Judge's Religious Comments Lead To Remand For Resentencing

In Tores v. State of Florida, (FL App., Nov.6, 2013), a Florida state appellate court reversed a 30-year sentence imposed on defendant for sexual battery and remanded for sentencing by a different judge because of religious comments made in imposing the original sentence.  In imposing the maximum sentence (when the minimum Guidelines sentence was 9 years, 4 months), the sentencing judge condemned defendant for his consensual dating relationship with the victim while defendant was married to someone else, and then said:

Just because your wife is in another country doesn’t mean you ought to be going out with other women. You’re a good Catholic fellow as I am. That’s not the way Catholic people - - that’s not the way anybody with morals should do anything.

The Florida Times-Union reports on the decision.