ILLINOIS
NWI Times
Sarah Reese sarah.reese@nwi.com, (219) 933-3351
HAMMOND | A former pastor of First Baptist Church of Hammond on Friday asked a federal judge to at least allow his attorney to present evidence showing his 12-year sentence should be overturned.
An attorney for Jack Schaap, 56, persisted in claims that Schaap’s defense attorneys provided ineffective counsel and that U.S. District Judge Rudy Lozano should have considered his teenage victim’s “sexual aggressiveness” at sentencing, federal court records show.
Florida attorney Charles Murray, representing Schaap, also brushed off prosecutors’ claims that Schaap’s sentence did not outweigh the gravity of his offense.
Prosecutors said Schaap’s conduct was “egregious” and done under the guise of providing religious counseling to the girl. Schaap’s attorney wrote such a characterization is an oversimplification of evidence in the case.
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