CSU QB isn't on SOR because he was convicted as a minor

This article discusses whether registered persons deserve the right for second chances. Derek Logue of OnceFallen.com was also cited in this story.

https://www.mydaytondailynews.com/news/crime--law/csu-isn-sex-offender-registry-because-conviction-came-minor/th6R85KQTdeT46e8WobRoK/

CSU QB isn’t on sex offender registry because conviction came as minor
By Josh Sweigart and Max Filby - Staff Writer

Posted: 5:00 a.m. Saturday, March 24, 2018

Central State University football player Trent Mays was convicted in 2013 along with a Steubenville High School teammate of raping a 16-year-old girl who was incapacitated by alcohol. But because Mays was a juvenile at the time, his conviction does not appear on the sex offender registry.
If not for widespread publicity of the crime, Mays’ conviction would be unknown to many of his fellow students, and possibly to the school.

Central State officials would not comment on their decision to allow Mays to enroll and play football, citing federal laws protecting student privacy.

Mays is one of 15 registered sex offenders in Greene County and 43 in Montgomery County who are not on the public registry because they committed their crimes as juveniles. Many of them are now adults.

State law requires juvenile offenders to report to the sheriff’s office where they live, but not where they go to school.

TOM ARCHDEACON: Trent Mays learning to make right decisions at CSU 

Greene County officials say Mays is the only juvenile offender who has reported a current college address in Greene County and none have registered a college or university in Montgomery County.

Ma’lik Richmond, who was convicted along with Trent Mays for the Steubenville rape, faced intense public pressure when Youngstown State let him on their team last year. The school said the team wouldn’t let him play after an online petition called for his removal from the team. Richmond ended up playing following a settlement with the school after he filed a lawsuit.

A pitcher at Oregon State quit the college’s baseball team after a newspaper revealed he was charged with molesting a six-year-old girl when he was 15.

RELATED: Sex offender says Ohio’s registry ‘destroys lives,’ should be abolished

“He went from being a major league draft possibility to being not drafted at all and probably won’t ever play baseball his entire life,” said Derek Logue, a registered sex offender in Cincinnati who now runs a website advocating for abolishing the registry. “His life is ruined.”

In response to this incident, Oregon State this year enacted a new policy requiring all prospective students to self-report if they have prior convictions or sex offenses. Similar policies exist at some, but not all, Ohio schools.

RELATED: Student twice charged and acquitted of rape wants to put past behind

Logue doesn’t believe any new laws or restrictions are needed in Ohio schools.

“You have these laws that dictate every aspect of how we live our lives…and the laws just seem to pile up year after year,” he said. “In time it begins to restrict our ability to become a productive member of society.”

YSU Football player successfully sues University for right to play football

The man served his time, let him play. And play he has, though just a little.

https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/convicted-rapist-malik-richmond-remains-at-youngstown-state-as-school-settles-suit/

Convicted rapist Ma'lik Richmond remains at Youngstown State as school settles suit
by Ben Kercheval

Oct 3, 2017

Ma'lik Richmond, the Youngstown State football player who was convicted in the Steubenville High School rape case of 2012 in Ohio, will be allowed to remain on the roster and play football for the program. This decision was reached when lawyers representing Richmond and Youngstown State filed a motion to dismiss the federal lawsuit filed by Richmond against the school.
The case was dismissed with prejudice. As such, Richmond cannot bring forward the same complaint. Attorneys for Richmond argued that the school could not bar him from playing so long as he followed school rules.
"What is most important is that Ma'lik moves on," said Susan Stone, one of Richmond's attorneys, in a statement obtained by the Associated Press. "This was never a case about money. This is a case about Ma'lik being given all the opportunities afforded a student of good standing."
"This has been a complex situation," a Youngstown State statement read. "While the settlement agreement may cause concern for some, we believe it is in the best overall interest of the university, students and the community."
Richmond, a defensive lineman, served less than a year in juvenile detention for his crime. He attended two schools after his release and joined YSU as a walk-on this past year. The lawsuit claimed that Richmond and his family spoke with YSU president Jim Tressel and coach Bo Pelini about joining the team, and that both were supportive.
However, in August, when news of Richmond's arrival got around, a petition was created to remove Richmond from the football team. The university then said that he would not play for the team but would remain part of the program and lose a year of eligibility. Richmond quit the team before filing his lawsuit in September. A federal judge granted a temporary order saying Richmond could not be barred from playing while the case was being reviewed unless, as Football Scoop noted, the coach (Pelini) opted not to play him. 
However, Pelini played Richmond in garbage time of a 59-9 blowout of Central Connecticut State on Sept. 16. "You have to be happy for the kid," Pelini said. "This isn't about me." Richmond has not played since.
Richmond's father, Nathaniel, was shot and killed in August by a probation officer in Steubenville when he opened fire on a judge, who returned fire.

