Culture Warrior (15 page)

Finally, Susie told her parents the story. Hulett was charged with a variety of sexual felonies and pled guilty. In a shocking statement, he explicitly told authorities what he had done to the little girl. I cannot recount what Hulett confessed to doing in these pages. The confession is simply too monstrous.

Presiding over the case was Judge Edward Cashman, a Vietnam vet with a rather eccentric sentencing record. In some cases, Cashman handed down tough penalties, but at other times he was inexplicably inappropriate. For example, the
Burlington Free Press
reported that he told a rape victim she had experienced “one of the harsh realities of life.” After the young woman burst out crying, Cashman apologized. Onlookers in the courtroom were aghast.

As the confessed child rapist, Mark Hulett, stood before Judge Edward Cashman, some in the courtroom were expecting the criminal to get the maximum sentence: life. Instead, Cashman handed down a sentence of sixty days to ten years in state prison—and all but sixty
days
of the sentence was suspended. Why? So that the rapist could get “treatment” outside of prison. “The one message I want to get through is that anger doesn't solve anything,” the judge explained. “It just corrodes your soul.”

Vermont Judge Edward Cashman ignited a firestorm when he sentenced a convicted child rapist to a mere
sixty
days in jail.

Susie's family was stunned. A man who had brutally and methodically violated an innocent child over a four-year period would be serving less time in prison than Martha Stewart had. How could this happen in America? Surely, the civil liberties groups, the press, and the public would not stand for it.

Wrong. Most of the Vermont media, generally very liberal, actually
supported
the judge! In a shocking display of journalistic irresponsibility, the media portrayed him as a courageous man bent on reforming the justice system. Noah Hoffenburg, editorial director of the
Bennington Banner,
summarized the Vermont media position when he wrote: “We can see sexual predation as the disease itself; and make every attempt, as Judge Cashman did, to get to the source of the illness, thereby preventing the devastation of sexual assault in the future.”

So, according to many in the Vermont media, child rape is an illness—not to be punished, but to be treated. Believe me, this kind of insane thinking is very, very common in the secular-progressive movement. In fact, there's even a name for it: “restorative justice.”

During my investigation of Judge Cashman, I found that he actually taught a course on “restorative justice” at the National Judicial College, which advertises itself as “the nation's top judicial training institution.” In other words, Cashman is a huge proponent of this madness, which encourages the legal system to find a way to “reintegrate offenders into society.” The “restorative” crowd does not believe in retribution for crimes; they believe in “repairing harm” for both the victim and the offender. That is to say, society has a responsibility not only to the person who is harmed but also to the person
doing
the harm. Criminals need to be “nurtured.” The S-Ps strike again.

Don't believe me? Well, guess who else has poured millions into getting “restorative justice” into the minds of those in the U.S. legal system? Does the name George Soros ring a bell?

Here's how bad this Vermont situation really was. Shortly after Judge Cashman sentenced the child rapist Hulett to sixty days, a man named Ralph Page ambled into the courtroom of another Vermont judge, Patricia Zimmerman. Page was there to answer charges that he had punched a woman in the face. Upon hearing the evidence against him, Page screamed at Judge Zimmerman: “That's f——bull—.” The judge promptly ruled Page in contempt of court and sentenced him to—you guessed it—sixty days in jail.

So there you have it. In Vermont you can get the same amount of jail time for systematically raping a little child over a four-year period as you can for cursing before a judge.

As for Judge Cashman, he remained defiantly steadfast. Before issuing his atrocious sentence, Cashman listened to the plea of the little girl's aunt, June Benway, who broke down sobbing in the courtroom while saying:

         

The thought of my niece enduring years of sexual abuse sickens me. For four years she was a prisoner in her own home. For four years she had to fear going to bed at night.

She's already developed behavioral problems that help to alienate herself from her peers…. When she is an adult, she won't be able to reminisce about her first kiss and experience the laughter and joy that should come with that memory. For her, the thought of her first kiss will probably evoke pain and anger. Her first kiss should not have been shared with some pervert….

         

But Cashman was unmoved by the words of Ms. Benway. After she finished her statement, the judge began his explanation of the “justice” he was dispensing:

         

I feel very strongly about retribution. And why? I didn't come to that easy. It isn't something that I started at. I started out as a just-dessert sentencer. I liked it. Cross the line, pop them. Then I discovered it accomplishes nothing of value. It doesn't make anything better.

And I keep telling prosecutors, and they won't hear me, that punishment is not enough. You can't be satisfied with punishment.

         

So in the mind of Vermont judge Edward Cashman, harshly punishing a child rapist is not the answer; “restorative justice” is. This abdication of common sense is truly shocking in a nation built on the bedrock concept of “equal justice for all” and “the punishment must fit the crime.” But Vermont, it seems, has left the United States. Asked about Cashman's deplorable decision, retired Vermont chief justice Jeffrey Amestoy described Cashman as a “competent, caring, and conservative” trial judge.

Maybe in the Land of Oz, he would be.

Cashman's outrageous behavior, and the Vermont media's acceptance of it, made me furious. I was personally outraged and figured the national media would feel the same way I did. So I vigorously reported the story and asked the national press barons to get behind me and support the little girl and her family.

They didn't. Once again, I was the naïve culture warrior. Please call me Dopey Tzu. The network news organizations and CNN totally ignored the story, as did the major urban newspapers. Even though millions of Americans were deeply concerned and angered, the elite media passed.

