The Loudoun County teen male charged with sexual assault at two separate high schools was originally sentenced to register as a sex offender — receiving a black mark on his record for life — but a judge recently reversed her decision on that, allowing the teen to escape the sex offender registry.
The parents of one of his victims blamed the county’s Commonwealth’s Attorney Buta Biberaj for letting him off the hook. According to the lawyer representing the assailant, Biberaj failed to follow the proper procedure in requesting the sex offender registration, which enabled the defense to demand a rehearing on that part of the sentence, and the judge vacated the registration requirement on rehearing and did not reinstate it.
“We were always concerned that Ms. Biberaj would not vigorously protect our daughter and seek justice for her and the other victims throughout the court proceeding,” Scott Smith, the father of a girl whom the male assaulted on May 28 at Stone Bridge High School, said in a statement on Saturday. “And, it now appears that our fears have been proven true by her utter failure to follow even the most basic statutory procedures required to ensure that our daughter’s predator would be placed on the Virginia Sex Offender Registry list.” The judge acknowledged that the court made an error in the original sentencing.
During the rehearing, the assailant’s probation officer, Jason Bickmore, opposed forcing him to register as a sex offender, arguing that studies show teenage sex offenders required to register actually have a higher rate of re-offending. Biberaj acknowledged that the registration may “stifle his success,” and she requested that the teen be required to register until he turned 30. The judge rejected this request.
“This incompetency by Loudoun County’s chief prosecutor should be a clear indicator of why she cannot handle the job, and why should [sic] not continue in that role in the future,” Smith added.
Biberaj’s office did not respond to Fox News’ request for comment.
Loudoun County Commonwealth’s Attorney Buta Biberaj
(Loudoun County Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Office)
Smith was not alone in pointing fingers at Biberaj.
Loudoun County Supervisor Caleb Kershner, who supervised the assailant’s defense lawyers, said in a Facebook statement that he personally stepped into the matter when his employee informed him “that the Commonwealth Attorney’s office had violated this young defendant’s due process rights” during sentencing.
“Buta Biberaj’s office had asked for the defendant to be placed on a lifetime sex registry, and they did so without filing for a hearing,” Kershner wrote. “By law, in juvenile cases, the Commonwealth Attorney is required to give advance notice of their intention to seek the sex offender registry for the defendant.”
“This type of prosecution by ambush is unfair, and it puts all of our due process rights at risk,” Kershner wrote. “The Commonwealth Attorney’s failure to follow the law could not go unanswered. So I intervened. And upon our motion, the judge agreed that the Commonwealth had not followed the law, vacated the registry requirement, and ordered a new hearing on the single issue of registry, which took place yesterday.”
At the rehearing, the judge reversed her decision, dropping the requirement that the assailant register as a sex offender. The Loudoun County Juvenile Court had previously found the male student “not innocent” of charges of forcible sodomy and forcible fellatio in the May 28 incident. The same student pleaded “no contest” in a separate case to two charges of abduction and sexual battery involving an incident at Broad Run High School on Oct. 6.
Biberaj, who received an $861,039 assist from the George Soros-funded Justice and Public Safety PAC in her 2019 election, also recently claimed that Scott and Jess Smith, the May 28 victim’s parents, had collaborated with her in delaying the assailant’s trial — a key decision that Kershner claimed led to the assailant remaining in school, where he carried out the Oct. 6 assault.
Scott Smith speaks with Laura Ingraham
Biberaj told Loudoun Now that she made the request to delay the assailant’s trial after the May 28 incident in collaboration with the victim’s family, advising the family that waiting for DNA evidence to confirm the sodomy allegations would bolster the case.
Yet Scott Smith vehemently denied this claim.
“My wife and I were shocked, but not surprised by the assertion that we somehow collaborated with Commonwealth’s Attorney Buta Biberaj in her decision to delay the trial of the predator who attacked our daughter,” Scott Smith said. “Nothing could be further from the truth. We had neither any input nor collaboration in that decision-making process. Rather, those decisions were made exclusively by her, without our input.”
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Kershner lamented “the serious failures of the system,” specifically failures of Biberaj and Loudoun County Public Schools.
“After the defendant’s first offense, he was released from custody at the Commonwealth Attorney’s request … because they weren’t ready to resolve the first sexual assault case within 21 days, as required by law for juveniles held in custody,” he wrote on Facebook.
Parents and community members attend a Loudoun County School Board meeting, just 40 minutes from Fairfax.
(Reuters/Evelyn Hockstein)
“The Commonwealth knew the offenses were serious, but they were simply unprepared to move forward with the case,” the supervisor added. “If they had been ready on time, the defendant would not have been released back into the community and the second offense would never have occurred.”
Virginians for Safe Communities (VSC), which is leading an effort to recall Biberaj and which released Smith’s statement, condemned the commonwealth’s attorney.
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Sean Kennedy, VSC’s president, said his organization is “committed to removing [Biberaj] from office and giving peace of mind to the families of Loudoun County that the public safety officials actually care about their safety — not doing George Soros’ bidding. Make no mistake, Buta Biberaj does not work for Loudoun County, she is bought and paid for by radical billionaire George Soros.”
