Former GOP Official Pleads Guilty to Selling Babies

[smityx]

I thought it was the Democrats who ran pedo camps

A major and repeating theme among republicans seems to always be projection. When they start spouting off crap it's usually a high probability they are already guilty of the same crime just trying to redirect the attention.

[Powerogue]

I would really think human trafficking and child prostitution would be a cause for more than "up to" 10 years in prison.

[Poopymonster]

I would really think human trafficking and child prostitution would be a cause for more than "up to" 10 years in prison.

It would, but he passed the melanin test and passed the wealth threshold that mitigates serious punishment. But as Cubby pointed out:

He will more than likely get more - unless some plea deal is found. Those sentencing guidelines are just for the federal charges - he still faces multiple state related charges. And considering what he did, I doubt anyone will allow him to run them concurrently. He'll be in jail for 20+ years, during the best years of his life.

[Ivanstone]

Not his first brush with the law.
https://www.civilbeat.org/2018/11/ma...-some-lawyers/

He got hit in 2006 but the ruling was overturned.

He's been doing this for almost 20 years.

I'm also wondering who started this investigation and when. I think its state and federal authorities. Sheriff Joe seems to have let him slide.

Edit:
https://www.sltrib.com/news/2019/10/...cted-official/
"Officials with Utah’s attorney general’s office said Wednesday that they began investigating Petersen’s adoption law practice in October 2017, after a hospital staffer in Utah called an attorney general tip line with concerns about a possible illegal adoption involving a Marshallese woman who had given birth at the hospital."

Much like sexual assault investigations, Sheriff Joe does not have the time to investigate adoption and medicaid fraud.

[Stormspark]

I would really think human trafficking and child prostitution would be a cause for more than "up to" 10 years in prison.

Well, they aren't white babies, they are pacific islanders, so they are just barely "not white" enough for the guy to basically get a slap on the wrist.

[DarkTZeratul]

I would really think human trafficking and child prostitution would be a cause for more than "up to" 10 years in prison.

At least by my reading, it sounds like he was "just" the endpoint setting up the adoptions, and not directly involved with the trafficking and prostitution bits. Kind of like how a banker laundering money for the mafia isn't going to get dinged for drug smuggling and murder.

Which doesn't make what happened any less heinous, or him less despicable for supporting it, he's just not legally culpable for the whole scope of awfulness.

[RaoBurning]

What is wrong with Maricopa county? I have never actually been there, and every time I see it in the news it is connected to some bizarrely horrific shit. It is a pretty urban place, why does it keep electing these completely vile people?

This isn't some minor political scandal like banging someone's wife or getting caught with a hooker. This is some straight up warcrimes minus the war. Holy shit, don't the Republicans love the death sentence? Can we use it on guys like this?

Dude, I was born and raised in Maricopa county (which is a pretty big place so it doesn't really narrow things down much, honestly) but holy shit I have no idea how Arizona keeps popping out the level of fuckawful we do. Arpaio was bad enough but Jesus Christ this is "the editor said to tone it down" levels of bad villainy.

Stranger yet, this is the first I'm hearing of it. Even accounting for being out of town for a few days someone in my family would have said something, I'd have thought.