Perhaps encouraged by the national media's apathy, some Vermont newspapers picked up the pace and actually began attacking me for my anti-Cashman stance: The
Brattleboro Reformer
called Cashman “One Tough Judge” in its headline and implied that I was a “demagogue.”

The
Rutland Herald
editorialized: “Cashman issued the sentence precisely to protect children. It was the only way to provide Hulett the treatment he needs in a timely manner in order to deter him from committing a similar offense in the future.”

Uh, the only way? I believe life in prison would deter Hulett from raping another child, would it not?

In fact, the only newspaper in Vermont to initially criticize Cashman was the
Burlington Free Press
(which also skewered me so it could have it both ways). But most Vermont media fell in with the S-P troops, a disgraceful exhibition that is not easy to digest. The plight of, and justice for, little Susie was obviously secondary to the “needs” of the rapist. And the Vermont media had no problem with that.

Yet the more I thought about the situation, the more it came to make sense. Vermont is the land of Howard Dean, who was five times elected governor. It is a state split between traditionalists and secular-progressives, with the S-Ps obviously controlling much of the media. The public outcry in Vermont was also muted. To be sure, thousands of Vermonters were angry, but many of them told
Factor
producers they were afraid to stand up for fear of criticism. Everyone agreed there is a powerful and intimidating S-P presence in the state of Vermont.

But the
Factor
culture warriors wouldn't let go. My staff and I pounded the story night after night, with revelations about Vermont's weak leaders and chaotic legislature. Thousands of Americans besieged the Vermont governor with e-mails. Finally, the state wobbled. Judge Cashman, realizing his career was sliding down the drain, issued a new sentence for the child rapist Hulett: three to ten years. And Hulett would get “treatment” in the Big House.

This case is one of the most vivid examples of the culture war ever on display. A guy rapes a little girl over a four-year period and it takes an intensely fought national battle just to see he spends three years in prison. Most legal experts in Vermont believe he'll be paroled after doing the minimum.

There is no question the little girl's human rights were violated. But not one person from the S-P groups Human Rights Watch, the ACLU, or the National Organization for Women stepped up to protect her. Likewise, liberal Vermont politicians, who are supposedly looking out for the downtrodden, like Senators Jeffords and Leahy, Governor Dean, and Congressman Bernie Sanders, said not a word. All the S-P warriors sat it out. And that's a fact.

Now, the logical question is: Why would the S-P movement want to stand behind an insane sentence for a child rapist? What's in it for them?

Well, we've explored the “restorative justice” link, but there's also something else. In the S-P world, few judgments are made about personal behavior; the old “if it feels good, do it” adage from the sixties is commonly accepted. But, usually, even the ACLU draws the line at violent criminal behavior. However, the restorative justice concept is picking up steam in the S-P ranks—the “disease” excuse is featured prominently in S-P criminal philosophy. We shouldn't prosecute street-level dope dealers, for example, we should give them “treatment,” because substance abuse is a disease that needs to be cured, not punished. And it is the “illness,” not the person, that is the cause of the harm people might do. It's really not their fault, you see. In the words of Judge Edward Cashman: “Punishment is not the answer.”

Many of us would like to kill a person who raped our child. That is a natural reaction, a genuine emotional response to a crime that is so heinous it is off the chart. But in the brave new world of the S-P movement, even child rape is not enough to condemn the criminal to spend much of his or her life behind bars. Even though the child is devastated for life, the criminal must be “healed” in order for true justice to take place. This is what America will come to if the secular-progressives ever take over—and if you think I'm exaggerating, you're wrong. The states of Minnesota and Vermont have been heavily influenced by secular-progressive thought. It is no accident that those two states are the only ones in the Union that officially sanction the philosophy of “restorative justice.”

The final part of this miserable story deals with our pals at the
New York Times,
the “all the news that's fit to print” newspaper. Apparently, the plight of the little Vermont girl was not “fit to print,” because the
Times
totally ignored the story. Now, I thought that rather strange. You'll remember the vicious attack on me by
Times
columnist Nicholas Kristof over the Christmas controversy. Kristof, the human rights guy, described me as akin to a Muslim fundamentalist. He also challenged me to join him in reporting human rights abuses abroad. Well, here's my question: If Africa is in play, Nick, why not Vermont?

So on February, 3, 2006, I dedicated my syndicated newspaper column to Kristof and his employers at the
Times
and wrote this:

         

Here's an update on that young Vermont girl whose life has been made a living hell by a justice system that literally could not care less about her.

You may remember that 34-year-old Mark Hulett pleaded guilty to raping the child over a four-year period, starting when she was just six-years-old. The judge in the case frowned when he heard the confession and promptly sentenced the vicious criminal to
60 days
in prison. A few journalists, including myself, picked up on the outrage and, under enormous pressure, Judge Edward Cashman changed the sentence to three years; still an incredible miscarriage of justice.

The girl, now 10, is being raised by foster parents. Vermont authorities believe her mother and stepfather are incapable of properly protecting the child. She is undergoing counseling and is in school, but, according to those who see her every day, she's confused and unhappy.

Surely this young girl's human rights have been violated; no person on this earth should have to suffer the way she has.

A few weeks ago,
New York Times
columnist Nicholas Kristof criticized me for reporting on the Christmas controversy. Kristof asserted that I fabricated the story and ignored “real” stories like the suffering in the Sudan.