Asst. U.S. Attorney DeBrotas predecessors
Eric Rinehart, a 34-year-old police officer in Middletown, Indiana, began consensual sexual relationships with two young women, ages 16 and 17. Rinehart was going through a divorce at the time, and in Indiana, he was doing nothing illegal, for 16 is the age of consent in the Hoosier state? Unethical? I tend to think so, but that isn’t part of the story.
One of the girls told Rinehart that she had posed for erotic photos for an earlier, presumably younger boyfriend, and suggested that she do the same for him. So Rinehart gave her his camera, with which she took the lascivious photos. This inspired Rinehart to take some more sexy photos and at least one video of both girls, which he downloaded to his computer.
For this, Rinehart was convicted on two federal charges of producing child pornography. A 1984 federal law had raised the federal age of consent for explicit sexual images of children from 16 to 18. Even though Rinehart was legally having sexual relations with the same women portrayed in the photos; even though, under Indiana law, he could have married them; even though he did not distribute the photos or intend to distribute them, and only had them on his computer for his own use—and even though the photos showed images of what he could see live, 3-D, and in the flesh any time he wanted to, U.S. District Court Judge David Hamilton had to sentence Rinehart to 15 years in prison, thanks to mandatory minimum sentences, and there is no parole in the federal prison system.
Reason reporter Radley Balko, who uncovered this absurd story, provides an excellent analysis of the child pornography laws and mandatory sentencing. But the ethical breakdown here is primarily in one place, the federal prosecutor’s office.
Why would Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven DeBrota prosecute Rinehart for a federal felony under this set of facts? He broke the law, but the circumstances render the violation technical, contradictory, and meaningless. This is precisely the kind of situation in which prosecutorial discretion is essential. Moral matters aside, Rinehart did nothing wrong, and certainly nothing that warranted 15 years behind bars. DeBrota knew about the mandatory sentencing, knew that Rinehart was caught in a law that was never intended to net people like him.
Nevertheless, DeBrota set out to ruin Rinehart’s career and life, and absent a Presidential pardon (fat chance!), he appears to have succeeded. This is the criminal prosecution equivalent of the idiotic no-tolerance decisions in public schools, except that the consequences of this abandonment of compassion, fairness, and common sense is far, far worse. This isn’t justice; it is abuse of power, it is an inhumane travesty of law enforcement.
The misapplication of the vast power of a federal prosecutor can do more harm than ten crooked lawyers at their slimy, greedy worst. The unethical conduct of Steven DeBrota is far worse than anything his victim, Eric Rinehart, did or was accused of doing.
Jack — Do you know if the DOJ made any public statements as to why they decided to pursue this prosecution? Thanks.
Balko’s reportage indicates not. They ususally don’t comment on such matters. I can’t imagine a valid justification.
It is very diffilcult to concentrate on the point here; “misapplication of the vast power of a federal prosecutor “. Not only would I deem Rhinehart’s discretion as unethical, it’s out right disgusting. That an officer of the law would engage in this behavior, further corrupting young people that he should try to salvage. Yup, agreed prosecutor mis-applied his use of power, but I can hardly impact very much sympathy to Rhineharts unjust charges.
I don’t understand your comment. He broke the law as written and passed. The prosecutor’s duty is to apply discretion in the interests of fairness and justice, which in this case would mean not prosecuting. Nevertheless, there was a prosecution, which was a breach of power and discretion? What exactly is so hard to focus on?
Jack:
I can’t thank you enough for writing this article. Yes, these laws do need reform and yes, prosecutors ARE mis-using their elected rights to prosecute people for crimes. Crimes, that years ago would have been considered typical behavior, especially those of teen agers. Too many men, fathers, sons and brothers are going to prison for offenses like: viewing pictures on their personal computers, urinating in a bush while fishing, parking with their wives and having a “back seat moment”, teen sexual behaviors, sexting, passing by a window in the nude in their own homes, brushing up against someone accidentally, “adjusting” themselves in public.
All of these “crimes” are being taken to extreme by prosecutors who want the public to fear and to vote them in to office for being “tough on crime”.
Meanwhile, when these “offenders” leave incarceration, they are not allowed to live in neighborhoods, not allowed to find employment, can not go to school to better themselves, can not live in nursing homes, and most of them can not live with their families because of children or younger siblings still in the home. Now the government is trying to take away their rights to have medical insurance, receive social security or unemployment. A lot of these “offenders” are homeless with no where to go and no way to better themselves. It’s a sad world we live in!
Thank you again for bringing this situation to light!
Blessings to you Jack!
Federal prosecutors are not elected which raises further questions about the motivation of Assistant US Attorney DeBrota. However, if the photos were only viewed by Mr. Rinehart how did it come about that this prosecutor could even determine that there was a prosecutable offense? It would appear that either Mr. Rinehart had the images stored on a work computer which could be problematic for a police officer or to have shared them via the internet with other people or perhaps he or the women were attempting to sell the images. More facts are needed to draw a conclusion that the prosecutor immorally exceeded his prosecutorial discretion.
What? There was no evidence that he shared or tried to sell the images, and while having them on a work computer may have had job implications, it wouldn’t have changed the “crime.”
There was no justification for the charge of having naked photo of women he was having legal consensual sex with. This isn’t that complicated.
Thanks, but please—all the credit should go to Radley Balko, who is tireless in his pursuit of outrageous examples of warped justice.
Jack,
Your words: “This isn’t justice. It is an abuse of power.” You are 100% right. As you pointed out, this man was only taking a picture and looking at what he could look at LIVE anytime and NOT break any law. What he was doing was NOT illegal in his state. Unreal and unjust that he lost 15 years of his life, his reputation and is facing a very sad future because of an over- zealous prosecuter. Thank God for people like you who are not afraid to stand up and call FOUL when stories like this come out. The world needs many more like you!
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This case was brought to Radley Balko’s attention by Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), a sentencing reform group that collects hundreds of horror stories.