What is the point in charging this guy? How much money and time will be spent that could be used on other, more serious matters?



By ANTHONY CORMIER

Sarasota, FL Herald-Tribune

Published: March 25, 2008

MANATEE COUNTY - Prosecutors are moving ahead with a case against one of two 93-year-old men picked up during undercover prostitution stings.

In the case of Frank Milio, prosecutors have issued subpoenas and plan to take him to trial in April.

Milio, according to police records, tried to pay $20 in November to an undercover officer on 14th Street West.

Milio recently told the Herald-Tribune he was only flirting with the woman.

"I haven't had that in years," he said. "Ninety-three is kind of old."

Carlos Underhill, 93, will not be charged, although he does not deny stopping to chat with the "good-looking girl" who made eyes at him and turned out to be an undercover officer.

Police say Underhill was willing to pay $30 for sex and that he promised to come back a few hours later to consummate the deal.

Prosecutors say that they cannot move ahead with the criminal case because there is no way to prove Underhill planned to come back.

Underhill was fined $150 for trying to pick up a prostitute in 1990, when he was 75. In the latest case, he says, he was not cruising Tamiami Trail for sex: He just wanted to chat with the buxom woman who smiled at him as he drove past.

"All I was going to do was talk," he said Monday. "It wasn't for sex. I am 93, you know."

http://www2.tbo.com/content/2008/mar/25/93-year-old-charged-sex-sting/

Maybe you misread? He was not charged according to the article.

But, if he had made the deal right then, and not conditional on his return, and if all in order with the sting operation, then yes I would charge him.

I know that it would be serious to the me if I lived on that street or if I owned the business in front of where the prositution hook-up was taking place.

RTC:

So at what upward age should people be excused from criminal responsibility?

To charge someone that is 93 years old (and, yes, someone was charged - just read the first paragraph), for someone that is 93 years old charged with what in Texas is a Class B misdemeanor, it seems rather pointless.

The age at which you decline to prosecute obviously depends on the seriousness of the crime and how old the defendant is. There is no one simple answer for that. But charging a 93 yr old for this seems silly and vindictive.

quote:

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Originally posted by Shannon Edmonds:
RTC:

So at what upward age should people be excused from criminal responsibility?

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He's just baiting you.

No fishing permitted.

If I were the defense on this one I'd surely ask for a jury trial.

I'm not sure I'd want one as the prosecutor.

Which would you prefer?

I wouldn't mind a jury but I would make sure that I had a witness(es) about the effect of prositution in that area. Its not like you are asking the jury to send the 93 year old man to the pen, you just want him to stop trying to pick up hookers on the street. I might also point out the dangers of a 93 year old man going to a prostitute (no snickering, I mean that he might get hurt if she tried to rob him or her pimp tried to rob him).

I snickered - please accept my apology. FRED

But, Stacey, it's not likely that the old guy had the resources to be Client Number 9. Where's he supposed to go? Sorry, but I snickered too, Fred.

No, definitely don't want a jury.

Snickered here as well, Stac.

Well, RTC, should these couple of old dearies (probably grandmothers) not be charged as well?

LOS ANGELES - Two elderly women accused of killing two transient men with a car so they could collect nearly $3 million in insurance money were videotaped talking about the scheme while in FBI custody, the prosecutor said in opening statements Tuesday.


"It's your fault," Olga Rutterschmidt, 75, told co-defendant Helen Golay, 77, in the tape played for the jury. "You can't have that many insurers. ... You were greedy. That's the problem."

Truc Do, Los Angeles County deputy district attorney, said the women befriended the two men and took out insurance policies on their lives, then drugged them and ran them over to make it look as if the two homeless men had been killed in hit-and-run accidents

For the rest of the article see:
http://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/latestnews/stories/wfaa080318_mo_homelesskill.37e88c7.html

JAS

quote:

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I might also point out the dangers of a 93 year old man going to a prostitute (no snickering, I mean that he might get hurt if she tried to rob him or her pimp tried to rob him).

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Yeah, or he could catch a disease. That'd be bad, too. Could kill him in his advanced years. Or worse, it could be passed around the nursing home.

oh wow, sorry, it was my misreading that it was "two" not just one 93 year old guy.

I guess my answer then is that there would be 2 old guys charged if the second had followed through.

JAS-

Shades of Arsenic and Old Lace...

I am appalled anyone would suggest blatent age discrimination as a factor in the choice to prosecute. Although admittedly I would also try to get the newest prosecutor in the office to try it.

Ok, and I snickered too.

A few years ago in my former county we had an old John robbed by his hooker and her pimp. He decided that he wasn't going to pay her the twenty bucks in his shirt pocket because she couldn't help him complete the transaction. Likely his biological issue.

She snagged the twenty and smacked him good, called her pimp over who hit him with a bottle as the hooker ran away.

We charged aggravated robbery. Wouldn't you?

[This message was edited by Philip D Ray on 03-27-08 at .]

Did defense counsel argue it was a contract issue?

Or theft of service?