Opinion

Justice in Jersey

Judge Glenn Berman predicted that neither side would like the sentence he was about to impose. He was right.

But the Middlesex (NJ) Superior Court jurist got the Rutgers spy-cam case right.

He sentenced Dharun Ravi to 30 days behind bars, three years’ probation and community service, and levied $11,900 in fines.

He also urged that the 20-year-old Ravi, who is in the US on a green card, not be deported to his native India.

Stunned prosecutors said they planned to appeal what they considered a slap on the wrist, given that Ravi’s roommate, Tyler Clementi, killed himself days after Ravi Web-cast a gay tryst in their dorm room.

But gay-rights activist Bill Dobbs called the short sentence — Ravi could’ve gotten 10 years — a “relief,” given what he called “an out-of-control prosecution.”

Surprisingly, quite a number of gay activists opposed jail time for Ravi, saying it would only make him a scapegoat for behavior that did not constitute aggressive bullying.

Complicating matters was Clementi’s suicide: Ravi was not charged in his death, but it clearly dominated the trial, in which Ravi was convicted of multiple crimes, including bias intimidation.

“I do not believe he hated Tyler Clementi,” the judge said. “He had no reason to. But I do believe he acted out of colossal insensitivity.”

And, he noted pointedly: “I haven’t heard you apologize once.”

But, as the judge also realized, that lack of remorse is not proper cause for a vindictive sentence.

As gay columnist Bryan Lowder wrote in Slate, hate-crime statutes — about which we’ve often expressed misgivings — “are being stretched to go after teenagers who acted meanly, but not violently. That’s not what civil rights statutes are for.”

Judge Berman understood that — even if the prosecutors still don’t.