Ex-Rutgers Student Dharun Ravi to Get Out of Jail Early
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ABC/LOU ROCCO(NEW YORK) — Former Rutgers student Dharun Ravi is expected to be released from jail next week after serving 20 days of his 30 day sentence for spying on his roommate Tyler Clementi’s intimate encounter with another man. Clementi committed suicide days later.
Judge Glenn Berman also sentenced Ravi to three years probation, ordered to complete 300 hours of community service and attend counseling programs for cyber-bullying and alternative lifestyles.
He must also pay a $10,000 assessment to the probation department in increments of $300 per month beginning Aug. 1. The money will go to groups that support victims of bias crimes. The judge recommended that Ravi, who was born in India and is here on a green card, not be deported.
Neither Ravi’s family or the Clementi family could be immediately reached for comment.
Prosecutors are asking an appeals court for a longer sentence while Ravi is appealing his conviction.
“I do not believe he hated Tyler Clementi,” the judge told the court when Ravi was sentenced. “He had no reason to, but I do believe he acted out of colossal insensitivity.”
Berman berated Ravi for not apologizing for his actions.
“I heard this jury say, ‘guilty’ 288 times — 24 questions, 12 jurors. That’s the multiplication,” Berman said. “I haven’t heard you apologize once.”
Ravi was convicted of invasion of privacy, bias intimidation, witness tampering and hindering arrest, stemming from his role in activating the webcam to peek at Clementi’s date with a man in the dorm room on Sept. 19, 2010. Ravi was also convicted of encouraging others to spy during a second date, on Sept. 21, 2010, and intimidating Clementi for being gay.
On May 29, Ravi released an apology and statement to notify Berman that he would begin serving his 30-day sentecnce.
“I accept responsibility for and regret my thoughtless, insensitive, immature, stupid and childish choices that I made on September 19, 2010 and September 21, 2010,” he wrote. “My behavior and action, which at no time were motivated by hate, bigotry, prejudice or desire to hurt, humiliate or embarrass anyone, were nonetheless the wrong choices and decisions.”
When Ravi began serving his jail sentence two days later, Clementi’s parents slammed Ravi’s apology for spying on Clementi’s gay date as “no apology at all, but a public relations piece,” in a statement.
“We have respect for Judge Berman and we appreciate the manner in which he presided over the criminal trial of Mr. Ravi. Although we do not question the sincerity of his feelings, and we have never sought harsh punishment, we are troubled by the judge’s failure to impose even a short jail sentence on the several charges of criminal invasion of Tyler’s privacy and bias crimes.”
“As to the so-called ‘apology,'” they continued, “it was, of course, no apology at all, but a public relations piece produced by Mr. Ravi’s advisers only after Judge Berman scolded Mr. Ravi in open court for his failure to have expressed a word of remorse or apology. A sincere apology is personal.”
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