After a judge dismissed the sentence of Genarlow Wilson -- an honor roll student and homecoming king serving 10 years in prison for having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old when he was 17 -- Georgia's Attorney General appealed, leaving Wilson stuck in jail.Last Monday, June 11th, a judge finally dismissed the sentence of Genarlow Wilson-the honor roll student and homecoming king serving ten years in prison for having consensual oral sex with a 15 year old when he was 17. In granting Wilson's habeas corpus petition, Georgia Superior Court Judge Thomas Wilson wrote that it would be a "grave miscarriage of justice" for Wilson to be kept in prison for the remaining eight years of his sentence.
Yet, immediately after the judge's ruling, Georgia's Attorney General, Thurbert E. Baker, filed a notice saying that his office would appeal the decision, leaving Wilson stuck in jail. Baker's actions have not only robbed Wilson of his long overdue freedom, they epitomize the insanity of a justice system that seems hell-bent on criminalizing young Black men.
At a New Year's Eve party in 2003, Wilson had consensual oral sex with another teen -- she was 15 and he was 17. Under an old Georgia law, he was convicted of aggravated child molestation, a charge intended for adult sexual predators. Sexual intercourse with the same girl would have been a misdemeanor under a "Romeo and Juliet" exemption for contact between minors; but because the exemption did not mention oral sex, Wilson, an honors student and star athlete with no prior criminal record, received a mandatory ten-year sentence without possibility of parole.
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