Judge In Shiloh Hendrix Case Repeatedly Let Sex Offenders Walk Without Jailtime

Shiloh Hendrix was sentenced to 200 days of community service and a $1,000 fine Thursday for her “disorderly conduct” toward a Somali man who followed her around and filmed her at a park in Rochester, Minnesota, last year. Hendrix could serve up to 90 days in jail if she violates her probation. The state of Minnesota pressed charges against Hendrix after the video of the 37-year-old mother went viral. Hendrix and her young son were followed around a playground and recorded by Sharmake Omar, who confronted her for rebuking a child and calling him the n-word after he allegedly reached into her diaper bag and stole one of her son’s things. Hendrix gave Omar the middle finger and cussed at him and called him the n-word in response to his accusations. (In 2022 Omar was charged with raping a 16-year-old girl, and prosecutors dismissed the case “in the interests of justice” in March 2025.) While taking a hard line on Hendrix’s speech, the judge who ordered the sentencing in the Hendrix case, Christa Daily, has a track record of granting outrageous plea deals, letting convicted sex offenders off with light punishments and little to no jail time. In January 2023, 54-year-old Thomas Lee Meyer was charged with possession of child pornography following an investigation by the Rochester Police Department. Investigators discovered “several child sexual abuse images of juveniles ranging in age from 6 to 8 years old” at Meyer’s residence. Meyer confessed to law enforcement that “he viewed thousands” of such images on his phone. According to Minnesota law, possession of child sexual abuse material when the victim is less than 14 is a felony with a maximum penalty of a 10-year jail sentence or a $10,000 fine or both. But Daily allowed a plea deal that had a “stay of imposition for four felony charges of possessing pornographic work and dismisse[d] six other similar felony charges.” The deal let Meyer complete probation, a sex offender program, and 100 days of community service and have his felony charges dropped to misdemeanors. Daily did not have Meyer serve any jail time. Later that year, Daily also sentenced 64-year-old Paul Alan Collopy to serve 30 days at a detention center after he pled guilty to sexually assaulting a 9-year-old girl several times from 2021 to 2022. He was reportedly allowed to leave the detention center for work and was subject to home monitoring for 30 days after his release. The pattern of these lightly imposed sentences for sex offenders only continues. In August 2024, Daily ordered Tommy Tongsengzeng Yang, 35, to serve two years of supervised probation and pay a fine of $3,373.10. Yang, “a Rochester community volleyball organizer,” was charged with third-degree criminal sexual conduct. Minnesota statute says such a charge can bring a sentence of 15 years in prison and a fine of $30,000. Instead, Yang pled guilty to fifth-degree criminal sexual conduct, a plea deal that allowed him to serve no jail time and probation instead. According to the criminal complaint, filed with the Rochester Police Department, Yang sexually assaulted a 15-year-old juvenile “several times in public parking lots around Rochester. The teenager told Yang ‘no’ several times during different encounters, according to the complaint” and allegedly sustained visible abrasions “during one of the assaults.” In another case, Daily sentenced Amber Ann Wenger to probation after she was “convicted of sexually assaulting two patients at inpatient treatment facilities.” Wenger pled guilty to “an amended charge of 5th-degree criminal sexual conduct” in December 2024, while “already serving 5 years of probation in a nearly identical case.” Wenger faced charges of third-degree criminal sexual conduct involving penetration, prohibited occupational relationship, and fourth-degree criminal sexual contact. Wenger was sentenced to house arrest for five years, allowing her to continue to work. After pleading guilty to her second charge, Daily granted Wenger a “stay of imposition.” This reduces her conviction if she does not “have contact with any vulnerable adults” and completes a second five-year probation sentence “without incident.” Hendrix’s defense attorney in the case, Brian Karalus, is seeking to appeal the ruling. Karalus said, “It was like I was fighting the prosecutor and the judge” during the trial. Libby Bandelin is a reporting and editing intern at The Federalist with the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. A recent graduate from Dordt University, she earned her B.A. in communications with an emphasis in journalism and a minor in criminal justice. In college, she served as chief editor for her student newspaper, and her writing won third place in the 2026 Cordell Prize. She's also attended journalism intensives with WORLD newsgroup and Alliance Defending Freedom. Christa DailyCrimeFelonyinjusticeLawMinnesotaOrderRacial SlurRochesterRochester Police Departmentsex offenderShiloh Hendrix