Child molester's light sentence draws Brock Turner comparisons

A Missouri judge has handed down a lenient sentence to a young white man convicted of sex crimes. In the aftermath of the Brock Turner trial, that's raising some eyebrows around the country.

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Twenty-three-year-old Joseph Presley pleaded guilty in June to molesting a young boy he was babysitting on two separate occasions. Presley's crime carries a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison.

Judge Calvin Holden initially sentenced Presley to 10 years in prison but then suspended the sentence at his discretion in favor of a 30-day jail term and five years of probation.

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That sentence has drawn parallels to the comparatively light sentences that young white men around the country — Brock TurnerAustin WilkersonDavid Becker and others — have received after sexual assault convictions.

Writing for the New York Daily News, civil rights activist Shaun King says: "Little black boys are treated like men in America while grown white men such as Brock Turner and Joseph Presley are treated like little boys. It's ugly."

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Presley's defense attorney, Dee Wampler, told KSPR a long jail sentence wasn't the answer to Presley's offense.

"Do we really want to take a boy that's not institutionalized, that has not been in prison before, and put him in prison with some real sex molesters and some real rapists?" Wampler asked.

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Wampler pointed to Presley's remorsefulness and his own history of abuse as a child as mitigating factors in the case. Under Missouri law, Presley will likely be registered as a sex offender for the rest of his life.