Ya gotta love Blair county. Our conservative judges think nothing of piling on sentences that beg to be overturned by a higher court, such as the Carter case, where a non-violent drug dealer was sentenced to 104 to 216 years in prison. I’m sure you can tell that rehabilitation wasn’t high on the list of things the judge cared about. Yet Blair county seems to have another disturbing trend when it comes to prison sentencing; wrist slaps for sexual assault of a minor. If you follow the above link to a previous story here at Foster Disbelief, you’ll see that I was comparing Gene “Shorty” Carter’s sentence with the following sentence that was just announced at the time of publication:
A 39-year-old Centre County man who entered a no contest plea to indecently assaulting a 5-year-old Tyrone girl will be required to register his whereabouts with state police for the rest of his life.
Kevin J. Ross, 39, 1052 W. Fowler Hollow Road, Port Matilda, agreed to the requirement in Blair County court on Monday, where he also pleaded no contest to corruption of minors.
Judge Jolene G. Kopriva handed down the negotiated sentence of three to 23 months in prison, followed by five years probation. Because Ross already served five months in prison before posting bail, he was credited for time served and allowed to remain free.
3 months for “indecently” assaulting a five year old. Full disclosure? I was sentenced to 1 to 2 years in state prison for a probation violation. I guess I should have had his lawyer….and judge.
Another wrist slap was recently handed down, and although the case isn’t the abuse of a five year old, it still involves a minor, this time with her creepy boss:
Samy El Masry, 64, who owned Samboli’s Restaurant at 25 W. 10th St., Tyrone, was accused 19 months ago of improperly touching, kissing and making sexual comments to male and female teens who were part-time workers.
The incidents occurred between April 1, 2013, and March 2, 2014.
On March 3, 2014, a 16-year-old girl and her parents reported to Tyrone police that the day before, when the girl began working at the restaurant, El Masry made comments to her such as, “I bet if I cooked you in the oven, you’d taste yummy.”
The girl said she was touched throughout the evening, and El Masry requested to kiss her. She replied, “No,” according to the police affidavit of probable cause.
He allegedly ignored the rejection, kissed her and then made a sexual comment.
He then paid her $20 in hush money and offered to buy her anything she wanted, including diamonds, the affidavit stated.
When her story came out, several other Tyrone Area High School students who had worked at the pizza shop said they, too, were harassed by El Masry.
Ew. I mean, just….ew. “You’d taste yummy”?
So we have a serial offender harassing teenage girls who work for him. It appears that, luckily, nothing ever went beyond some groping and a forced kiss or two, but we can’t know that for sure. We just know that among those victims who came forward, nothing more serious than the above occurred. Some of you may even be reading this (and I really hope no one is, but…) thinking the guy may have been creepy but not criminal. But the power differential between employee/employer is huge. Saying “no” to your boss could cost you hours, shifts, good sections, or even your job. Depending on how badly the employee in question needed the job, the pressure to do something they did not want to do could have been immense. (And I hope I don’t even have to say this, but forcibly kissing someone and/or groping/touching someone when they don’t want you to be touching them is seriously not fucking okay.)
Now I’m not suggesting that this guy should be locked up for the next ten years. I’m not actually sure what an appropriate sentence would be for him, to be honest. But it deserves something, because this case just screams “potential rapist” to me. He’s a repeat perv, and has already stepped over enough boundaries to make me wonder where, or for that matter, if, he would stop. (Seriously people, if someone doesn’t want to kiss you and they don’t want you feeling them up, then don’t kiss them and keep your grimy hands off of them. It really isn’t that fucking difficult.) So while I am not sure what sentence I would hand down if I was the judge, this sentence is a joke.
El Masry was initially charged with 28 offenses. After spending seven months in the Blair County Prison, he entered pleas to one count each of unlawful contract with a minor, indecent assault, corruption of minors and harassment.
Blair County Judge Wade Kagarise sentenced El Masry to time served to 23 1/2 months in prison followed by 10 years’ probation.
“Priorities, people,” Judge Kagarise didn’t say after handing down the sentence. “If we lock up all the sex offenders for long sentences, then we won’t have enough beds for the non-violent drug offenders.”
Foster Disbelief 