I’m no lawyer, but this judge sounds perverse and open to being overturned.
1. He wasn’t charged with molesting “kids”. How can that affect his sentence? How can the judge even reference that?
2. What he was convicted of was using unapproved amounts of his own $$$ to pay off a blackmailer. IMHO, that shouldn’t be a crime.
3. The only victim I heard come forward was 17 at the time. Was that even a crime in Illinois back in the ‘70s?
4. Isn’t blackmail a felony? Why is this willing “victim” now a hero?
5. I don’t weep for Hastert. I weep for the end of the republic.
Hastert pleaded guilty to the charges against him. There can be no appeal when a defendant pleads guilty.
There was in court testimony from victims of Hastert’s sexual abuse and testimony from their family members. Those actions were the reason for the financial crimes that Hastert committed. That testimony is why the judge called Hastert “a serial molester.”
Hastert admitted in court that he had molested students and he said that he was “deeply ashamed.”
That is to say, MOTIVE, which is always relevant to enhance or minimize the impact of a convection.
If you are broke and your wife comes down with a potentially fatal cancer and you had no insurance, you might me moved to embezzle money for her care, relief of her pain and possibly to save her life. Embezzlement is still a crime. Your motive does not exonerate you BUT that motive would be a LOT less damaging than Hastert's desire to keep his seat in Congress and Speakership and power by using that power for personal gain and to obtain the cash to shut up his victims and keep his constituents in the dark as to just WHAT they had been bamboozled into electing to Congress.
Yes, that is a crime in Illinois and two former teachers at our local public indoctrination high school (one male and one female) are doing substantial time for it. Even in the absence of force, teachers taking such advantage of underage students are deemed RAPISTS.
That colossal level of blackmail is certainly a state felony. If the mail or e-mail was used on two instances by a perp, it can also be federally prosecuted as a RICO felony extortion.
The victim is not a hero but a felon but, under the circumstances, it is quite unlikely that a jury will be empaneled with a prosecutor attempting to convict the blackmailer for victimizing slime like Hastert. I don't weep for Hastert either. The end of the republic? Hastert is only one of all too many problems killing this republic. Life is short (particularly at my age and condition) and I am not going to attempt to write even a partial litany of the rest.