According the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Georgia State Supreme Court has ordered Genarlow Wilson be released from prison. According to the AJC:

The court’s 4-3 decision upholds a Monroe County judge’s ruling that the sentence constituted cruel and unusual punishment under both the Georgia and U.S. constitutions.

The majority opinion said the sentence appeared to be “grossly disproportionate” to the teenager’s crime and noted that it was out of step with current law.

And according to an AP report, via the NYT, Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears wrote in the majority opinion on the 4-3 opinion that:

…the severe punishment makes ”no measurable contribution to acceptable goals of punishment” and that Wilson’s crime did not rise to the ”level of adults who prey on children.”

You can read the summary of the Georgia Supreme Court decision here, and the full opinion here.

I have to run, but more, of course, later. For other $3.60 posts and background on the Genarlow Wilson case, you can click here.

Also, more news and video after the jump.

And it’s interesting, no? On the one hand we imagine that too much media attention perverts justice, insofar as it gives us a sense that a case is more about public opinion than it is about “the law.” But that might be more an argument regarding the Paris Hiltons, and less one for the Genarlow Wilsons.

Without media attention, where would this case be, really? Clearly the attention has made the district attorney, David McDade, nervous. Wanting his own slice of media approbation likely figured in his decision to release the sex tape used in Wilson’s original trial. And that’s nasty. As I’ve noted in a comment elsewhere, McDade’s failure to block out the faces on the video speaks to a fundamental disregard for meaningful justice and to his disengagement with the alleged victims in this case. This, it seems, is less about justice and more about winning. Right now, it looks like McDade is the one lacking confidence in the “facts” of the case.

My heart sinks when I think of that tape because I am hard pressed to imagine that something bad didn’t happen to those girls that night. And whether that thing be about teen sex, about athletes and groupies, or even about some astonishingly bad judgment, one thing remains– something likely wasn’t right. But those girls’ voices are noticibly absent from the aftermath, so I dance around this point, not knowing what that night was supposed to mean to them. I like to imagine this silence has been a matter of self-protection, even as the tape release might potentially destroy that as well.

It’s hard, but this case isn’t about the sex; it’s about the adjudication thereof. With bad judgment Wilson made himself vulnerable to the law, but it is the law’s– the DA and attorney general’s– zealotry that makes the consequences of that bad judgment suspicious, as the notion of justice is overtaken by the desire to punish something else or something “more.”

As Sherry F. Colb points out, “If we did not know that Wilson’s disturbing predicament had arisen in the United States, we might assume that we were hearing about a case in a theocracy. His case, however, sheds light on a disturbing fact regarding our criminal justice system, a reality about which we have grown complacent: people in the U.S. are routinely condemned to spend years in brutal prisons as punishment for behavior that harms no one… [T]his treatment of victimless crime is symptomatic of a criminal law that is strongly influenced by religious views about sexual morality.”

But maybe this all moot, for it is my impression that any final decisions will be made in regards to which legal and legislative apparatuses have the legal right to “make the call.”

An interesting read? An old CNN transcript, in which the tape is discussed. The jury was unaminous that no rape had occurred, but were required to make their judgment (apparently the jury foreman started crying while reading the sentence?) based on the law.

The president cannot pardon Genarlow Wilson, nor can Georgia’s Governor. Wilson, no matter what we think should happen, is deeply entangled in the system, and at this point only the system can make this right.

Or the prosecutor, Eddie Barker, who has the power to set the sentence aside.

But we know where he stands, apparently claiming that “the one person who can change things at this point is Genarlow. The ball’s in his court.”

No, Eddie, it’s in yours.

Update:

Southern Criminal Law and Justice has a nice explanation of what I was trying to get out by naming “the system.” “Genarlow, Innocence Lost, and Barbarous Procedure.” Check it out!

“10 Years in Prison For Consensual Sex: Genarlow Wilson’s Mother Speaks Out on Why Her Son Remains Locked Up“ (click to listen).

And here is the link to my Genarlow Wilson background post, which will be updated frequently up until his new hearing later this week.

On hearing the news (did he really hear it right that moment? I’m unclear), Obama immediately makes the connection between the Genarlow Wilson sentence and the Libby commutation.

This is the same connection Obama would go on to use in a speech he has given in a variety of venues, which I mentioned in an earlier post.

Obama in New Hampshire:

And here are some details on the speech the comments above eventually morphed into, and which I discuss further in a previous post, “Obama on Scooter Libby and Genarlow Wilson“:

Related posts at $3.60:

More on Barack Obama

More on Genarlow Wilson

More on Michelle Obama

Related posts by me at Cypher&Syllable:

More on Michelle Obama

Some of the group, all of whom are African-American, compared McDade’s actions to those of Mike Nifong, the district attorney in North Carolina recently sanctioned for zealous prosecution of Duke lacrosse players who eventually were cleared of rape charges. They suggested McDade should be prosecuted criminally for distributing a tape that shows Wilson, who was 17 at the time, having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old.

What Parsons’ refers to as “the personal” in Obama’s remarks I simply see as his willingness to speak on silence and inaction in the media– especially when it comes to justice for black people. And even though he’s not talking about anything new, there is something particularly striking in the specter of disproportionate sentencing in this cultural moment, this moment of Paris Hilton and Scooter Libby, of Genarlow Wilson, the Newark lesbians sentencing, and the Jena Six. (Jesse Rae Beard, one of the h.s. students, is pictured, left.) Obama took a good opportunity for shifting the norm, by using specific examples to make other candidates seem too abstract and less connected to the cultural moment, without affecting his own reputation for being “intellectual,” but here humanized, relatable.

The story is a good one. Below it is a Jena Six background story, since I haven’t posted on the case yet:

And here’s a background story related to the Jena Six, whom I will say more about in a later post:

Related posts at $3.60:

More on Barack Obama

More on Genarlow Wilson

More on Michelle Obama

Related posts by me at Cypher&Syllable:

More on Michelle Obama

Click here for the latest Genarlow Wilson updates at $3.60.

20 July, 2007 @ 11a

• Wilson’s appeal trial is being held right now. It was being simulcast, but the feed from the courthouse has gone out. You can check here for updates.
• The Daily Report (a paper out of Georgia) has one of the best information pages I’ve seen on the case. You can check it out here.
• Radley Balko has a particularly useful survey of some of the more recent issues with the Wilson case, particularly viz. McDade’s release of the party tape. I’m not a fan of the title (I’m just not in a glib mood lately), but it’s definitely worth checking out: “Genarlow Wilson and the N Word.” And here’s the link to my long comment thereon. (Reason.com)
• Democracy Now just posted this interview with Genarlow Wilson’s mother, Juanessa Wilson: “10 Years in Prison For Consensual Sex: Genarlow Wilson’s Mother Speaks Out on Why Her Son Remains Locked Up“ (click to listen).
• CNN transcript in which the actual Genarlow Wilson tape is discussed.

Have you seen this, about the tape being leaked/released to members of the public?

Release of Ga. Teen Sex Tape Draws Fire (NYT)

How could they have not protected the girls involved in this incident? What is going on in Georgia?:

Senator: Release of Wilson sex video should be investigated (AJC)

Following is some important background:

You can read the full story here at CNN, or here at the New York Times. And here is a CBS news story from last year, which more detail, if you are unfamiliar with the case.

After the jump, a timeline of stories on the Genarlow Wilson case.

You might also find this article, “The Harsh Wages of Sin: Why Genarlow Wilson is Languishing in Prison.” It’s written by Sherry F. Colb, a professor of law at Rutgers.

Below are relevant news clippings and videos. These go by date, most recent first: