Athletes have it good

It's good to be an athlete. Aside from the millions of dollars, the instant celebrity status, the women, the cars and the mansions, pro athletes get the biggest perk of all – living above the law. Whether it's rape, drugs, murder, child support or domestic violence the number of athletes getting off scott-free is increasing at an alarming rate.

Pick a sport and you can find a handful of athletes who have trial dates scheduled or a rap sheet that would put Al Capone to shame. After following OJ's lead, Kobe was the next uber-athlete to walk out of a courthouse without the thought of keeping his soap on a rope for the next 10 to 15 years.

There are two major points when trying to understand why the system is the way it is. The first is our legal system: from the lawyers to the judges, to the juries, something must be done.

What I find most alarming is the publics' sympathy toward these athletes. I love the Lakers. I have followed them since I was a sperm, which blinded me at first to how I viewed the Kobe trial. At first, all I could think about was whether or not he would be in uniform for the upcoming season. After the reality of the allegations sunk in I took another stance. I thought that if the accuser was my sister and Kobe did in fact rape her, then he deserved to go to prison as well as burn in hell for eternity.

This is an abbreviated list of athletes who have escaped significant jail time in recent years:

Jamal Lewis – The reigning NFL rushing king recently copped a plea on drug charges. Lewis was indicted in February and charged with conspiring to possess with intent to distribute at least five kilograms of cocaine and using a cell phone in the commission of a drug crime. This is a charge that carries a maximum 10-year sentence that Lewis will never see. The terms of the plea state that Lewis must spend four months in a minimum security prison and two months in a halfway house. The best part about the deal is that Lewis gets to decide when he wants to serve the sentence. If the Ravens fail to make the playoffs, Lewis can bail out early and serve his time before next season starts. Fair? Imagine being indicted for the same crime. What would be the odds of going to a cupcake of a prison for only three months? About the same as OJ finding the real killer.

Rafael Furcal – The Atlanta Braves shortstop was arrested Sept. 10 and accused of driving under the influence, his second DUI arrest in four years. That arrest violated his probation in Cobb County for a June 2000 arrest on similar charges. Once he was found guilty, do you think that he went directly to the slammer? Instead of going to jail in those oh-so-flattering neon orange jumpsuits, Furcal was allowed to play in the post-season until the Braves lost. The next day, he started serving a 21-day sentence.

Leonard Little – Little is a sack-master deluxe with the St. Louis Rams who has recently emerged as one of the best defensive lineman in the NFL. It started in 1998, when Little was involved in a fatal accident that killed a woman, after he was driving drunk. He pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and was sentenced to 90 days in the city workhouse and was put on four years' probation.

So if Lewis got a slap on the wrist for using a cell phone in a drug deal, then Little received a neck massage. Now, wouldn't you have thought that Little would have learned from his mistake? Absolutely not. Little was indicted on charges of speeding and as a persistent offender with a felony driving while intoxicated. He was pulled over by police for speeding and was eventually busted for DUI.

The problem is the publics' perception of the athletic world. It is just a microcosm of the rest of the world and it is delusional to think that just because someone is leading a privileged life they should live by a higher moral code than the rest of society. What would you do if you were thrust into the spotlight at 22? Can you imagine giving millions of dollars to a kid whose biggest responsibility had been making his bed? We as a society need to wake up and realize that athletes need to be accountable just like the rest of us.

The bottom line is that fans need to open their eyes and understand what needs to be done, because if we as a society continue to be ambivalent to these crimes, then it could be your loved one on the other side of an athletes' DUI.

Trent Loomis is a print journalism major at Cal State University Long Beach. He can be reached at sportsd49er@yahoo.com.