Sentence goes over the line

One of the nation's great female sprinters has been revealed to be a liar and a cheat. But the problem with the prison sentence handed to Marion Jones is the extent to which the judge merged unsportsmanlike behavior with criminal behavior.

To be sure, Jones broke the law by lying in 2003 to federal investigators who were uncovering a twisted tale of performance-enhancing drugs being dispensed to world-class athletes from a San Francisco laboratory. She also broke the law by lying, separately, to investigators looking into a case of fraud involving the man who was the father to her first child.

U.S. District Judge Kenneth Karas, though, seemed more interested in the impact of her decision to take steroids. "Athletes in society have an elevated status," Karas said Friday. "They entertain, they inspire and perhaps most importantly, they serve as role models for kids around the world. When there is this widespread level of cheating, it sends all the wrong messages to those who follow these athletes' every move."

Karas is right about the message Jones sent, and she has appropriately lost her Olympic medals, her athletic career and her marketable reputation as a result. But when Karas enhanced her criminal punishment beyond the probation and community service typically required of such offenders, he applied a standard that has yet to be used on even some of professional baseball's most flagrant steroid abusers. He also separated a mother from her nursing four-month-old.

Jones deserves no mercy from people who value the purity of athletic competition. But if judges are going to start imprisoning athletes for being bad role models, Congress will need to expand the federal penal system.

[Last modified January 14, 2008, 20:14:20]