Pressure continues for prosecution of homosexual cop for molestation

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Vegas DA responds to protests

Pressure continues for prosecution of homosexual cop for molestation

© 2001 WorldNetDaily.com

A national legal watchdog group is accusing the Clark County district attorney's office of ignoring the law and making a political decision not to prosecute a homosexual Las Vegas policeman for sexually molesting a teen-age boy.

The U.S. Justice Foundation wrote to District Attorney Stewart L. Bell last month urging prosecution of narcotics detective Vinten Hartung for allegedly luring a boy, now 16, into a sexual relationship. Hartung reportedly plied the boy with alcohol.

While dropping felony molestation charges, the district attorney's office said it was continuing to investigate Hartung on two lesser charges of stalking and furnishing alcohol to a minor. Hartung resigned from the Las Vegas police force, shortly after WorldNetDaily brought the case to national attention.

"This letter is being written in an effort to urge you to prosecute the above matter to the fullest extent permissible under the law," wrote USJF attorney Richard D. Ackerman. "Nevada law holds that it is illegal to have sexual relations with a 'minor.' In this case, the victim is a 'minor' for purposes of your consent laws.

"Various publications have quoted you as saying that, 'We in essence concluded neither the state nor the federal authorities are able to pursue the sexual offenses. ... It discriminates against a class of people, and that's not allowed under the equal protection clause of the Constitution.' It is our understanding that this 'class' of persons, to whom you refer, are homosexuals."

The USJF makes the case that, with regard to liability for criminal offenses, homosexuals are not a protected or immune class of persons as suggested.

Bell responded to the organization in a letter dated March 28.

"I received and reviewed your correspondence of March 21, 2001," wrote Bell. "In that regard, I can only attribute the inaccuracies in your factual understanding and conclusions to the fact that the information you received was filtered through the print media. The bottom line is that in Nevada a person of the age of 16 or older has the ability to consent to sexual interaction, whether they be either male or female. To that end, while it offends the moral sensibilities of all of us that a 42-year-old adult male had consensual sex with a 16-year-old teenager, in this case, since the relationship was consensual, it is not prosecutable."

Ackerman has already drafted a response to Bell for the U.S. Justice Foundation, saying "we are left even more confused than we were before corresponding with your office."

"To wit, it appears that in almost all statutory and common law contexts, the term 'minor' relates to those who have not yet attained the age of 18 in Nevada," Ackerman writes. "While it is true that the age of consent for most sexual activity is 16, this is not true for what your Legislature has defined as 'crimes against nature' and other crimes involving public morality and social conscience. It is presumably these laws that you wish not to carry out because of your own beliefs about their soundness."

Ackerman cites a series of Nevada laws defining the term "minor."

"More disturbing is the fact that your courts have held, on at least three occasions, that a 'minor' is someone who is under the age of 18 for purposes of determining violations of the type that Vinten Hartung has engaged in," he continued. "As your letter admits, there is no doubt that Hartung engaged in the subject acts with a person under the age of 18. The media and your office have also made it clear that the relationship began when the victim was 15."

Ackerman cites four cases that define a "minor" as someone under 18 in similar circumstances.

"With all due respect, the decision not to prosecute in this case can only be attributed to political factors since Nevada's Legislature and judiciary have concurred in their findings that (these laws) are designed to protect minors," Ackerman concluded.

The U.S. Justice Foundation is a nonprofit public interest, legal action organization dedicated to instruct, inform and educate the public on, and to litigate, significant legal issues confronting America.



-- Uncle Bob (unclb0b@aol.com), April 09, 2001

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