Should Jalen Kitna Have Been Required To Register as a Sex Offender?
Most people know by now that the attorneys for the University of Florida’s backup quarterback Jalen Kitna cut a deal with the state attorney’s office so that there was no prison time (only 6 months of probation for each of the two second-degree misdemeanor counts of disorderly conduct, possibly being released from the second set of probation if he follows the terms of the plea agreement). But the most important break that the prosecutor gave Kitna was that he does NOT have to register as a sex offender.
NPR WUFT in Gainesville, Florida, looked at more than 1,000 cases finding “…there have been seven others in Alachua County since 1996 charged with exactly five counts of possession or distribution of CP – just like Kitna – but only two of the seven had otherwise clean records before they were swept up in the legal system.”
One received a two-year prison sentence with four years of sex offender probation and was required to register as a sex offender. The other person was sentenced to four years in prison and required to register as a sex offender.
Gainesville, Florida, ABC TV 20 interviewed the state attorney’s office for an explanation of why Kitna was not sent to prison or placed on the sex offender registry.
Unlike most people charged with CP who have to rely on a public defense attorney who is grossly overworked, Kitna had a family that could provide two defense attorneys: one from Gainesville and one from Jacksonville.
In the New York Times 2019 article, “The Internet Is Overrun with Images of Child Sexual Abuse. What Went Wrong?” (paywall) by Michael H. Keller and Gabriel J. X. Dance, CP was found to be not doubling or tripling but growing exponentially.
The New York Times article stated: In 2018, “tech companies reported over 45 million online photos and videos of children being sexually abused – more than double what they found the previous year. Twenty years ago, the online images were a problem; 10 years ago, an epidemic. Now, the crisis is at a breaking point.” Conclusion: What we are doing is not working.
Do we feel that a harsher sentence would better serve the cause of justice? Some of our FAC members have stated at our website that they felt the sentence should have been harsher. Or would justice be served by seeing more such plea deals, rather than fewer, if defendants pose a low risk to re-offend?
The sexual recidivism rate also needs to be considered in making research-based policies: The U.S. Sentencing Commission’s Report: Federal Sentencing of Child Pornography Offenses, June 29, 2021 found that “recidivism events by non-production CP offenders released or placed on probation in 2015, after a three-years follow-up period was 4.3%…the lowest recidivism rate for all criminal offenses.”
The United States is leaning toward harsher and harsher sentences as we live in a country where punishment is often considered the only way to change one’s bad behavior, unlike Canada and Europe that place a greater emphasis on prevention and rehabilitation.
Regardless of how one feels about Kitna’s sentence, one thing we can agree upon is that requiring people to register as a sex offender is doing nothing to make society safer — a statement backed up by research.
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I thought the whole point and basic of Florida Action Committee, ACSOL, NARSOL, etc., was that NO one should have to register as a sex offender.
Therefore, to answer the question in the title of this article, I say no… he should not have been required to register as a sex offender.
Mig; Well said. Thank you 😊
Must have been nice to have an opportunity to pleade your way out of the registry. I took a plea, except the registry didn’t exist at the time. So I had no choice.
So yeah it burns me a little when I hear this kind of thing.
@Pariah
Same. I did not learn of a registry until 6 years after my offense, when I was being released. First two things I had to do upon release was visit the probation department, then go down to the Sheriff’s department and register.
Having said that, when I first registered, it was a 2 hour interrogation. Now I go in, get a photo taken, answer a few questions and am in and out in 10 minutes. (Two different counties as I moved away from the one that treated you like you had just slaughtered 50 people)
I was teaching at a university when I answered an ad on Craigslist. Turns out that it was a police sting. I got twenty-two months in a DOC hotel, ten years probation, and a lifetime registry for no victim. I’m glad that that the guy escaped my fate, but yea it hurts. I hope that he learns from it.
So they say cp has grown to a breaking point on the internet ? Meanwhile the Grady fudds are spending they’re time and money on bait and switch games to entrap guys looking for adults on adult web sites oh and sending goon squads to do driver’s license and residency checks not to ask the question of how much of the cp is posted by the Grady fudds to use to ensnare more people and how much of that have they lost control of they should be arrested for every piece that they post
Since I’m on the hit list for only one federal count of possessing CP, everyone else should be too. This case just proves there is no such thing as equal justice.
The player, the lawyer, the prosecutor and the judge all went to UF that why it’s really hard not to be bias. Rules for thee but not for me. I see this as nothing but two set of legal systems, one for the rich and one for the 99% of us. Somehow he gets a second degree felony drop to a couple of bullshit 2nd degree misdemeanor with the chance to be off in six months mean while https://reason.com/2017/04/14/florida-man-gets-100-years-for-possessin/ this guy was 6 years older and didn’t play football and look at his deal. Silver spoon and a silver get out of jail free card must be nice to have a competent lawyer unlike the last in class public defender most get stuck with.
@Eugene
Meanwhile, many of us like myself were not only put on the registry retroactively, but for life. Registry didn’t even exist when I was sentenced.
Yes, I imagine that is beyond frustration that their afforded the opportunity not to be on the registry while you were put on after the fact. I do hope they grant you your release from the registry soon