TX: Judge gives child rapist 10 years probation

ELLIS COUNTY, TEXAS - Judge Gene Knize, who recently won re-nomination in the March 7 GOP primary over an attorney who sought to expose his past decisions in sexual assault cases, granted a request from Ellis County prosecutors last week to give attorney James Leonard a 10-year probation sentence for three counts of sexually assaulting two children under the ages of 14.

Leonard, who upon pleading guilty was forced to give up his law license, will serve a six-month sentence in county jail, authorities said of the decision handed down last week.

Originally reported in the Waxahachie Daily Light, victims of past abuse in other cases - as well as Republican activists - have openly and publicly plead for Knize to "do the right thing" in cases involving probation for child sex offenders.

That included Knize's March primary opponent, Dan Altman, an attorney from Midlothian, located 20 miles south of Dallas.

"We warned the people, we warned them and warned them, and surprise, surprise, Judge Knize turns his back on the very people who elected him," said Ellis County resident Joey Dauben, who last October launched The Ellis County Observer, an investigative news blog that covers political events and campaigns in the county.

Knize, having been the district judge for 19 years, has no Democrat in November, all but assuring his re-election for another four-year term.

Last May, Knize granted another prosecutor request for probation on Dr. Aniruddha Chitale, who was accused by 21 women of assault while they were in his Ennis Regional Medical Center office [link: nbc5i.com/news/4244400/detail.html].

The Leonard case caught many political observers off guard. Readers of Dauben's blog, he said, were waiting last week for the fate of Gilbert Garcia, who is alleged to have molested and assaulted his now-15-year-old stepdaughter since she was 7.

Prosecutors, however, fought an attempt by Garcia's defense attorney, Dallas lawyer Thomas Pappas, to have Garcia's bond reduced from $1 million. Garcia is currently awaiting a continuance hearing, but remains in custody in county jail.

"Garcia's case has been continued three times since The Ellis County Observer has been covering it. Aside from one columnist in The Ellis County Press [newspaper], this case hasn't been getting any media coverage."

Knize was to rule on Garcia's fate before the March 7 primary, but The Ellis County Observer sought public outcry over the decision, saying it amounted to keeping the re-election chances of the veteran judge intact.

When public pressure mounted, the case was continued to last week, when the downtown Waxahachie courthouse was shut down due to a gas leak.

Leonard, an attorney from Waxahachie, plead guilty to three felony charges relating to sexual contact, exposure and indecency with two children under the ages of 14, according to the Waxahachie Daily Light's Monday issue.

However, solutions to the probation plea bargains for sexual predators are few, Dauben said.

"We need to fire every single assistant prosecutor in our county attorney's office, that's all there is to it," he said. "But we've got to wait another three years for the 2008 election to fire the county attorney. Then we've got another four years of this judge. The safety and well-being of every Ellis County resident is at stake if we don't do anything. Had these cases been done in the 40s or 50s, this judge would have been hanged."