Photo: Ekaterina Bolovtsova / Pexels
For: Real America News
The Adams County Judge, Robert Adrian, was arrestedsigned to civil matters such as small claims and probate files in an administrative order issued Thursday by Chief Judge Frank McCartney of the Eighth Judicial Circuit, according to the Herald-Whig newspaper.
The removal came after Adrian faced widespread protests overturning the conviction of Drew Clinton, who was found guilty of sexually assaulting to a girl of 18 years old at a graduation party last May.
Am I the only person who thinks Illinois Judge Robert Adrian is disgusting? He said it would not be right to sentence Drew Clinton 13 to prison for raping Cameron Vaughan 18, during a graduation party. This “Judge” and rapist are pigs united in misogyny. pic.twitter.com/zYds0JgNCN
— Frank – ‘Love, Children, Planet’ – Schaeffer (@Frank_Schaeffer) January 04, 2022
The judge issued the stunning reversal during Clinton’s sentencing hearing on January 3, saying that the nearly five months that the teenager spent in the county jail were “a lot of punishment”.
Clinton had faced the mandatory minimum sentence of four years.
The judge presided over the three-day bench trial in October and found Clinton guilty of one of three counts of sexual assault.
He said he overturned the conviction to avoid an appeal he believed would be successful, for which determined that the prosecutors had not “proved their case”.
The prosecutor in the case, A nita Rodríguez, said that she had never seen a judge overturn a ruling like this before and that she was concerned about how it could affect the victim.
The Adrian’s decision prompted an immediate backlash from advocates for sexual assault survivors and forced the victim to go public, emotionally recalling the horrific moment she woke up and was sexually assaulted.
“I woke up at my friend’s house with a pillow over my face so they wouldn’t hear me and Drew Clinton inside of me,” Cameron Vaughan said Tuesday, WGEM reported.
“I asked him to stop several times and he didn’t. I finally got up off the couch and pushed him off of me and he jumped up and started playing video games like nothing happened,” he said.
Cameron’s mother Rachael Vaughan told the New York Post on Thursday that she worries the overturned conviction could send her daughter spiraling into a mental “dark place.”
“To say that we are completely shocked and stunned is an understatement,” he said.
“I am concerned that when the smoke settles and things calm down take her to a dark place. It is a constant concern”.
The distraught mother said her daughter completely changed after the assault. His grades dropped, he resigned from the team and went so far as to try to take his own life.
Cameron Vaughan’s family was “shocked” and ” stunned” by Judge Robert Adrian’s decision.
She told the newspaper that the judge “completely pulled the rug out from under her”.
“The judge considered that, since he has 18 years and no criminal record, five months is enough,” Vaughan said.
“And that’s not a long time. He was found guilty and was supposed to serve four years and at least 85 percent of that time… That is the law.
“This opened all the wounds again and it is heartbreaking, because after his aggression, he tried to commit suicide”.
The petition calling for Adrian to face charges for “abuse of discretion and the judiciary” had obtained more than 23, signatures until Friday night.
According to The Whig Herald, Adrian ordered a prosecutor in a separate case out of the courtroom, after the attorney “liked” a Facebook post critical of his decision. Clinton’s attorney, Drew Schnack, said he agreed with the judge’s decision. He argued that the prosecution did not prove his case and that the evidence was not strong enough to warrant conviction.
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