A Florida fitness trainer, Elissa Alvarez, 20, and his girlfriend, Jose Caballero, 40, have been found guily in a notorious case where they were filmed having sex on a public beach in front of families with children. There is general agreement that Alvarez and Cabellero were disgusting and shocking in their conduct. There is little debate that they deserved to be arrested for lewd and lascivious exhibition, particularly with a videotape and calls to the police. However in a move that has become all-too-common , the prosecutors are set to punish the couple for not pleading guilty by pushing for an absurdly draconian sentence against Caballero of up to 15 years in jail.
Keep in mind that both Alvarez and Cabellero will have to register as sex offenders — a huge penalty that comes with social stigma and living restrictions. There is no need for a lengthy jail sentence. These two have been widely (and legitimately) called low-life pigs.
The two decided to go to trial despite the videotape and eyewitness testimony. They both insisted that they were not actually having sex. While it was a weak defense case, they have every right to seek a verdict. However, prosecutors now take the view that if they demand for a plea is ignored, they are relieved on any further duty to be reasonable and just in their indictments and sentencing arguments. I have seen this happen over and over again. It is vindictive and retaliatory against those who want to go to trial. I have had prosecutors tell me that “this is how the game is played” — you defy the state on a plea and they throw the book at you. However, the result is clogging our jails with excessive sentences and maintaining a crippling threat against those who simply want to seek a verdict on their charges. Assistant State Attorney Anthony Dafonseca voiced the same lack of any responsibility in seeking the maximum sentencing – blaming the couple the heavy potential sentence for seeking a trial: “We gave them a reasonable offer, what we felt was reasonable, and they decided it wasn’t something they wanted to accept responsibility for.”
Caballero is in the worst position because he served in the past for trafficking cocaine.
Once again, the conduct of these two deserves serious punishment, but 15 years? What do you think?
bam, DBQ is a keeper.
Mark, Using YOUR math, if 22% of porn store customers are women, that means 78% are men, going to my SCIENTIFIC point that men are more visual[not debatable] and the largest consumers of porn by a WIDE margin. You are just a curmudgeonly old man. And porn must hurt your logic. Losing those precious bodily fluids??
Nick: Apparently you are unaware that very often, men and women—especially married/long-time couples—watch porn TOGETHER, and it’s not uncommon for the husband to be the one who does the shopping, since many women, although they like porn, are embarrassed to be seen shopping for it. Please don’t tell me my business.
Whoa! Speaking of drugs, I just had an out of body experience or something. I was looking at this thread, and instead of hitting the “page down” button, I was hitting the “page up”,and there I was lost for a moment, thinking to my self, what is with these people??? They just keep repeating stuff they have already said…Then I saw my comments, and I thought, “Whoa—I am doing it too???” Where was I??? Did I black out, because I don’t remember saying this stuff but once…
Anyway, I discovered my error. But I still have a queasy feeling, like something is wrong with the time-space fabric.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
@PaulCS
I have never bought much. or often. IIRC, it was $25 for a little baggie that was maybe like 1/4 ounce. What would happen is that one person would go and buy a full ounce somewhere, and then sell 3/4 of that for enough to pay for the whole ounce. Which meant he was getting his stuff for free, unless he got popped. At which time the words “risk premium” might have meant more to him.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
I think the downward slide started with the Boomers, and their disdain for structure and rules, as exemplified:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vGU93EGmAtQ
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
DBQ
You should be applauded. Consistently a voice of reason and well-reasoned comments. I always enjoy your take on things.
Paul C
What part of FOR THE SOLE PURPOSE OF PROVIDING LAW ENFORCEMENT EVIDENCE OF A CRIME don’t you get?
bam bam – the part where what people say they are doing and what they are really doing are two different things.
@PaulCS
Dontcha think that what your values are has a little something to do with the money you make???
For example, Bob and John both start out in life with a college education. And working at the same company. Bob smokes dope. He spends $25 per week to smoke dope. John doesn’t smoke dope. He puts $25 per week into his IRA. Bob keeps forgetting to do the Accounts Receivable report, sooo he doesn’t get promoted. John, has a good memory, and gets a promotion. Meanwhile, Bob smokes dope with Susie, a skank ho, and they have sex. Susie gets pregnant, and hits Bob up for child support. Bob doesn’t want to marry Susie because she is a skank ho. John has sex with Jane, and when she gets pregnant, they get married. Meanwhile, Bob got a funky disease from Susie,the skank ho, and goes to work with a “cold sore” on his upper lip. Meanwhile, Susie garnishes Bob’s check for child support, and the whole office knows that he sleeps with skank ho’s. And that that probably isn’t a cold sore. John is healthy, and doesn’t have STDs!
Bob can no longer afford his apartment and moves into a motel. Meanwhile, John and Jane have a two income family, and buy a house in the suburbs. Eight years later, Bob’s son is having problems in school. And needs a therapist. John’s son plays soccer and is on the honor roll.
etc.etc.etc. See where this is going???
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Squeeky – you have not bought dope lately have you. 😉
your place in the middle class is based on money
Not necessarily. The middle class is an attitude and lifestyle. Yes. Money does help, but you will never gain middle class status or keep it if you don’t have the attitude, ideals, morals and goals that are common to the middle class. http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2008/07/29/americas-four-middle-classes/
Dust Bunny Queen wrote “you will never gain middle class status or keep it if you don’t have the attitude, ideals, morals and goals that are common to the middle class.”
Wow! That’s hilarious. Don’t know how old you are, but remember Ted Kennedy and pregnant Mary Jo Kopechne? Remember Jim Bakker and Jessica Hahn? David Vitter and his New Orleans prostitutes? Jimmy Swaggart and his prostitutes? Do I seriously need to go on? And these weren’t middle-class people but Ruling Class folks—or maybe you’re saying the same “logic” doesn’t apply to them?
