The University of Oklahoma Sooners will take the field at Gaylord Memorial Stadium in Norman tomorrow in their season opener against Louisiana Tech. The start of the season comes after a difficult summer in which the team had to deal with questions about whether players Frank Shannon and Joe Mixon would be eligible to play.
Shannon is appealing a one-year suspension after an alleged sexual assault in January. No charges were filed in that case--in part because the young woman involved did not wish to file criminal charges, and yet the University was still required by federal law to launch its own investigation of the incident.
Mixon made headlines when the freshman running back punched a young woman in the face during an altercation early one morning at a Norman restaurant. Initially, Mixon was vilified for hitting a girl, but soon he gained supporters who said that he was merely acting in self-defense against a heavily intoxicated, aggressive, and combative woman. In fact, his defense attorney requested that the District Attorney file assault and battery charges against Amelia Molitor, the woman involved in the altercation. Molitor herself has a criminal history that lends credibility to the defense, with misdemeanor convictions and deferred sentencing for drug possession and possession of a fake I.D., and with a pending felony DUI case in Cleveland County.
The debate about Mixon's involvement and level of culpability continues, even after the young man was suspended from the team for the 2014-2015 season and criminally charged with a misdemeanor count of Acts Resulting in Gross Injury (21 O.S. � 22).
Notice, Mixon was not charged with assault and battery. This seems to indicate that there is, in fact, evidence that Mixon was not the aggressor in the case. However, should he be criminally charged just because he hit a girl? One former Oklahoma legislator told The Oklahoman that Cleveland County District Attorney Greg Mashburn's decision to file a charge against Joe Mixon was a violation of the spirit of the law.
Former Oklahoma state senator Mike Fair told sports writer Barry Tramel that in the 1980's, he and Rep. Rebecca Hamilton worked together to remove gender from Oklahoma law, saying, "If it is wrong for a man to commit a crime against a woman, it is wrong for a person to commit a crime against a person." He argues that Mashburn's statements in announcing his decision to file misdemeanor charges against Mixon are in direct contradiction to the legislature's efforts to remove gender from the equation.
Mashburn justified the charges by saying,"In this particular case, I felt like this statute more fit what happened because now we don't have to talk about who the initial aggressor was. Was there gross injury? And there was. And was that against public morals? And I believe that anytime you punch a girl with that much force, even when she had hit you first, that it would be against public morals."
Fair disagrees, and says that the gender of those involved is irrelevant in determining whether criminal charges should be filed: "If the person, Ms. Molitor, verbally assaulted Joe Mixon, she was guilty of assault. When she shoved him and slapped him, she was guilty of battery. For District Attorney Mashburn to make the case of 'punching a girl' as any different from her crime of pushing and slapping, shows an ignorance of the law."
This case should not be about what our daddies taught us about hitting a girl, or what our mamas taught us about nothing good happening after midnight. It should not be about whether or not Mixon was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Instead, the case should be about whether Mixon and/or Molitor acted outside the law during the altercation. Any criminal case should be based on law, not on emotion or personal perception.
