By Brandon Ortiz
bortiz@herald-leader.com
A federal judge declined Thursday to give additional prison time to four men serving 87-month sentences for stealing rare books and assaulting a librarian with a taser.
In February, a three-judge panel of the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Charles Allen, Eric Borsuk, Warren Lipka and Spencer Reinhard — all from Lexington — should have received more time than the 7 years, 3 months they were given after they pleaded guilty to the high-profile theft in April 2005.
The men faced an additional two to four years.
The appeals court said that U.S. District Judge Jennifer Coffman miscalculated the federal sentencing guidelines by not including the cost of all the books that the men tried to steal in the December 2004 robbery.
But Coffman said Thursday that she would have imposed the same sentence even if she had considered the tougher sentencing guidelines.
Federal sentencing guidelines are no longer mandatory.
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- Charles Allen
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- Eric Borsuk
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- Warren Lipka
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- Spencer Reinhard
Why did the prosecutors spend time and resources pressing this issue? Didn’t they understand that the district court judge would probably stick with her orignal sentencing terms regardless of the valuation of the books?
Considering how much remorse each showed, by their quotes and statements in the Vanity Fair story, they should be allowed out of jail now…
Stephen - the appeal to the 6th Circuit was filed by the defendants, not the prosecutors. These guys wanted time knocked off their sentences, and instead the circuit court ruled that they should have gotten more.
These young men are already paying a tremendous price for their crime due to the event’s high publicity. I’m happy that this ruling was made. Two years would have been more than enough punishment. They have already learned a big lesson.
This whole resentencing process only came up because the jerks tried to get their time lessened. THEY are the ones who are responsible for prosecutors sepnding time because prosecutors wanted to make sure they at least served the slap on the wrist that the judge chose to give them. See the Herald Leader Thur Dec. 6, 2007, and know your facts before you respond.
The sentences imposed in this case are already too steep for the crimes involved. If anything, the crimes should have been decided according to each man’s involvement and actually activity. If the public only knew….what a waste of taxpayer’s money and people’s lives.
In other words, Judge Coffman didn’t want to admit she messed up last time.
To those who think the time should be less for the crimes involved — remember that these guys physically assaulted and further threatened the librarian that showed them the books. And even though not all four were in that room at the time, they all were very involved in the planning, which obviously had to involve physically overpowering the librarian.
What if this had been four African-American men? They would have been thrown under the jail. These boys are getting off easy. They could have killed that librarian.
Get real. These guys deserved what they had coming to them. Easy life, praise, money… they were only working their way up. They’ve only received more publicity from the whole act, and now will go on their merry ways, because trust me… they will. They have been cushioned all their lives up till now, and will only be re-cushioned and supported by “those that love them most.” It’s a pity they aren’t staying. If they really felt badly, Vanity Fair would have nothing to say about it.