The man was, indeed, sentenced by the judge. The fact that she accepted a plea agreement suggested by the prosecutor doesn’t change the fact that the judged sentenced him. Judges often accept prosecutors plea bargains, but they are not required to do so. If they think the man is innocent, as you suggest, they should find not guilty; in that case, no one is sentenced to anything– not even crochet.

If the judges thinks the man is guilty , they should convict and lay down a sentence comensurate with his guilt.

As to the prosecutors actions: If the prosecutor can drop cases whenever they wish; they did not drop this one.

In fact, the prosecutor did not drop the charges, and the judge the man guilty of a serious crime but gave the man a ridiculously light sentences.

Notwithstanding any plea agreement, either the judge should have:

a)cleared the man because she believed the evidence was not sufficient to convict. In that case there should be no sentence, community service or anything, or

b) she should have found him guilty and then given him a reasonable sentence for the crime.

No matter how I see this, there is something wildly wrong with the outcome.

I also think it is a tragedy that a judge would accept an extremely unusual sentence that will certainly be discussed widely in a case where, one would think, she might be concerned with a child’s privacy.

This judge used extremely bad judgement all around.