Some thoughts on the sentencing of former Plattsburgh Assemblyman Chris Ortloff
I was in Albany today for the sentencing of Chris Ortloff — former Plattsburgh Assemblyman and state Parole Board member — to 12.5 years in Federal prison.
He confessed to participating in lengthy on-line chat-room discussions involving child rape. He also attempted to arrange a sexual rendez-vous with two girls who he believe to be pre-teens.
Fortunately, the encounter was a ruse concocted by state police as part of a sting operation.
We’ll have a full report during the 8 O’clock Hour Wednesday morning. In the meantime, here are some stray thoughts about today’s sentencing hearing.
First, it was bizarre to hear Ortloff speak at length after so long.
He’s a talented and practiced orator, a former TV anchorman and politician. He quoted at length from the Bible and Shakespeare and argued that his case might serve the public good by warning other people away from the more decadent temptations of the internet.
Second, it was startling to hear Ortloff claim that he was completely cured of his “addiction” to child pornography and the desire to have sex with very young girls.
He made this claim unambiguously and without qualification. “I sleep well and have healthy dreams,” he insisted. Most experts in the field of child-sex predators will tell you that it just doesn’t work that way.
Thirdly, it was surreal when Ortloff’s defense attorney, Andrew Safranko, cited Ortloff’s involvement in the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics, going so far as to recall the famous, “Do you believe in miracles?” line that followed the US-Russia hockey game.
Safranko told Judge Thomas McAvoy that Ortloff was hoping for a similar “miracle” in Tuesday’s sentencing.
Finally, I was more than a little taken aback by Judge McAvoy’s relatively light sentence: Just 12.5 years, despite the fact that Ortloff was arrested in a hotel room where he was expecting to meet with and rape a pair of pre-teen girls.
This decision followed the Judge’s brief comments describing Ortloff’s actions as among the most heinous and disturbing crimes possible. “Children can’t defend themselves,” Judge McAvoy noted.
Yet he sentenced Ortlof to considerably less than the 15-19 years requested by Federal prosecutors.
Speaking Tuesday with the Plattsburgh Press-Republican, Assemblywoman Janet Duprey — a fellow Republican but also a longtime political opponent of Ortloff’s — said the following.
“Whatever they gave him is not enough,” Assemblywoman Janet Duprey, who replaced Ortloff in the State Legislature, said.
“He really deserves to spend the rest of his life behind bars.”
That said, this sentencing brings to a close one of the most jarring and disturbing chapters in North Country history.
The Ortloff case will certainly rank among the most bizarre public life stories of our era. A close ally of former Sen. Ron Stafford and Gov. George Pataki, a participant in the 1980 Olympic glory, a true celebrity, brought to the ultimate nadir of public condemnation.
In his own comments, Ortloff acknowledged that he had “lived the American dream” before giving in to desires and urges that can only be described as sordidly heinous.
This is a difficult, ugly subject. Your comments are welcome below, but please maintain decorum, civility and thoughtfulness.
I’ve dealt with a lot of twisted people. You just never know what’s in someones mind and heart. It’s sad, and more than a little frightening for a parent.
The most bizarre thing about crimes like this are the groups that support the activity. NAMBLA, the porn industry, civil rights groups… there are limits to what can be stomached IMO.
One thing you hardly ever hear about is arrests of those who produce photos and videos of children engaging in sexual activity.
I would guess that in most cases, it is done by the parent or parents. But I don’t know because you never hear about it.
I wonder why this is so.
One creepy development of late is what I would describe as the mainstreaming of child porn.
This article — see link below — by porn actress Aurora Snow (see below) describes her experiences at the age of 18, being primped and dressed to appear much younger.
“I was put in movies with titles like Naughty Little Nymphos and Trained Teens,” she writes. (The echoes to Ortloff’s case are creepy.)
“I quickly adjusted to playing the part of nymph. They dressed me in school-girl uniforms and tied my blonde hair into pigtails—anything to make me look every bit as young as I was.”
In fact, she was 18, but her article makes it clear that what many male consumers of porn want is the fantasy of young sexualized girls.
“Because I was 24, I was immediately slotted into the “older woman” category,” she writes. “My days as a barely-legal actress were forever over.”
Ugh.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-08-09/porn-star-aurora-snow-goes-from-barely-legal-to-milf/2/
Sexually abusing a child is a heinous act that ruins a child’s life forever.
Ortloff is a sick man.
He needs to be restricted from any contact whatsoever from all children for the rest of his life.
As a society we are too lenient on people who commit these vile acts. Castration followed by public stoning in addition to incarceration for life for perpetrators of sexually abusing a child is an appropriate penalty.
People who have these sick thoughts would not be apt to follow through with illegal actions if they knew severe repercussions would be administered without exception if caught and convicted of said crime.
Sunshine, I wish that were true. In my experience most people think they’ll never get caught, no matter what the crime.
I won’t even touch the other side of the argument that says by following through with your punishment you become as bad as the criminal.
I heard of a N.C. man who had a bad habit of beating his wife.
Some neighborhood men caught wind of what was happening and paid a visit to the abusive man, took him out back to the woods and gave him what he had been doing to his wife along with a stern warning re his future behavior towards her. The beatings stopped.
I’m not normally an ‘eye for and eye’ type of person but when it comes to those helpless in defending themselves (youth), I believe the rules need to change.
I see the damage done to our youth by abusers, both physical and sexual. Unfortunately, our legal and social services systems as they currently function, have great difficulty in protecting our youth.
The rate of abused youth becoming abusers as adults is high.
How else can we stop this downward spiral?
“The only victims here are his family.” Are you serious!!!!! Then they must be just as guilty as him! “Cured”?!!? How sick and delusional can you be?????? There just ain’t NO fixing that!!!! Eye for an eye!!! Little man, little, little, little, little man. Disgusting! Rotten! My blood boils!!!!!
Stop sugar coating it Kim, say what you feel…
BTW- ditto.