More Good News: Convicted child molester is likely to be chosen in the MLB draft

C'est Moi

C'est Moi

Dishin' it out.
Location
Houston Y'all
Link: https://www.yahoo.com/sports/convicted-child-molester-likely-chosen-mlb-draft-151015468.html

...For more than a year now, teams have grappled with the idea of Heimlich. He is Oregon State’s ace and one of the best college pitchers in the nation; he is the signatory of a guilty plea to molesting a 6-year-old female relative when he was 15.


Well, I guess he'll get the big bucks because heaven forbid that professional athletes in this country be held to any moral standard. :rolleyes:
 

Here's a great article about this:

www.si.com/mlb/2018/05/16/luke-heimlich-oregon-state

He will probably get drafted by a major league team in one of today's 30 rounds. I have trouble knowing for certain how I feel due to several questions. First, for six years he has maintained his innocence and passed a polygraph test. His niece was only 6 years old, and her mom was divorcing Luke's brother during this period. We don't know what effect this had on the situation.

Second, he completed all of the tasks that the judge required of him...counseling, classes, probation for two years, and a written letter of apology to his niece. He was judged to be a low-risk sex offender unlikely to commit another sex crime. He paid his debt to society as we say. He even left the team last season in order not to distract them during the College World Series when the news came out. That cost him dearly.

Third, in addition to the divorce turmoil for his family and his own situation, his mother was a social worker who had access to sound advice from others. The lawyer believed a guilty plea was beneficial to the family in order to avoid dragging everybody into court for a trial. Some feel like I do that if you are innocent then why would you plead guilty? Did they get bad legal advice or was he guilty of some molestation? I'm sure Luke Heimlich has thought about that all year.

Fourth, we can never see the whole picture. What does his older brother think about what happened? What does the victim think now that she is 12? Is it possible that someday she might admit that her mother forced her to say these things because of her bitter divorce? How about his parents and the victim's mother's parents?

Had he become a computer whiz and a millionaire nobody would have ever heard about this story. The price of fame certainly cost him a fortune in baseball.
 

He admitted his guilt at the time and was sent to counseling, etc. And to those claiming he "was ONLY 15 years old" I say, yes... old enough to know better. (Besides, he's in college now so not much older. :rolleyes:) I have a real problem with that all just being overlooked and now he'll be a baseball "HERO" making millions. Kind of disgusting from where I'm sitting.

Typical from the professional athletes of our time, though. Dog fights, murderers, rapists and now pedophiles... GO TEAM GO.
 
If you read the article(s), this is not your typical juvenile sex abuse situation. Only two people really know what happened. It's very clear that the boy denied the allegations, discussed them with his parents, and, after choosing to plead guilty, performed all of the punishments expected of him. They trusted the judgment of their attorney who felt a He Said/ She Said case automatically meant he would be found guilty.

What's not clear to me is if he ever was alone with his niece since his mother home schooled their children and he was seldom home, or why would they automatically find him guilty if he did plead innocent, and why didn't the father (a former pastor) and mother seek a different lawyer for a second opinion?

Meanwhile, over 900 players have been drafted and nobody has drafted him. There are ten more rounds left. All the publicity must be tearing the family apart. His brother won't talk to him, and the girl must be aware of the spotlight. Will he get a second chance, or pay for this the rest of his life? We'll see.
 
I saw a blurb on MSM.com a few weeks ago. A self admitted, unrepentant, child molester is running for office. Where was that ? Pennsylvania ? I forgot.

I keep saying America is falling apart at the seams. Few people pay any attention.
 
For some of you the good news is Heimlich was not drafted by any major league team this week. Although he clearly was more talented than over 1,000 of the draftees, clubs must have all felt it wouldn't be worthwhile to sign him. It's ironic that none of the sex offender news would have ever been reported had it not been for two police mistakes. His case would have already been sealed and you and I would have never heard of him.

What's next for him? He pitches for Oregon State against Minnesota this weekend. What his mindset will be is anyone's guess. There is a chance that an Independent League team might sign him as they don't fall under major league baseball's wing. Sometimes they will give a chance to a celebrity of sorts to help boost their attendance.
 
People that take a plea must consider the future consequences very carefully and what that plea will cost them in the future. Some crimes may be forgiven by the public because they feel that the perpetrator served his time or paid his debt to society and are willing to move on. However, when a defendant accepts a plea of guilty of rape or child molestation, for example; sometimes the story never ends and the issue doesn't go away. It may follow that person for an eternity.

If that person't attorney suggests to just accept the plea, it's best sometimes to fight the allegations and allow a jury to decide the outcome. People do have a tendency to think that if a defendant is willing to accept a plea, they must be guilty, otherwise, why would they take a chance on having to carry around that burden for the rest of their life?

At 16, he may have been too young to make the decision of whether to take up the fight or to accept the plea and that's when that person needs to depend on his parents or another adult's sound advice. If the parents were looking at the costs involved to take the matter to court, the attorney's fees could have financially ruined them, but to accept a plea may have just stung them a bit, but they would have been able to recover from the loss of their finances. Sometimes money does play a big part in making these types of decisions.

I would hope that there was a very intense investigation at the time of this incident and that the child was physically examined by a trained medical professional. A lot can be derived from a thorough examination.
 

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