commentary by Patrick H. Moore
Suppose you are a parent and you discover that your Washoe County, NV relative, Issac Onsurez, molested your six-year-old daughter for two solid years on up to 100 separate occasions beginning in 1997. Then, after the perpetrator was arrested, as part of his confession, this despicable excuse for a human being states that your daughter was a “curiosity child that wanted sex,” and that although he knew it was wrong, he couldn’t help himself.
“Forgive me, Father. I was helpless. She was just so sexy.”
By this point, as the parent of the poor abused child, you would be fit to be tied and might contemplate violence of your own if you thought you could get away with it.
You are of two minds over the possibility of a trial. It would be very hard for your daughter to take the stand and talk about the terrible things Onsurez did to her so many times so many years ago. So you are, in a sense, relieved when you learn that a plea deal is being worked out. The terms of the plea deal are life in prison with the possibility of parole after the first 10 years. You’re not pleased with the eventual possibility of parole but you’re informed that “possibility of parole” means just that – there’s a “possibility”. No guarantee.
So when Washoe District Judge Brent Adams sentenced Onsurez to 10 years to life on Wednesday, March 12, although you were not entirely satisfied (you never will be entirely satisfied), you did experience some sense of closure and certainly felt relief that the nightmare was finally over.
The one week later, you discovered that the nightmare is very much intact; in fact, this new episode is the worst since the day you learned your daughter had been brutally misused.
In a decision that appears to have startled everyone, last week Judge Adams reduced Onsurez’s sentence from 10 years to life to a mere year in the Washoe County Jail to be followed by five years of probation. The judge stated that the confusion was due to a clerical error in the original electronically-signed Order of Judgment and Committal.
The prosecution was horrified by the rather shocking reduction but when they reached out to the judge for an explanation, Adams reportedly stated that “it was not his intention to sentence Onsurez to life with the possibility of parole in 10 years.”
As for the mother of the victim, she made this comment to the Reno Gazette-Journal:
“It was the harshest sentence he could impose, and that was the justice we were looking for… … then two days later we get a phone call.”
* * * * *
So what was Judge Adams’ rationale for sharply reducing Onsurez’ sentence. The facts of the case are rather simple:
Onsurez pleaded guilty in December to lewdness with a minor under 14, a Category A felony in Nevada, which carries a minimum sentence of 10 years in prison.
So isn’t Adams then in violation of the statute? Not exactly. Prior to Dec. 31, 1999, a date sometime after Onsurez’ allegedly stopped molesting the child, the law controlling cases of this nature changed. Prior to Dec. 31, 1999, a sentence of Probation for lewdness with a minor was a legal sentence under Nevada law as long as the defendant underwent a psychosexual evaluation and was deemed a low risk to re-offend.
It turns out that Probation had been discussed during a status conference in February, but according to court records, Onsurez’s plea deal was for the life sentence with the possibility of parole after 10 years.
Onsurez did undergo two psychosexual evaluations before sentencing; one was mandated by the court and the second evaluation may have been completed by a forensic evaluator chosen by the defense team. In both instances, Ordonez was judged to pose a low risk of re-offending.
The results of the evaluations strike me as somewhat unconvincing. Keep in mind, Onsurez molested (committed lewd acts with) the six-year-old child approximately 100 times between 1997 and 1999. Not only that, he stated that she was “a curiosity child that wanted sex.” To me, this deeply offensive rationalization would raise a red flag as big as the Titanic.
Furthermore, it is pretty well-known that the desire to molest children is one of those uncanny needs/desires that does not tend to go away, even perhaps with age. (Onsurez is now 69.)
The victim’s mother had this to say:
“Judge Adams issued a very stark message. If you are a young adult and suffered child sexual abuse in Washoe County, more than likely if it happened in the 1990s, your abuser is not going to receive prison (sentence).”
“Our office marshalled a great deal of resources to prosecute this case and see it to resolution and we believe Judge Adams delivered the appropriate sentence a week ago on March 12,” Deputy District Attorney Shannon Bryant read from a statement. “The victim’s mother’s emotional reaction is understandable … As I said earlier, the judge offered no explanation for why he changed his mind.”
According to the victim’s mother, in 2012, the victim told police in Northern California that she had been violated as a child during trips to visit Onsurez in Reno. She alerted authorities after a friend of her family reported similar crimes as a child.
* * * * *
So what would be a proper outcome? If 100 molestations equal a 365 day county jail term, that means that each act is only worth about 3.65 days in custody, which is obviously ridiculous. For abuse such as Onsurez heaped upon the victim, I’m not even sure that 10 years with the possibility of parole constitutes sufficient punishment, and as many of you know, I do not tend to advocates protracted sentences; on the contrary, many would suggest that I would be far too lenient if I were wearing the jurist’s robes.
So where does this leave us? Onsurez’s victim must now try to go forward knowing that her assailant, after all this time, has got away with what is little more than a “slap on the wrist”, unless, of course, he is beaten or killed while in custody based on the nature of his crime. Such a sentence would appear to suggest that the victim’s anguish is of no value, at least in the eyes of the court.
As for Onsurez’ mother, she will be heartsick for a very long time. And we should not overlook the fact that she probably beats up on herself every day for not recognizing that something was seriously wrong back in the late 1990s when Onsurez was violating her poor child.