Patheos blog
July 21, 2019
By Hemant Mehta
In 2012, Ohio preacher Jason Brothers stayed at the home of a family in Georgia when he was giving a guest sermon at North Mt. Zion Church of God in Hiawassee. When the family’s 14-year-old girl got up for a drink of water that night, Brothers, who was in a wheelchair due to his cerebral palsy, asked her for a hug… then raped her.
The girl only told her parents what happened after they caught her trying to end her own life.
This week, Jason Brothers was sentenced for his crime. The punishment involves no prison time, going back home to Ohio, and remaining on probation for another four years. In other words, nothing of any consequence even though he admitted to two counts of felony sexual battery on a minor.
The reason for that has everything to do with his attorney: Republican House Speaker David Ralston.
According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Ralston took advantage of a legal loophole that allowed him to delay the trial as many times as he wanted as long as he said he was on state business.
Ralston did that at least eight times, dragging the case on for more than six years.
By the time a jury finally heard the victim’s story, she was a 21-year-old woman trying to recount a traumatic incident that happened several years earlier. Her memory wasn’t perfect. Same could be said of the other witnesses. The testimony would’ve been far more powerful if she was, say 15 or 16.
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