Th Vindicator OpEd discusses the second chance given to football player on the registry

This is an OpEd worth reading.

http://www.vindy.com/news/2017/aug/06/the-school-of-redemption/

The school of redemption

Published: Sun, August 6, 2017 @ 12:00 a.m.

By Todd Franko

We forgive. We hate.

They are two polarizing traits that distinguish humans from all other species.

In America, we are exceptional at both, and that is the paradox in “The Land of Dreams.”

We watch news footage of kangaroo leadership and human atrocities in far-flung places and convince ourselves that we are an advanced and reasoned society as we sign checks to the needy, walk racetracks for cancer, build homes for the poor and so on.

All of it, though, conceals an ugly American truth – like a waterway masking a nasty shore.

We are the world’s best at punishment.

The International Centre for Prison Studies reported our American imprisonment at 716 per 100,000 people, followed by such world powers as, ahem, St. Kitts & Nevis (714), Seychelles (709), U.S. Virgin Islands (539), Barbados (521), Cuba (510), Rwanda (492), Belize (476) and Russia (475).

The Council of Europe measured criminal justice systems of like-minded countries. Our rate of 478 per 100,000 far exceeded Canada (188), Australia (130), New Zealand (192) and Japan (51).

These measures do not take into account the thousands of citizens trying to walk a straight line amid a societal minefield of demands such as: check this previous felon box, sign these criminal registries, don’t be this close to this place, call here at this time, don’t own this, pee here, work there and more.

Hell – in many parts of our glorious land, criminals get to pay for this privilege to be caught one inch out of line.

So by many measures, we are a society that has perfected punishment.

It is perfect, after all, right? Not one innocent person has ever been incarcerated and not one perpetrator has ever lived a purposeful life again after their crime.

That’s the legacy that now emerges in a great debate here in Youngstown in our religion that is football.

On the Youngstown State University football roster is Ma’lik Richmond. He played a role in one of the most heinous chapters in recent Ohio high-school football history in Steubenville. Richmond’s sex crime – as a teen against another teen – was horrific. What adult leadership in the city did then in trying to hide the crime was shameful.

That was Steubenville 2012.

In Youngstown 2017, Ma’lik is trying to walk on to the football team after enrolling last August.

It’s not a popular decision for many. But equally, it has support from many.

That’s how the team’s 2017 campaign will begin.

Much of the uproar is about letting a sex offender enjoy the privilege of playing on the team. Among the talk on social media:

“You give second chances to nonviolent offenders. Not to rapists.”

“Ask his victim if she believes he deserves a ‘2nd chance.’”

America – the land of perpetual punishment.

What Ma’lik did was reprehensible.

But finding punishment equitable to the pain endured by the victim is something we will never reconcile in any world calculation.

In mankind’s worst of crimes – murder – all advanced societies long ago abandoned the rule that all killers must be killed. From that foundation, all other punishments trickle.

We cannot possibly lock up forever all violent offenders – despite our best attempts.

So if we are to not lock up offenders forever, then re-entry and redemption are the paths we must plow. We trust the creation of those paths to be made at impartial times by impartial parties.

To ask a victim and family to decide on when and how punishment ends for a perpetrator is as skewed as asking the same from the perpetrator and that family. It’s a slippery, subjective slope.

Richmond’s five-year path to redemption has included a juvenile detention facility, a return to his high school and his football team (the latter I think was incorrect). It continued to one university setting, and then to another and then to YSU and now to YSU football.

All of it unblemished, as best as officials can determine.

Of the many things Youngstown State University is known for or is becoming known for, you can include a title of The School of Redemption.

From coaches to city corridors to athletes to students. If there is a national poll for rebuilding or redeeming careers, the current YSU might be ranked No. 1.

The latest chapter is Ma’lik.

If we’re enjoying much of what the university is now under President Tressel (as we seem to be) and what the team is now under Bo Pelini (as we seem to be), then this decision with Ma’lik deserves the same amount of opportunity as their other decisions.

This is their decision that they will own – made not just as president and coach, but also as husbands and fathers of daughters.

People who chide such decisions rarely have the privilege or pain of looking into someone’s eyes and making life-changing decisions such as this.

Criminals have that chance. And that they make the wrong one is always tragic and often fatal.

Our system says most such people will live amongst us at some point again.

Hopefully they see how other humans act with a life’s fate in their hands and can learn accordingly.

That’s the School of Redemption.

Todd Franko is editor of The Vindicator. He likes emails about stories and our newspaper. Email him at tfranko@vindy.com. He blogs, too, on Vindy.com. Tweet him, too, at @tfranko.