The Glade 4.0

http://www.kfdm.com/articles/former-39394-school-high.html

I'll boil this down for people who don't want to read everything at the link.

- Rakheem Bolton is accused of rape by an unnamed woman at a party.
- Bolton is suspended and transferred to an alternative school.
- Grand jury fails to indict Bolton.
- Bolton is allowed back to school.
- Bolton joins football team.
- Unnamed woman, now a cheerleader, refuses to cheer for Bolton at a game.
- School kicks unnamed woman off the squad for refusing to cheer for Bolton.
- New grand jury indicts Bolton for rape.
- Bolton plea bargains out with misdemeanor assault.
- Supreme Court rules against unnamed woman who sued the school for kicking her off the team, declaring the lawsuit frivolous and ordering her to pay $45,000 in legal fees.

Now, I just got flamed to hell and back on SA.com for saying the school did absolutely nothing wrong. Most people were of the opinion that Bolton should have been expelled the moment the accusation was made, or at the very least never allowed to join the football team, and never allowed to come back. I just can't understand the logic of how everyone can be so convinced that Bolton is "obviously" guilty despite the fact that they couldn't even get enough evidence for a grand jury indictment the first them and the second time he was able to plead rape down to a misdemeanor.

If they didn't have enough evidence for a grand jury the first time, I have no idea how they managed to do it the second.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

You're right Xeq - other people were reacting with emotional foolishness.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

Accusations of rape have too much weight and can be unfair. Expelling him over an accusation is absurd. If he was convicted he'd be in jail and couldn't go to school anyway.

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"...the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?" -Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Not sure what SA.com is, but haven't the simians there heard of the Duke lacrosse case?

Ithm somethingawful.com.

I'd say you took the correct position, Xeq. Well done.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

Ok, if he plea bargained, then he's a scumbag who, at a minimum, assaults girls. That means she was kicked off the cheerleading squad for refusing to cheer for a guy that, at a minimum, assaulted her. That sucks balls.

However, if she was kicked off the squad prior to him being indicted, then... I don't think she has a case. The school was operating under the best information they had at the time. That means she now has to pay $45,000 for getting pissed off about being tossed off a cheerleading squad for refusing to cheer for a guy that, at a minimum, assaulted her. THAT SUCKS BALLS.

Still, I'm not seeing how what transpired should have been different.

The next question is, now that he's been convicted of assaulting her, what is the school doing with him?

Or, possibly, his lawyer advised him that if it went to trial he'd lose because of the sympathy towards rape victims and predjudice against perceived sex offenders.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

When he finally plea bargained, he was no longer in high school. He was 17 when the alleged event happened, don't know why he wasn't tried as a juvenile.

I mean, it's obvious why the school did this to the cheerleader. Football brings in the big bucks through ticket and merchandise sales, and they can't suffer anything that would endanger that dynamic, like their cheerleaders refusing to cheer.

Football doesn't really bring in the bucks for high school the way it does for college, especially not through merchandise. It's more of a thing of "if you're not going to cheer, you're not going to be a cheerleader" which makes sense regardless of income.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I'm not sure innocent people should plead guilty, but maybe that's a different issue. I'm not sure the school did anything wrong. Being involved in school sports and activities such as cheerleading is not a right. If she was unable to do what needed to be done then she shouldn't have been a cheerleader. I don't believe she was discriminated against unless there were other ladies who didn't cheer who were kept on the squad.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

He was innocent until proven guilty and should have been treated as such. I don't know enough about the nuances of the legal system to explain why he was up before a grand jury twice unless new evidence was discovered. I know victims rights groups will hate the fact she needs to pay the 45k, but she did try to run ahead of the system too far.

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A man who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself. ~ John Stuart Mill

You plead guilty, you are guilty, as far as I am concerned. Why would I think otherwise?

Sadly, because sometimes that is the best route to go. Especially if you plea to a lesser charge.

He got a suspended sentence with no felony on his record. So basically no punishment at all other than the 150 hours of community service. If you were facing 20 years in prison, wouldn't you take that even if you were totally innocent? I mean, the trial itself would probably consume 150 hours of your time even if you were somehow guaranteed an acquittal.

Because you might become better informed of exactly how plea-bargains work in our legal system.

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"...but there exists also in the human heart a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to attempt to lower the powerful to their own level and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom." - De Tocqueville

I generally prefer not to use movies as examples, but have you ever seen Con Air? Bad legal advice is not uncommon.

That's doubly true with sex offenses. My father was a criminal defense attorney for over 30 years, and the only cases he ever lost where he truly believed that the accused was innocent were sex cases. Contrary to what a lot of people like to claim, the stigma is not on the victim of a sex offense, and they are generally given more credit and treated better in court than any other sort of victim, while the accused is often, if not presumed guilty, at least looked at with a significantly less strong presumption of innocence than is the norm.

Lawyers know this, and he may have been advised on that basis.

If this were not a sex offense I would agree with you. In fact, I agree with you that he is, legally speaking, guilty because he plead guilty, but I do not buy based on the facts we know that he is "a scumbag who assaults girls." He might be, but I am highly suspicious of the entire affair.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

I'm in agreement with you Xeq.

Sex-related crimes are a witch-hunt. You are automatically guilty and can not prove your innocence.

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Buckle your pants or they might fall down.

Not always... but it leans that way very heavily.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."

That's smart thinking, but I still wouldn't want to do it. It essentially still means you are saying you did that act, whatever the law decides to call it. I couldn't do that if I didn't do that act.

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I prefer to think of them as "Fighting evil in another dimension"

No, I get that there are stupid deals just to get a "win" in the prosecutor's book and bad legal advice. However, if you say you are guilty, why would I second guess you? You're guilty. If you're lying, that's your problem, not mine.

Integrity.

Would you say the same thing if the jury handed down a verdict of guilty?

Some guilty pleas also do not require an allocution; he may have pleaded no contest as part of his plea agreement.

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Grenade 3 Sports Drink. It's fire in the hole.. Your hole!

Again, if this were anything other than a claimed sex offense, that would be an unassailable position. Sex offenses, however, make plea bargains for the innocent unusually attractive because you are highly likely to get convicted regardless - and if the plea bargain charge does not carry "convicted sex offender" with it, that is a huge incentive right there.

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"Hysterical children shrieking about right-wing anything need to go sit in the corner and be quiet while the adults are talking."