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http://www.naacp.org/advocacy/justice/gwilson_petition/
BACKGROUND
As a high school senior in Douglas County Georgia, Genarlow Wilson had a 3.2 GPA and multiple offers of football scholarships to competitive universities. His whole future should have been ahead of him. Instead, Genarlow Wilson has spent the last two years in prison for the “crime” of a consensual sex act with a fellow high school student.
FACTS OF THE CASE
At age 17, during a New Year's Eve Party, Genarlow Wilson engaged in consensual oral sex with a schoolmate who was three weeks from her 16th birthday.
Genarlow and 5 of his peers were brought to trial for sexual acts at the party involving the 15 year old girl. Genarlow was the lone defendant who refused to accept a 5 year sentence as a plea bargain because he could not bear to be labeled for the rest of his life as a “sexual predator” for an act which was initiated by the alleged victim.
Because the age of consent in Georgia is 16, a jury was forced to find Genarlow guilty of aggravated child molestation.
According to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 47% of 9th through 12th graders have already had sex, and over 14% have had sex with 4 or more partners. While these staggering numbers suggest that perhaps as a society we should take a greater role in educating our teenagers about the risks of teen sexual behavior, unless we believe that millions of our teenagers should be imprisoned, Genarlow should not be singled out and forced to waste his youth for a consensual sex act.
At around the same time that Genarlow was sentenced, a high school teacher was convicted of having sex with a student. The white female teacher was sentenced to just 90 days. Genarlow received a mandatory sentence of 10 years.
Under the archaic Georgia law, it was a more serious crime for teens less than 3 years apart to have oral sex than intercourse. If there had been intercourse instead of oral sex, Genarlow would have been convicted of a misdemeanor and received a much lighter sentence.
The Georgia legislature has modified the law to make oral sex the lesser misdemeanor; however the law did not free Genarlow because it was not retroactive.
Georgia State Senator Emanuel Jones has courageously introduced Georgia Senate Bill 37 which, if approved by the Legislature, would give the court discretion to, at last, free Genarlow Wilson.
It is a waste of tax dollars to imprison Genarlow Wilson for his victimless crime, depriving him of the chance to earn an education and his own livelihood.
The community and the State of Georgia would be better served to have Genarlow Wilson in an institution of higher learning than a penal institution.
RESTORATIVE JUSTICE
The sentencing of Genarlow Wilson is evidence of a justice system that is broken and more beholden to the interests of prison-builders than to the well-being and rehabilitation of individuals and communities.
The NAACP seeks to free Genarlow Wilson today and to call permanent attention to the fact that state resources are squandered and the community pays when such promising lives are ruined. It is time to rethink our justice system from the ground up and make a radical switch from punitive to restorative justice.
Restorative justice is an alternative to the traditional justice system which implements consequences at the community level that ensure safer neighborhoods, truly penitent offenders, restitution for victims, lower recidivism rates, fewer families torn apart and no lives needlessly sacrificed to the blind and ineffective rhetoric of being “tough on crime.”
TAKE ACTION!
Download Flyer
Visit www.naacp.org or http://wilsonappeal.com
Call, fax or write members of the Georgia legislature and urge them to pass Senate Bill 37.
If you are a resident of Georgia, you can find your state representative at http://www.legis.state.ga.us/
FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:
NAACP Field Operations
NAACP National Director of Field Operations Reverend Charles White, [410.580.5777, cwhite@naacpnet.org]
NAACP Region V Director, Dr. Francys Johnson [404.688.8868, francysjohnson@gmail.com]
