Brock Turner deserves county jail, not state prison

Behind The Headlines - Inside the Brock Turner trial

Former Stanford swimmer Brock Allen Turner, left, arrives with family and his lawyer Mike Armstrong, back center, at the Santa Clara County Superior Courthouse in Palo Alto, Calif. (Karl Mondon)

Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Aaron Persky will have to perform a legal incantation Thursday if he follows a probation recommendation and sentences Brock Turner to county jail rather than state prison. Persky should do it. Turner doesn"t belong in prison.

The former Stanford swimmer, 20, was convicted of three felony charges in late March in connection with the sexual assault of an unconscious woman outside a fraternity party on campus in January, 2015.

Turner was rightfully convicted. I wrote a column earlier this year praising the two Stanford students, both from Sweden, who interrupted the assault and chased the drunken athlete down.

But probation officials, who see hundreds of less remorseful defendants, had it right. Turner should be given six months in county jail. He is not, as the prosecution has it, "a continued threat to the community."

Why do I say that? The probation people cite his lack of a criminal record and what they see as genuine remorse. His attorneys have argued that the ex-swimmer has a record of real accomplishment.

"I would give anything to change what happened that night." Turner wrote in a statement to probation authorities that was quoted in a defense brief. "I can never forgive myself for imposing trauma and pain on (the victim)."

Severity

Nobody should be confused about the severity of this case for him. For the rest of his life, Turner will have to register as a convicted s*x offender. That effectively closes many career avenues. It"s a permanent blight.

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Deputy District Attorney Alaleh Kianerci, has urged the judge to disregard the probation recommendation, saying, "the fact that the defendant preyed upon an intoxicated stranger on a college campus should not be viewed as a less serious crime than if he were to assault a stranger in downtown Palo Alto."

In the abstract, Kianerci is right. We should not give people breaks because they go to Stanford. But it is hard to judge this case apart from its context. And that context has messy elements that a summation of the charges misses.

Turner met the victim at a party at the Kappa Alpha fraternity. Both were drunk: The woman was so drunk that she does not remember what happened. On the stand, she acknowledged having blacked out on several previous occasions while drinking.

At some point, the two lay down on the ground near a trash bin, where Turner assaulted the woman, who was unconscious when the Swedish students came upon the scene. He was convicted of assault to commit rape of an intoxicated woman, sexually penetrating an intoxicated person with a foreign object, and sexually penetrating an unconscious person with a foreign object.

Culture of drinking

You don"t have to buy Turner"s story that he so was drunk himself that he did not realize she had passed out. But it"s hard to review this case without concluding that it has roots in a culture of campus drinking, the unindicted co-conspirator here.

And that brings me to my final point. Because of a long history of ignoring sexual assaults on campuses, particularly by athletes, we have become more vigilant about prosecuting them. And that is commendable.

But there is a temptation to see the Turner case as a chance to send a message, rather than to weigh all the messy human elements involved.

Judge Persky should find, in legal terms, that there are "unusual circumstances" here and give Turner a county jail term. His conviction stands as warning enough. We don"t need the last pound of flesh.

Scott Herhold is a Mercury News columnist. Contact him at 408-275-0917 or sherhold@bayareanewsgroup.com. Follow him at Twitter.com/scottherhold.

Related articles:

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Editorial: The sentence was too light

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Editorial: Conviction shows more needed to stop campus s*x assaults

Turner convicted of sexually assaulting unconscious woman

Source: http://www.mercurynews.com/scott-herhold/ci_29966203/brock-turner-deserves-county-jail-not-state-prison