I searched the forum for the original Amish 'haircutting' incident but can't seem to find it, so apologies in advance in case this has already been posted:

Carlo Wolff
CJN Staff Reporter | 0 comments

Legal authorities involved in the hate crimes case of a breakaway Amish bishop suggested their religion informed their decision. Steve Dettelbach, the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, and U.S. District Court Judge Dan Aaron Polster are Jewish.

Steve Dettelbach

Judge Dan Aaron Polster

Both also suggested that the freedom of religion the U.S. Constitution guarantees was key to the case – as was the Constitution as a whole.
Dettelbach, who coordinated the prosecution that resulted in the conviction of Samuel Mullet Sr. and 15 of his followers last September, said he considers Polster’s Feb. 8 sentencing of the 67-year-old Mullet an appropriate reflection of “how truly serious these crimes are.”

“This was an unusual case in that it involved Amish people who rarely come in contact with federal law enforcement,” Dettelbach said. “Sadly, religious violence is a problem that we’re dealing with in our country and our community all too often.”

Polster sentenced Mullet, who presided over a settlement near the Village of Bergholz near the West Virginia border, to 15 years in jail following his conviction on charges of conspiracy and hate crimes. Fifteen of his followers earned lesser sentences for their part in a series of attacks that took place in fall 2011 in which they broke into homes, restrained Amish who didn’t follow Mullet’s strict interpretation of the Gospel, sheared their hair and cut off their beards.

Unlike Dettelbach, Polster wouldn’t comment, other than to say in a voicemail that it’s “not really appropriate for to me add anything to what I said at the sentencing … a judge speaks either in writing, or orally, on the record in court, and that’s what I did.”

At the same time, the judge provided a raw transcript of the sentencing in which he said one of the reasons he was handling the case with special care is it involved the First Amendment. Mullet’s sect, which benefits from the Constitution in being exempt from military duty, at the same time deprived other Amish of their right to religious freedom.

“So each of you has received the benefits of that First Amendment, and yet you deprived those benefits from other Amish citizens and through force and violence you tried to ram your religious beliefs down their throats,” Polster said before handing down the sentences. (Mullet’s followers, including six women, received sentences spanning a year and a day and seven years.)
“And I heard testimony that you were motivated by love and compassion and the belief that your parents or other Amish members had strayed from the true path and needed to be chastened or corrected to return to the true path,” the transcript also reads, referencing the judge’s faith. “Sadly, this same logic, albeit the conduct was a little – a lot less extreme, that the Inquisitors in Spain used 500 years ago when they tortured and burned their victims to the stake – at the stake. Many of them were members of my religion, to save their souls.”

“Whether it’s a religiously motivated arson at the largest mosque in Toledo or an attempt to burn down a predominantly African-American church in Conneaut or threats aimed at a young Muslim man for moving into an apartment building right here in Cleveland, we have to be vigilant at protecting the freedom of each person in our society to pray and worship as they wish,” Dettelbach said.

“The idea of people being dragged out of their beds in the middle of the night because of their religious belief and subjected to degrading and humiliating ritualistic religious violence is something that as a Jew causes you to shudder. The fact that it could happen here in our country makes you remember how really vigilant we need to be in protecting these freedoms.”

At the sentencing, Polster told the defendants they had two weeks to appeal their sentences or convictions. Such appeals are likely, defense attorneys indicated.
cwolff@cjn.org

http://www.clevelandjewishnews.com/news/local/article_fe5d8546-76c3-11e2-a188-001a4bcf887a.html