News/Commentary

Man convicted of repeatedly raping 4 and 9-yr-old girls gets only 180 days in jail, and he’s upset about it

February 3, 2023 | | Print Article

The public is in an uproar over news that a convicted 20-year-old Rochester, Minnesota rapist must serve only 180 days in jail for raping two young girls when he was around 16 years old.

One of convicted rapist Mohamed Bakari Shei’s victims was reportedly nine years old, while the other was four or five at the time.

“A female juvenile reported to a Rochester police investigator in April 2020 that Shei first raped her on Mother’s Day in 2018 at a Rochester residence. The juvenile would have been around 9 years old on that date. Shei would have been around 16 years old. Shei told her that he would give her money for a book fair at school or buy her toys, the juvenile told police,” according to the Post-Bulletin.

“A different juvenile told an RPD investigator in June 2021 that Shei had raped her several times at the same residence during the same time period,” the paper added.

After the assaults, he was charged in juvenile court for the crimes in 2019. But because of the COVID pandemic, the case was pushed back and back and back — up “to the point that prosecutors would soon lose jurisdictional authority to prosecute the case,” according to the Post-Bulletin.

The juvenile court charges against him were eventually dismissed but then reintroduced in adult court.

Shei eventually accepted an Alford plea deal wherein he’d get zero prison time, 30 years of probation, and his charges would disappear once he completed probation. All this was offered in exchange for him not challenging the prosecutors’ decision to forward his case to adult court.

“An Alford plea is a guilty plea in which a defendant maintains their innocence and does not admit to the criminal act they are accused of, but admits that the prosecution has sufficient evidence to persuade a judge or jury to find the defendant guilty, and thus agrees to be treated as guilty,” according to The News & Observer.

During Shei’s sentencing on Monday, however, District Judge Jacob Allen was apparently so moved by statements from the victims and their families that he decided to sentence Shei to some jail time anyway — albeit only 180 days.

This did not please Shei or his attorney.

“Shei’s lawyer, James McGeeney, argued that the court lacked the authority to impose any jail time, as that was not ‘the spirit’ of the plea agreement and any jail sentence would be in violation of the agreement,” the Post-Bulletin notes.

“There is no moving on or getting over it. I’ve tried,” one of the victims said in court while reportedly fighting back tears.

“A family member described one of the juvenile survivors as a bubbly girl who loved to share with others, but following Shei’s multiple sexual assaults, the juvenile became withdrawn and more reclusive,” according to the Post-Bulletin.

“Some day you will have to answer for this egregious act against a child,” the family member reportedly told Shei in court.

“I hope you heard what was said in this court today. The conduct they described and the way it affected them should be something that haunts you,” the judge likewise told him after listening to the testimony.

His jail sentence will reportedly begin on the 13th. Shei must also “undergo a sex offender program and complete 200 hours of community service,” though he won’t be required to register as a sex offender.

This fairly soft sentence has not sat well with the public.

Look:

FYI, the name of the prosecutor who handled the case is Thomas Gort …

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Vivek Saxena
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