[mhx]

I'd like someone to give me the case for why his 25 year sentence is moral.

[auggy]

"I'd like someone to give me the case for why his 25 year sentence is moral."

I bet the whole story is not being told.

[DBrow]

One clue is in the article- he apparently mouthed off that he "had a right" to do what he did. Fits in with his rich-poor Trotskyite talk.

Judges and juries frequently are swayed by shows of remorse, admissions of guilt, and promises not to do it again, and plea bargains are another good way to get out of doing time (and a plea bargain includes an admission of guilt and an monitored promise to not do it again called probation). "Repent and sin no more" comes to mind as a lesson in forgiveness.

Judges and juries are frequently not impressed with defendants who refuse to admit guilt (claiming a right is salt in that) and who are unrepentant and unremorseful.

Now, that may not be just or moral but I've been in enough courtrooms to see the dynamic. A judge in LA handed a six month sentence to a gang member who huffed, "So?" and the judge changed it to eighteen months on the spot. The gang banger was silent at that point.

And the unknown part of the story may lie in the "distribution" statement, which may simply be a statutory requirement based on quantity, a la possession with intent to distribute, or maybe more, I can't say.