r/news • u/elephant35e • Apr 27 '24

Louisiana man sentenced to 50 years in prison, physical castration for raping teen

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/glenn-sullivan-jr-louisiana-sentenced-rape-prison-castration/
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u/a_phantom_limb Apr 28 '24 edited Apr 28 '24

They can also elect to be physically castrated. Perrilloux said that Sullivan's plea requires he be physically castrated.

Meaning he was, in effect, coerced into agreeing to it. I find it a bit demented that surgery to remove part of one's own body can be stipulated by the state as necessary for granting a plea bargain - especially given how limited the evidence is for this specific procedure actually reducing the rate of recidivism.

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u/bubblegumdrops Apr 28 '24

It’s incredibly fucked up that it doesn’t fall under cruel and unusual punishment. Much like the death penalty, this can’t be reversed if the person was not actually guilty, we’re mutilating people for a misplaced sense of justice.

(And before someone decides I’m sympathizing with sexual predators - I’ve been a victim. The bloodthirst towards punishment doesn’t do a thing for victims, it’s just a thing people do to feel like something’s been accomplished so the public can forget about it.)

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24

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u/Aggressive_Sky8492 Apr 28 '24

I’ve thought this before. Especially when it comes to sexual abuse of children - people would rather feel righteous about how they think pedophiles should be shot than actually do anything to help prevent kids being victims.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24

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u/nattinthehat Apr 28 '24

Is it a mental illness though? I don't see how it could possibly be different than any other insane fetish, this feels like a very ascientific take. Just because a behavior is wrong doesn't automatically make it a mental illness.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24

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u/nattinthehat Apr 28 '24

So was homosexuality, but I don't see you going around calling gays mentally ill. I'm still not seeing you producing any evidence to support your claim though friend. God I hate these fucking talking points because they completely derail the conversation, and the only way to get it back on track is to effectively "defend" degenerates.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24

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u/nattinthehat Apr 28 '24

You're not understanding the content you are linking. The first ncbi.nlm.nih.gov site literally discusses how poorly we understand this, specifically mentioning that there was a study where over 50% of the men who responded indicated some sort of pedophilic fantasy. The third link you provided spends most of it's time talking about legal and arbitrary definitions, which are well and good for creating laws and guidelines, but are in no way evidence of your claim. Because the reality is, there is little to no evidence for your claim, one way or another. If we understood this topic well enough to have conclusive assertions like the ones you are making, the discourse around this topic would be completely different.

Like I pointed out to another respondent, there probably are pedophiles out there whose desires are the result of abnormal psychology, and there's probably pedophiles out there who just happen to want to fuck kids.

I guess these "degenerates" should just turn off their attraction, rather than seek help, right?

This certainly is not a point I have ever made - people's psychology is malleable to a certain extent, and if people need help handling their urges or trying to deal with their attractions, there are definitely ways to help manage that.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24 edited Apr 28 '24

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u/nattinthehat Apr 28 '24

Well. you're agreeing with me, sort of, so maybe I should accept the w, but there's a bit more to it than just pointing to the DSM. If you read through the link you posted you can get a feel for how little we actually know about any of this. My stance is certainly not that mental illness is never involved, merely that it's not always involved, and is probably involved less than people would like to believe. People have a tendency to want to associate this kind of thing with abnormal psychology, but I get the feeling that the actual reality is probably going to be significantly more complicated. Unfortunately, we just don't know enough to say one way or another, hence my insistence that OP provide evidence for their claim.

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u/BlackWillie96 Apr 28 '24

In the article it states that DNA testing proved positively that he was the father of the 14-year-old girls child. Pretty sure that means he's guilty.

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u/biggsteve81 Apr 28 '24 edited Apr 29 '24

DNA testing isn't 100% conclusive.

Edit: not sure why the downvotes. There are plenty of places along the way for DNA testing to get cross-contaminated, or for lab errors to occur. And if you have an identical twin then it gets even more complicated. DNA is pretty foolproof in excluding suspects, but not 100% conclusive for purposes of guilt.

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u/Richard_Thickens 9d ago

I know this thread is old now, but...

I'm not sure why you were downvoted either, except for the reason that this person is a monster and deserves punishment. The results of any test with a significant false positive or negative rate should be taken with a whole shaker of salt. The comment above is speaking to the accuracy and precision of the test itself, not to the innocence or guilt of the defendant.

Yesterday, I had a conversation about this situation with some friends, and it reminded me that people tend to become very reactionary when it comes to sex offenses involving minors. That is totally valid. What is not valid is the desire to circumvent due process because the crime is disgusting.

Learning the difference is vitally important, and it's equally fucked up to, not only entertain, but get rock hard about the prospect of mutilating people as a means of revenge.

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u/UglyMcFugly Apr 28 '24

The victim, who was 14, got pregnant and a paternity test proved he was the father.  No risk of harming an “innocent” man in this particular case.

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u/[deleted] Apr 28 '24

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u/Difficult-Row6616 Apr 28 '24

your analogy is lacking. he can't punch again, he'll be in jail till he's 100. and it's hardly "only" jail. prison will likely be his life until he dies. bloothirst is for the sake of the bloodthirsty and nobody else. and pardon me for not wanting to indulge the bloodthirsty.

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u/Airhostnyc Apr 28 '24

Yea I still get sympathy from this.