Judge orders Genarlow Wilson freed
Served over 2 years of 10-year sentence for oral sex with underage teen

By JEREMY REDMON
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 06/11/07

A judge has ordered that Genarlow Wilson be freed from prison, where he has spent more than two years for receiving consensual oral sex from a 15-year-old girl when he was 17.

Monroe County Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson also amended Wilson's felony conviction this morning to a misdemeanor without the requirement that he register as a sex offender.

Wilson's lawyer, B.J. Bernstein, appealed to the judge Wednesday to free him from prison, arguing that his 10-year prison sentence and inclusion on the state's sex offender registry is grossly disproportionate and violates the Constitution.

Bernstein also pointed to how the Legislature changed the law last year to make similar acts a misdemeanor punishable by a maximum of one year in prison. Wilson, now 21, has been locked up for more than two years.

Bernstein said the attorney general's office had filed notice of appeal, and said she believes it puts a stop to Wilson's immediate release. She said she plans to look into filing a bond to release him while the appeal is pending.

Judge Wilson agreed the 10-year prison sentence "would be viewed by society as 'cruel and unusual' in the Constitutional sense of disproportionality."

"The fact that Genarlow Wilson has spent two years in prison for what is now classified as a misdemeanor... and will spend eight more years in prison is a grave miscarriage of justice," Wilson wrote in his order, which was released this morning.

"If any case fits into the definitive limits of a miscarriage of justice, surely this case does."

Wilson added, "If this court, or any court, cannot recognize the injustice of what has occurred here, then our court system has lost sight of the goal our judicial system has always strived to accomplish... Justice being served in a fair and equal matter."

Paula K. Smith, senior assistant attorney general, opposed Wilson's petition. She told the judge Wednesday the change in law does not apply to Wilson's case.

"The General Assembly passed a statute. They did not make it retroactive," Smith said. "It was their prerogative to do so. They did not. The courts of Georgia have not."

A Georgia Department of Corrections spokeswoman said Wilson would "ideally" be released from prison within the next 48 hours, though it is unclear whether an appeal from the attorney general's office would delay his release.

"He will be released as expeditiously as policy allows," said Tracy J. Smith, the department's spokeswoman. "Ideally, we are looking at a 48-hour window."

Juannessa Bennett, Genarlow Wilson's mother, shared her reaction to the judge's order with reporters today.

"I just feel like a miracle happened," she told The Associated Press, adding that her son appeared hopeful when she spoke to him yesterday. "He was on hands on knees."

Bernstein appeared at Bennett's side.

"This is a nonviolent offense," Bernstein said. "It was consensual teenage sex. There is no way that it could be anything other than a misdemeanor now."

Wilson was originally charged with raping a 17-year-old at a party on New Year's Eve of 2003, but he was acquitted. He was ultimately found guilty of aggravated child molestation involving the 15-year-old girl. Four other male youths at the party pleaded guilty to child molestation of the 15-year-old and sexual battery of the 17-year-old. A fifth pleaded guilty to false imprisonment.

Their party was captured on a profanity-laden and sexually graphic video filmed by one of the male youths. The video shows Wilson having intercourse with the 17-year-old and receiving oral sex from the 15-year-old. Wilson's appeal was filed in Forsyth because he is being held there in the Burruss Correctional Training Center. The state attorney general's office is representing Burruss's warden in the appeal.

Wilson's case has attracted national media attention, from TV shows "Good Morning America" to "The O'Reilly Factor." Several influential people have gone to bat for him, including former President Jimmy Carter. Carter wrote Attorney General Thurbert Baker last month in support of Wilson's petition, citing the "disproportionate nature" of his punishment.

Matt Towery, a Republican House member from 1993 to 1997, said today it was never his intent to lock up teenagers involved in consensual sex acts when he authored the Child Protection Act in 1995. The bill was intended to crack down on child molesters, but it was amended in the Senate, Towery said, to raise the age of consent from 14 to 16 --- meaning consensual sex acts with a 15-year-old could result in prison terms usually reserved for armed robbers and kidnappers.

"Needless to say I think justice was done today," Towery said. "This has been just an absolute nightmare to see young people such as Genarlow go to jail -- compounded by prosecutors and people lobbying - using videotapes and everything in the world - to try to keep him in jail."

Towery also argued the attorney general's office should "reconsider any effort to appeal. This intent is absolutely solid. And this is a misinterpretation of the intent of the Legislature."

State Senate President Pro Tem Eric Johnson (R-Savannah) said he worries about the legal precedent the judge set today by freeing Wilson from prison. Johnson fought an effort in the Legislature this year that would have allowed a judge to modify Wilson's sentence along with many others who were convicted of certain felony consensual sex crimes between teenagers. That bill failed.

"We have all said that was a harsh sentence," Johnson said of Wilson's 10-year prison sentence. "The precedent of this is what I'm concerned about."

"The Georgia Supreme Court already ruled on the Constitutionality of some of this," Johnson added. "I don't know if this was a politically correct judge that is just throwing it back into the courts."

Judge orders Genarlow Wilson freed

The sentence was ridiculous to begin with, IMO. Glad he's going to be set free.

:)
Kimi

B.J. Bernstein

That's unfortunate.


Paula K. Smith, senior assistant attorney general, opposed Wilson's petition. She told the judge Wednesday the change in law does not apply to Wilson's case.

Give it up, sheesh.

