Posted on 02/08/2013 5:14:33 PM PST by daniel1212
CLEVELAND—Denying he ran an Amish cult, the 67-year-old ringleader of hair- and beard-cutting attacks on fellow members of his faith in Ohio was sentenced Friday to 15 years in prison, while family members convicted of carrying out his orders got one to seven years.
The judge said the defendants had violated the constitutional rights protecting religious practice that had also benefited them as Amish. Authorities had prosecuted the attacks as a hate crime.
Before his sentencing, Samuel Mullet Sr. told the judge he had been accused of running a cult. Mullet, his ankles in chains and a white beard down to mid-chest, said that if his community is seen as a cult, "Then I'm going to take the punishment for everybody."...
The government had asked for a life sentence for Mullet, while the defense asked for two years or less.
Some defendants tearfully offered to take the brunt of the blame and punishment on behalf of Mullet or their spouses. Addressing the judge one by one, they said there would be no more beard-cutting attacks.
Freeman Burkholder, the 32-year-old husband of a Mullet niece and father of eight children, apologized to the judge.
"I won't do it again," he said.
Anna Miller, 33, married to a Mullet nephew and mother of six, also apologized, turning to relatives of victims as she said, "I'm sorry, it won't happen again."
Federal prosecutor Bridget Brennan urged the judge to punish Mullet adequately.
"He is a danger to this community," she said. "He is capable of controlling 15 defendants."...
Rhonda Kotnik, attorney for Kathryn Miller, a 24-year-old mother of three who received a one-year sentence, said appeals would focus on whether the hate-crimes law is unconstitutionally broad and whether restraining the victims to cut their beards amounted to kidnapping.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
Better call the Amish Mafia and let them wreck his buggy.
A life in prison for a beard cutting incident? I’d say the punishment doesn’t fit the crime.
Edit:. As the government asked for a life sentence for this, what do you think they might ask for more politically incorrect “hate crimes?”
It does sound like they are trying to set a precedent. Life imprisonment on Venus for quoting the Bible on homosexuality.
15 years? Pretty harsh sentence for murder. Who did he kill?
Maybe the government really really trully from the bottom of their hearts loves those folks who try to live a simple Biblically based life and is outraged that anyone would wish them harm.Or mabye they are being played as fools by the enemy of men's souls who is busy laying the ground work for the future 'protection' of Biblical Christianity.
Back in the good ol' days these wallies that would go around trying to trim beards would be given a sound flogging with the promise of plenty more where that came from should they wish to continue.Now we have the government wanting a life sentence!? All with the best of intentions naturally.What a mess!
Oh yea, this is religious persecution. These folks really P.O. Obama and his Just-us department commies.
Narco-traffickers, human traffickers, killers, rapists, etc all get much less time in jail.
ANY Christian who riles the gubmint pays with his or her life in USA now, as they do in Iran.
I dislike the man but the sentence is too stiff. Anybody else convicted of beard cutting?
>>>>A life in prison for a beard cutting incident? I’d say the punishment doesn’t fit the crime.<<<<
Not in United Socialist States of Amerika. It is a big hate crime, not some harmless black on white rape or murder.
These government idiots has to get fired. They should have seek death penalty for this dangerous dissident!
Granted, it has not been proved that it is a short steps from cutting beards to flying jetliners into skyscrapers, but is best not to take chances.
Why were they cutting beards?
But then you have “Golden Testa,” an advocate of a gluten-free diet: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2986105/posts.
their version of a drive-by hit
Wait, wait just a minute! He can’t be Amish, he’s like, uh, a whiter shade of pale! Or is he the same kind of Amish as Beyonde?
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