Genarlow Wilson seemed to have everything going his way. He was a star athlete, carried a 3.2 GPA, and never had any criminal trouble.
But everything changed when he was arrested and accused by Douglas County District Attorney in Georgia of inappropriate sexual acts. A jury acquitted him of the allegation of rape but convicted him of aggravated child molestation for a voluntary act of oral sex with another teenager. He was 17, and she was 15.
Wilson has already served 27 months of a 10-year felony sentence. Because of an antiquated Georgia law, he could have been charged only with a misdemeanor if he and the girl had engaged in sexual intercourse.
Subsequently, that law was changed; but Wilson remained in jail, which led to editorials in The New York Times and a letter from former president Jimmy Carter protesting the injustice of Wilson's original sentence.
This week a judge finally offered common sense to what was otherwise insanity run amok by ordering Wilson to be released immediately. But shortly after the ruling Georgia's attorney general, Thurbert Baker announced that he was appealing the ruling to the state Supreme Court resulting in Wilson remaining behind bars.
Can anyone imagine Wilson still being incarcerated after the judges ruling, or for that matter arrested, if he were white? Don't tell me because the attorney general is black that proves that racism is not at play. The toxic concoction of political ambition and stupidity infects all races. Moreover, one need not possess a racist intent for the outcome to be racist.
Since there are no 17-year-old white males in the state's history who have received a 10-year mandatory sentence for similar infractions, should one assume that they have resisted the hormonal temptation to engage in oral sex with 15-year olds?
Three years ago I wrote a very similar piece about Marcus Dixon. Dixon, of Rome, Ga., was a star athlete who received a football scholarship to play at Vanderbilt, a member of the National Honor Society with a 3.96 grade point average, and scored over 1200 on his SAT.
Shortly after being accepted to Vanderbilt, Dixon was accused of having forcible sex with a white girl three months shy of her sixteenth birthday. Marcus and others maintained that the sexual rendezvous, which took place on school grounds, was planned ahead of time. Several of the girl's classmates also testified that she had told them it was consensual.
It took the jury only 20 minutes to acquit Marcus of charges of rape, aggravated assault, false imprisonment, and sexual battery. The jury also concluded that, as was Dixon's claim, the sex was completely consensual.
Because Dixon was legally an adult at the time, the jury voted to convict him of misdemeanor statutory rape and aggravated child molestation. The latter carries a mandatory 10-year sentence. Sound familiar?
Dixon has since been released, but who knows to what degree his life has been permanently altered?
It was the Georgia Supreme Court who ruled in Dixon's favor perhaps they would do likewise for Wilson, but they have already ruled against him once. This still raises questions as to Baker's motivation for wanting to keep Wilson locked up.
Baker's actions are reminiscent of Burt Lancaster in the "Island of Dr. Moreau" as he constantly throughout the movie cries out to the subhuman beast that he created: "What is the law?" as if the law itself cannot be flawed.
Those who believe that Baker's actions only further the initial miscarriage of justice should follow the lead of those outraged citizens that relentlessly called the Los Angeles District Attorney's office bemoaning the early release of Paris Hilton.
Genarlow Wilson had so much promise. His future was bright. Momentarily assuming that he is guilty of something, isn't 27 months long enough?
Every American should be outraged. If you believe this is justice simply look at any young person that you might be familiar and insert their name in this piece where it reads Genarlow Wilson. Do you still think it is justice?