Ohio
Related: About this forumAmish Sect Leader Gets 15 Years in Beard-Cutting Attacks
The leader of a dissident Amish sect was sentenced to 15 years in prison on Friday for a series of bizarre beard- and hair-cutting attacks on other Ohio Amish that drew national attention.
Samuel Mullet Sr., 67, the leader, was sentenced in Federal District Court in Cleveland, for coordinating assaults that prosecutors argued were motivated by religious intolerance. Fifteen of his followers, including six women, were given lesser sentences ranging from one year and one day to seven years by Judge Dan Aaron Polster.
The breakaway Amish were convicted last fall under multiple counts of conspiracy and hate crimes, which carry harsher punishment than simple assault. Prosecutors had asked for a life sentence for Mr. Mullet. Defense lawyers claimed the government was blowing out of proportion personal vendettas that Mr. Mullet harbored against former followers and other critics, and that the hair- and beard-cutting was humiliating but not physically injurious, and thus did not deserve a lengthy sentence.
The series of five attacks in 2011 spread fear through Amish communities in eastern Ohio. Followers of Mr. Mullet broke into homes, restrained men and women and forcibly sheared their victims, sometimes with tools used to clip horse manes. For Amish, descendants of 18th-century German-speaking immigrants, long beards and flowing womens hair represent religious devotion and cultural identity.
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MADem
(135,425 posts)And the subject is chopping off hair?
It's a serious crime, given the whole "assault" and "hate crime" vibe attached to it....but that's one of those coincidental accidents that, if written in a novel, would be dismissed as unlikely if not unbelievable!
JohnnyRingo
(18,636 posts)I believe he's a family member of a victim just for clarification.
This is a local story where I live, and the back story is fascinating. The Amish community has their share of quirks and eccentricities, to say the least. Here's the story from the local paper on the series of events that led up to this conviction:
http://www.tribtoday.com/page/content.detail/id/582998/Some-fear-community-disruption.html?nav=5021
From left:.. Levi Miller.. Johnny Mullet.. Lester Mullet
In an unrelated story, another local Amish man could face life in prison this week for 11 counts of sexual assault on minor girls (family members).
limpyhobbler
(8,244 posts)JohnnyRingo
(18,636 posts)He was the ringleader. He looks a lot like the other Mullets in the mug shots with dark hair.