Another American judge has made an order regulating a litigant’s sex life. In the most recent case a court in Kansas sentenced a career criminal to a lengthy prison term for being a felon in possession of a weapon and also imposed a probation order to follow the jail sentence.
In an unusual move, U.S. District Judge Howard Sachs inserted a probation condition that Christopher Harris be barred from having unprotected sex while on probation, for the very simple reason that Mr. Harris had sired ten children with seven different women. He made the order over the protestations of Harris’ lawyer saying that Harris’ behaviour was creating severe social problems.
A week later Judge Sachs amended his order to read:
“The defendant shall use contraceptives before engaging in sexual activity that may otherwise cause pregnancy unless such use would violate his religious scruples or is expressly rejected by his sexual partner.”
However, unlike a similar order made in Wisconsin, the US Court of Appeals struck down the Sachs’ order saying the condition imposed was not related to the nature and circumstances of the offence, and did nothing to protect the public from future crimes.
In Wisconsin, Corey Curtis was sentenced to three years probation for falling behind in his child support payments. Mr. Curtis had nine children with six mothers. During the sentencing Judge Tim Boyle mused about whether he had the authority to order the sterilization of Mr. Curtis.
The alert prosecutor then advised the Judge there was precedent in Wisconsin to control Mr. Curtis’ sex life, referring to a 2001 case where a payor father was ordered not to father any further children until he had paid the arrears of child support he already owed.
This precedent setting case, State v. Oakley, was upheld by Wisconsin’s highest court and later appealed to the United States Supreme Court, who declined to hear the case, thus explicitly recognizing the legitimacy of the trial court order.
The Justices of the Wisconsin Court held that the “no-procreation” condition of probation was not unconstitutional. It was also preferable to the eight-year prison sentence that otherwise would have been ordered.
Different states, different judges, different results. That’s what makes the law so challenging.
Lawdiva aka Georgialee Lang
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