Actually, I’d support the concept of everyone walking around everywhere naked, though they might want to wear something warm in the winter and carry a parasol in the summer, depending on where they live. I’m guessing that idea wouldn’t appeal to you…
Been there. Done that. (Reference my post yesterday at 2:08 about growing up nudist) It really isn’t all that interesting or sexually titillating. There are a lot of very unattractive, flabby, scabrous and just plain ugly people out there. Sometimes clothing is a blessing…..for the onlookers.
And for the sake of hygiene…..put on some underpants if you are going to sit on a public chair, bench or otherwise. Your leaking body fluids are not desired. Really.
There is a time and a place for everything. Nudity is no big deal IMO, but there rules and laws about being nude in a PUBLIC place. Be nude in your house, in your yard, in the wilderness, in nudist resorts, camps, beaches. My husband and I are fortunate to live where we can be free in our own yard without the interference of neighbors or the idea that we might be offending anyone. We enjoy our time on the deck and yard, in the sun or in the shade when it gets too hot and enjoy our ‘adult’ beverages as well 🙂
There is no need to shove your flabby saggy hairy body parts in the faces of people who are not in the least bit interested.
There is a reason that we have private and public designations. You can do whatever your heart desires in private spaces. Not so much in a public area.
@MarkK
I think you are over there on the sleazy side of the planet. Where people put visqueen on their furniture and mattresses.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Mark, it has nothing whatsoever to do with speaking to children about sex. I’m fully in favor of Sex Ed in schools and in the home. It’s a lewd public act in front of children. Children do not need to see this up close, in live action and color.
I. Annie wrote: “Children do not need to see this up close, in live action and color.”
Actually, children don’t pay much attention to such things; they think anything sexual is boring because their hormones haven’t kicked in yet. If the grandmother had simply said, when the kid asked her about the couple, “Oh, they’re just having sex; just leave them alone,” that would have been the end of it. It’s only when adults make a big deal about it that kids get interested—not in the act itself, but in trying to understand why mommy and daddy are so upset.
markkernes
Interesting that you never addressed my question about the right to expose yourself to others in public. Part of that sexual freedom that you want all of us Puritanical Americans to embrace cause you get your kicks from it?
Actually, I’d support the concept of everyone walking around everywhere naked, though they might want to wear something warm in the winter and carry a parasol in the summer, depending on where they live. I’m guessing that idea wouldn’t appeal to you…
Y’know, Lenny Bruce used to have a great routine, where he’d be on stage and hold up a Playboy centerfold and say something like, “Look at these tits! I love ’em—and if you have a problem with them, don’t call a cop. Go right to the source: God. God made these tits, and if you think they’re dirty, complain to the maker, not me.”
@PaulCS
Then you must love poor black neighborhoods! Do the math. What are the statistics relating to children who grow up in homes without two parents??? Geeesh, just the effect of having a one-earner family as opposed to a two-earner family.
Here, read this
http://www.city-journal.org/html/8_1_a1.html
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Squeeky – you are talking about the lower class, not the middle class.
Squeeky – I taught classes with pregnant teens. I am well aware of the problem. It was going on while I was in high school and I am sure it was going on before that.
is the grandmother guilty of filming public nudity, sex, etc.? Is this a crime that has gone unpunished?
Nope. No crime for the grandmother. She was likely filming to document their crime if public indecency. She has proof.
They can’t complain about being filmed either since they have no expectation of privacy being in the act of sex on a PUBLIC beach area. If Granny was filming them unbeknownst to them through their windows, then they would have a case.
Paul C
If I film the commission of a crime, where the victim is murdered, for the sole purpose of providing
law enforcement with evidence, you would call that filming a snuff film?
bam bam – yes, you are filming a snuff film. The question then is what you do with it. If the only copy goes to the police, then it is evidence of a crime. If a copy goes to the police and you upload a copy to YouTube, then there are problems.
@MarkK
“Deep Throat is about as middle class as you can get!”
Yep, it is now. Which is why we have a shrinking middle class in the country. The bar got lowered. The middle class started acting trashy, and now about half of them have STDS, and illegitimate babies, and are dope fiends, and they can’t understand what happened. Why they don’t seem to have the middle class life their parents and grand parents had??? Well, they don’t behave themselves the way their parents and grandparents did.
This time, when Rome burns, they will be busy fiddling with themselves, not playing fiddles.
Squeeky Fromm
Girl Reporter
Squeekster: “[Deep Throat] is why we have a shrinking middle class in the country. The bar got lowered. The middle class started acting trashy, and now about half of them have STDS, and illegitimate babies, and are dope fiends, and they can’t understand what happened.”
Wow! I had no idea we weren’t living on the same planet! I’m on Earth, aka Terra. Which planet are you living on?
Squeeky – your place in the middle class is based on money, not illegitimate births. If the middle class is shrinking (as you say and which I do not agree) it has to do with economics.
bam bam: “By the way, Paul C, the grandmother was filming the commission of a crime. She should be congratulated for creating indisputable evidence to present to the authorities.”
AND for avoiding talking to her grandkids about sex—which they’d be too young to understand much anyway, so their sight of the love-making couple would have had little to no effect on them. Once again, it’s not really about the kids; it’s about ADULTS sexual hang-ups.
I. Annie
I couldn’t help but think that I would’ve dumped my ice cooler on them, as well. My only hesitation would be in wanting to avoid getting charged with assault. Just my luck, I would be charged with a crime and these two pervs wouldn’t be.