This was wrong from the get go. 17 year old kids go and diddle 15 year olds with monotonous regularity, why in the sam hell would they bring a KID up on charges for having sexual contact with another KID? You guys in high school should be well aware that a favorite little hobby amongst the Seniors is to go and date the cutest little freshman they can find, and there is sexual contact between the two groups. Mr Wilson didn't

It was wrong from the start, the prosecutors have probably really screwed this kid up for at least the next few years. He has lost his scholarship, he had a good future screwed all to hell.


If some jerk of a prosecutor really wishes to protect a child from an adult sexual predator, could they at least make sure that the so-called sexual predator is an actual adult in the first place?

Geez.

Dammit.

It seems the State of Georgia is not going to allow him to leave prison. The attorney general is doing everything possible to block his release. What a bunch of vindictive people. It smacks of racism to me.

ATLANTA, Georgia (CNN) -- Jubilation turned to anger Monday after Georgia's top prosecutor vowed he would fight a judge's order that would have set free Genarlow Wilson, a Georgia man serving a 10-year prison sentence for a consensual sexual encounter he had as a teenager.

Wilson's attorney, B.J. Bernstein, said her client would not accept a proposed plea bargain that would get him out of prison because it would require Wilson to plead guilty to a felony.

A judge ruled Monday that his conduct should have been punished as a misdemeanor.

"We're going to keep fighting," Bernstein told reporters at a news conference at the state Capitol. (Watch the day's twists send supporters on emotional roller coaster )

She was flanked by civil rights leaders and black lawmakers, who expressed anger at the decision by Georgia Attorney General Thurbert Baker to block Wilson's release by filing an appeal of the judge's ruling.

Joseph Lowery, former president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, called Baker's decision "unnecessary, unjust and unfounded."

"We don't understand the reasoning or rationale of the attorney general on this issue," Lowery said. (Watch Lowery call the top prosecutor's action absurd and unjust )

Wilson is black, as is Baker.

Law changed but Wilson not included
Wilson, 21, was convicted of aggravated child molestation for having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old girl when he was 17, during a 2003 New Year's Eve party in Douglas County, just west of Atlanta, Georgia.

Wilson was also charged with raping a 17-year-old girl at the party -- who prosecutors maintained was too intoxicated to consent -- but jurors acquitted him on that charge.

Under the state law in effect at the time, Wilson received a mandatory 10-year sentence and has already served more than two years.

Partly as a result of Wilson's conviction, state legislators changed the law to make such consensual conduct between teenagers a misdemeanor, rather than a felony. But that change wasn't made retroactive, so it did not affect Wilson.

Monday, acting on a petition filed by his attorneys, Monroe County Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson ruled that Genarlow Wilson's punishment was cruel and unusual and voided it on constitutional grounds. The judge reduced the sentence to one year and said Wilson should not be put on Georgia's sex offender registry, as the old law required.

Wilson's attorneys hoped to use the ruling to free him from state prison. But shortly after it was handed down, Baker announced he would appeal the decision, a move that keeps Wilson behind bars.

In a statement announcing his decision, Baker said he filed the appeal to resolve "clearly erroneous legal issues," charging that the judge did not have the authority "to reduce or modify the judgment of the trial court."

'The ultimate abuse of power'
Baker also said prosecutors in Douglas County had offered a plea deal that would reduce Wilson's sentence, possibly to time already served, and place him in a program for first-time offenders.

Once his sentence was complete, his conviction would be removed from his record, and he would be taken off the sex-offender registry, the attorney general said.

But Bernstein said Wilson would not accept the proposed deal because it would still require him to plead guilty to a felony with a 15-year sentence, which would hang over him until the sentence had been served.

"That's the ultimate abuse of power as a prosecutor," said Bernstein. "I want this child out. Enough already."

Bernstein said Wilson's attorneys are now trying to get him released on bond while Baker's appeal makes its way through the courts; but, so far, they have not been successful.

Wilson's plight has drawn national attention and pleas for his release, including from former President Jimmy Carter, a former Georgia governor, and even some of the jurors who convicted him.

But late last year, the Georgia Supreme Court, on a 4-3 vote, turned down Wilson's appeal, and both Douglas County District Attorney David McDade and Baker have opposed moves by his attorneys to have him released.

Legislation that would make the change in Georgia's child molestation law retroactive in order to free Wilson failed to win approval earlier this year.

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/06/11/teen.sex.case/index.html

Frogger,

The question that should be asked is this:

Will the streets of Georgia be one iota safer with this guy behind bars?

he's probably a REAL sex pervert by now.

Frogger,

The question that should be asked is this:

Will the streets of Georgia be one iota safer with this guy behind bars?
Absolutely not... End of story.

This was wrong from the get go. 17 year old kids go and diddle 15 year olds with monotonous regularity, why in the sam hell would they bring a KID up on charges for having sexual contact with another KID?

Well I think it's pretty clear Darth. In order to keep this kid from a life of crime, they needed to eliminate his chance to go to college, lock him up with criminals, make him a pariah by labeling him a sexual predator, and make sure he can't get any good jobs by making him a felon. Thanks to their quick actions, we can be assured that after he's been reformed he has a bright future ahead of him! Can you imagine what his life would've been like otherwise?

This guy has already served two years for a crime he never should have been convicted or sentenced for. Will anybody ever pay for fucking up his life? Not a chance.