Shane Piche raped a 14-year-old girl who rode his bus in upstate New York. His sentence of 10 years\u2019 probation has prompted outrage.<\/b>
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He was her bus driver, ferrying her to school in Watertown, a small city in upstate New York. Then, one day last summer, having plied her with gifts and alcohol, he invited the 14-year-old to his home and raped her.
The driver, Shane Piche, 26, pleaded guilty to third-degree rape earlier this year. But instead of going to prison as the victim\u2019s family had hoped for, Mr. Piche was sentenced on Thursday to 10 years of probation.
He was also assigned the lowest-level status on New York\u2019s sex offender registry, according to an official with the State Supreme Court in Jefferson County. The Level 1 status is reserved for offenders with a low risk of committing another similar crime, and means that his future addresses will not be made public.
In explaining the sentence, Justice James P. McClusky said that Mr. Piche had no prior arrests and that only one victim had been involved, according to the Watertown Daily Times newspaper.
Mr. Piche was ordered not to be left alone with anyone younger than 17, and to pay $1,425 in court and other fees, according to the court official. Prosecutors had initially charged him with second-degree rape, as well as first-degree unlawfully dealing with a child and endangering the welfare of a child.
The sentence has led to angry calls to the judge\u2019s chambers from people outraged by the sentence, which was shared widely on social media and has generated thousands of signatures on an online petition calling for the judge\u2019s ouster.
The case in Watertown, about 70 miles north of Syracuse, also has reignited a fresh debate over the severity of punishments handed down to sex offenders.
In 2016, the former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner was sentenced to six months in prison after having sexually assaulted an unconscious woman. The furor surrounding his case prompted nationwide demands for the resignation of the sentencing judge.
Last year, a doctor in Houston, Shafeeq Sheikh, was given 10 years of probation after raping a patient.
Susan Estrich, a professor at the University of Southern California\u2019s law school, called it \u201cshocking\u201d that Mr. Piche was allowed to plead guilty to what she said were \u201cwatered-down\u201d third-degree rape charges.
\u201cIt\u2019s outrageous,\u201d she said. \u201cThis is back to the future. This is what we\u2019ve been fighting against for 30 years.\u201d
She said the plea agreement effectively blamed the 14-year-old victim. \u201cThis is the beginning of a backlash in the courts \u2014 leaning over backward to protect men,\u201d Professor Estrich said.
Hours after Mr. Piche\u2019s sentencing, a petition was launched on MoveOn.org to remove Justice McClusky from the bench. The judge was elected in 2011 to a 14-year term on the Supreme Court.
\u201cRemove him from his position immediately for his blatant disregard for survivors of sexual assault,\u201d reads the petition that by Tuesday had gathered more than 20,000 signatures.
Prosecutors had requested that Mr. Piche be assigned a Level 2 sex-offender designation, which would have meant that his future addresses would have been published on the state\u2019s sex offender registry.
The victim\u2019s mother had said she had been hoping that Mr. Piche would receive prison time.
\u201cHe took something from my daughter she will never get back and has caused her to struggle with depression and anxiety,\u201d the mother said in a statement obtained by WWNY, a Watertown-area television station. In February, when Mr. Piche entered the guilty plea, the girl\u2019s mother told the station that Mr. Piche \u201cbought her daughter gifts and invited her and other minors to his home, where he gave them alcohol.\u201d
Mr. Piche\u2019s lawyer, Eric T. Swartz, could not be reached on Tuesday for comment, but he told WWNY that the sentence was just.
\u201cHe\u2019ll be a felon for the rest of his life. He\u2019s on the sex offender registry for a long time,\u201d Mr. Swartz told WWNY. \u201cMaybe not the rest of his life because of the level, but this isn\u2019t something that didn\u2019t cause him pain and this isn\u2019t something that didn\u2019t have consequences.\u201d
The maximum sentence for third-degree rape is 1 1\/3 to four years in prison, according to a spokesman for the Unified Court System, Lucian Chalfen. But he said Justice McClusky was \u201cwell within\u201d the sentencing range for the negotiated plea.
\u201cThe defendant is now a convicted sex offender who will spend the next decade on a very onerous and intrusive sex offender probation and have to register as a sex offender,\u201d Mr. Chalfen said in a statement.
He said the majority of the \u201cvitriolic calls\u201d to Justice McClusky have come from out-of-state callers who \u201cknow nothing about the facts and circumstances of the case, thanks to social media.\u201d
\u201cJudicial independence is a cornerstone of our society,\u201d Mr. Chalfen said. \u201cRemoving judges for handing down sentences that some may disagree with cuts both ways, leaving us with no process of accountability.\u201d<\/p>\n