NFL JUSTICE

So as you may already know, Donte Stallworth plead guilty to killing while intoxicated. Not only did he receive 30 days in jail for his crime, but also 10 days of probation afterwards. Recently, the NFL commissioner, Roger Goodell, suspended the Cleveland Browns' wide receiver indefinitely. Ironically, the NFL sentence is more harsh, and more deserving, than what Stallworth received from the law.

Only famous people can kill people and get away with it, or almost get away with it. I don't care if you turned yourself in, or you plead guilty. That's what you're SUPPOSED to do. What you aren't supposed to do is kill people. I don't care how rich or famous you are, you shouldn't have different standards. You kill someone, you go to jail. You cheat someone out of money, you go to jail... you get the drift. Not that I comb through cases like these everyday, but I don't think I've ever heard average Joes, or Joannas, getting only 30 days for killing someone while drinking and driving. I have seen cases where these people get 3 or 4 years, and still there are people who think that is not enough jail time. However, there is another measure where Stallworth will be under house arrest for 2 years. If he has a nice house, then that's complete crap. The only good thing is that taxpayer's won't have to pay for his whole jail stay.

It was also disclosed when Stallworth gave his guilty plea that an undisclosed amount of money was agreed upon between Stallworth and the Reyes family. I can understand that taking the NFL player up on a deal like this could be beneficial for the family. However, I cannot believe that the Reyes family wouldn't want Stallworth to get the justice he deserves instead of accepting a huge amount of money and almost forgetting about it. It's showing America that all you have to do is shove a whole bunch of money at a problem and it will basically go away... but then again when is that not the case?

So I think that Goodell made a good decision. If the courts of the United States will let someone basically walk just because they are famous, then the least that could be done is to end their celebrity-dom. Stallworth definitely deserves this sentence. You can't kill people and come back to work like nothing happened. That's giving everyone the wrong idea. Especially those who aren't famous and if they ever decided to kill someone, they will probably end up getting the death penalty and not get to go back to work, or whatever they do. Goodell wrote this in a letter to Stallworth: "The conduct reflected in your guilty plea resulted in the tragic loss of life and was inexcusable. While the criminal justice system has determined the legal consequences of this incident, it is my responsibility as NFL Commissioner to determine appropriate league discipline for your actions, which have caused irreparable harm to the victim and his family, your club, your fellow players and the NFL."

The only thing I find weird about this statement is, what if he plead not guilty? Would the NFL be behind him?

Jaclyn Kahn