Rambold. The girl committed suicide with the criminal case pending.

"What I said is demeaning of all women, not what I believe and irrelevant to the sentencing," Baugh wrote in a letter to the newspaper. "My apologies to all my fellow citizens." He also promised to explain his sentencing decision in more detail. (Baugh had previously said that this wasn't "forcible beat-up rape," notes the Missoulian.) Outrage continues to build over the comments, with a protest outside the courthouse scheduled for tomorrow, reports the AP. Also, MoveOn has an online petition calling for Baugh's resignation. Prosecutors had wanted Rambold to spend 10 years in prison.

http://www.newser.com/story/173340/judge-sorry-for-comments-on-teen-rape-victim.html?utm_source=part&utm_medium=united&utm_campaign=rss_top

Who is he to imply, with his barely passing familiarity with the victim, that he is qualified to make a determination on her maturity?

then since you put that time into that post and proud of it, well earned, i will say that reading the above gave me another position i had not thought of. so yea you, for sharing and putting the time into your post.

[LanternWaste]

7. I have a tendency to disbelieve the sincerity of an apology made after the fact. That's not contriti

I have a tendency to disbelieve the sincerity of an apology made after the fact. That's not contrition, that's PR.

My dad would often tell me after I'd sneak in after curfew, "you're not sorry-- you're just sorry you were caught. If you were really sorry, you would have apologized before I caught you..."

[seabeyond]

8. true all that. further, i do not know if it is this article, or the first

one i read, where he was defending his actions. but one article he was clear to say, ... what he said was wrong, but the sentencing was not, in so many words.

so with what you state (which i agree whole heartedly) and insisting it was a fair sentence, that about tells us everything.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

10. I think it's best...

...at this point for me to get off my soap box. If there's not something that may be changed, then it's best to learn from the experience and move on. A decision has been made by the court. Whatever is done should be done with the future in mind and not the past. As the point has been well made here in this thread, only forgiveness comes from an apology. What has been done was wrong and as far as I can see, it can't be undone.

The only things that conquer prejudice, injustice and hate are strength, determination and education.

"Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper or your self-confidence."
Robert Frost

[seabeyond]

12. it wakes people up. a childs death, the stupidity of some men... it wakes people up

this mushroomed and made more people aware what so many of us have been "educating" people on for a long time. that many more people will be much quicker to recognize, be aware, acknowledge in the future.

these little demonstrations of misogyny coming from so many directions is hitting a lot of people, repeatedly, upside the head.

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

14. i hope so

[ismnotwasm]

9. I couldn't even come up with a coherent response

So very vile. I'm glad you did

[discntnt_irny_srcsm]

11. Trust me...

...it didn't come naturally or quickly. As I said, I read that story yesterday and have since been trying to write what I thought of those events. I can't think of anyone who shouldn't feel failed by the system.



ETA: I can't help thinking that in this case Victor Hugo was wrong when he said, "He who opens a school door, closes a prison." At least in this case.

[seabeyond]

13. lets look at this really stupid point she is more sexually mature than her age. she fuckin KILLED

herself over this shit. how FUCKIN mature is that.

a poster in a thread in GD wants to make clear the difference between forced, violent rape and sex with a teen.

the whole fuckin reason we have an age as off limits is because of the immaturity. because KIDS cannot handle being manipulated by a fuckin OLD man. the end result in this case with this sexually MATURE girl was her death

i am so angry