Prisoner Released From Jail to Watch Red Sox Game

There won't be a happier fan in all of Kauffman Stadium on Wednesday night than Randy Aaron Barker. As you can probably guess by the fact that we referred to him by three names, Barker has had some trouble with the law, but unlike most of those thrown behind bars, Barker's pleas for mercy fell on willing ears.

A judge in Iowa allowed Barker, who is serving a 10-day sentence for interference with official acts and violation of a protective order, to be temporarily released so he could join his father and brother at the game. Barker told the judge that the three of them had been planning a trip to the game for three months, that they hadn't been able to attend a game in 25 years and that baseball was one of the "few pleasures" of his life.

KCCI in Des Moines spoke to Lance Morris who said that Barker has repeatedly harassed his family, including making more than 60 phone calls to his mother in one night. Morris learned of the release by reading the local newspaper, presumably because the judge decided that the family weren't Royals or Sox fans and, thus, unlikely to be in the stands with Barker on Wednesday night.

We may not be talking about an arch-criminal here, but isn't the whole point of putting someone in jail to punish them? Part of punishment is that you don't get to partake in pleasurable things, no matter how few of them there are in your life. While the judge's heart may have been in the right place, his robe shouldn't give him the right to remake Field of Dreams with a three-named stalker playing the role of Moonlight Graham.

If there's justice, which this story leads us to believe there isn't, the game will play out one of two ways. Either Josh Beckett will get shelled and the Royals will run away with a shutout victory, or the cops will escort Barker to the game will take him away after the top of the fifth inning with Beckett en route to a perfecto. It's an official game at that point, and we're real sticklers for the rules in these parts.