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March 17, 2017
"Good, Bad and Wrongful Juvenile Sex: Rethinking the Use of Statutory Rape Laws Against the Protected Class"
The title of this post is the title of this new article authored by Anna High that a helpful reader flagged for me. Here is the abstract:
This article considers the question of whether statutory rape laws can and should be used against members of the class they were designed to protect. Many commentators have argued that meaningfully consensual sex among similarly situated and sufficiently mature teenagers should be beyond the scope of strict liability rape laws, but the question becomes more fraught in the context of the “contested outer limits” of adolescent sexuality — sexual contact among children and adolescents that offends social norms, leads to harmful outcomes or appears to be exploitative. What are the implications of using statutory rape laws against minors to target “bad sex”?
I contend that even in relation to “bad sex,” there are serious policy and constitutional objections to the use of statutory rape laws against a member of the class they are designed to protect. In jurisdictions without all-encompassing age-gap provisions, the response to sex among adolescents needs to be reformulated to ensure that the use of statutory rape laws against minors is confined to cases involving wrongful, as opposed to mere bad, sex, and is predicated on a clear and objective definition of exploitation, as opposed to mere fornication, as the punitive target.
March 17, 2017 at 08:42 PM | Permalink
Comments
Statutory rape is a feminist scheme to go after productive males. They disrespect the smart 17 year old girl who wants to skip the "Let's Struggle Together" phase of a relationship. She has decided to have a relationship with an established 30 year old.
NJ Senate has banned all marriage before 18, even one with parental consent or even judge consent. They mislabeled as child brides females aged 17 years, 11 months, 29 days, 23 hours, 59 minutes.
http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2017/03/nj_senate_votes_to_outlaw_minors_from_getting_marr.html
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 17, 2017 11:03:31 PM
Bad sex? Is that a new law term?
I think the rape laws when it comes to teens, definitely need to be examined. Teenagers are fickle, their raging hormones often get the better of them and while not fully mature, most know what they are getting into when they have sex.
What starts out as consensual sex between teens too often turns out to later be panic, regret and fears of STD's or unwanted pregnancy. That's when charges of rape get thrown into the mix, AFTER the fact. Teens want to have it all and still retain their "good girl, stellar boy" images in front of their parents.
We live in an age of "he said, she said" especially when it comes to teens and sex. It's an age old question, who took advantage of who, or did two teens just have sex.?
Posted by: kat | Mar 18, 2017 10:07:36 AM
Only physically forcible sex is a crime. The rest is lawyer jihad against the patriarchal family.
All false reports to government officials should be punished. A minimum sentencing should be statutory. Parties making false reports, including witness misidentification, should get what Martha Stewart got for lying to FBI agents, in her home, not under oath. She told them, she did not receive a specific phone call. Phone records showed she did. She was sentenced to 5 months in prison, 5 months of home arrest, and 2 years of probation. Such liars should be liable to damages done to the victim in torts. "Parties" should include police officers, prosecutors, lawyers representing the false accusers, forensic experts, and judges.
This liability should be strict liability. To deter.
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 18, 2017 10:57:16 AM
Here in Kentucky, where the age of consent is 16, we had one of these cases just 2 years ago. A 15 year old boy was convicted (in juvenile court) of having sex with his 13 year old girlfriend in Woodford County, Kentucky. The two kids had "dated" for two years before they decided to have sex together -- the sex was consensual, and occurred at the girl's home, when her parents were not home. She called the boy and invited him to come have sex with her on several occasions. Eventually, her parents discovered nude pics of both their daughter and the boy on her iPhone. When questioned by her parents, she admitted that they had had sex on multiple occasions. Her parents went to the County Attorney, who prosecuted the 15-year old boy for statutory rape, despite the fact that he was himself younger than 16. A public defender pleaded the boy guilty in juvenile court and he was removed from his parents' home and sent to live at a Kentucky Juvenile Detention Center until his 18th birthday. His convictions were appealed to the Woodford Circuit Court and then to the Kentucky court of Appeals, which affirmed. The Kentucky Supreme Court granted discretionary review to address whether a child younger than 16 can legally be convicted of the statutory rape of another child younger than 16. The structure of the statute strongly implies that to be prosecuted for statutory rape, the defendant child must be older than 16. After oral argument was held, the Attorney General's Office filed a Motion to Dismiss the appeal on the ground that the public defender in Juvenile Court (5 years earlier) had failed to make a Conditional Guilty Plea, to preserve the issue for appeal, so all of the prior appeals and the case at the Supreme Court were in error and without jurisdiction. The Ky. Supreme Court granted the Motion to Dismiss the appeal for lack of jurisdiction, so this boy (now 22 or 23 years old!) is stuck with his statutory rape conviction and registration on the Sex Offender Registry. To me, this case clearly cries out for a Governor's Parson and for the rewriting of the statutory rape statute by the Kentucky Legislature.
Posted by: Jim Gormley | Mar 18, 2017 3:00:18 PM
Sexual Prudery. Why are we Americans such prudes? Why is it that so many adults are uncomfortable with the idea of teen sexuality, and prefer to remain in ignorance or denial? Young people begin to have sex at about the same age in most industrialized countries, yet we prosecute kids
According to Pierre-Andre Michaud, chief of the Multidisciplinary Unit for Adolescent Health at the University of Lausanne Hospital in Switzerland and a leading researcher in European teen sexuality, "In many European countries—Switzerland in particular—sexual intercourse, at least from the age of 15 or 16 years, is considered acceptable and even part of normative adolescent behavior."
Americans suck. Period.
....
Posted by: Huh? | Mar 18, 2017 9:36:42 PM
To the lawyers repeatedly claiming that crime is decreasing, are we counting all the statutory rapes that take place every day?
Is doing everything, but not having intercourse, statutory rape or is it child sexual abuse, a separate crime? How many crimes of everything but intercourse are being committed?
Are millions of statutory rapes a year not being counted in the crime statistics?
If a 17 year old girl gets married in Arkansas, but moves to New Jersey, will she be arrested? Will the Full Faith and Credit Clause prevent New Jersey from arresting young married couples from other states? Will underage marriage in New Jersey be counted in the crime statistics used by lawyers seeking to justify decarceration?
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 18, 2017 10:18:29 PM
Looking at 20 years for raping 14 year old boy.
http://ijr.com/2017/03/825294-woman-charged-rape-listing-14-year-old-boy-father-child-medicaid-forms/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=Owned&utm_term=ijamerica&utm_campaign=ods&utm_content=Family
Is the lawyer profession the stupidest group of people in this country? Students in Life Skills Class would have 10 times the common sense.
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 18, 2017 10:39:49 PM
What ever happened to parent responsibility and moral teachings? My opinion: Government corruption and self-satisfaction, Hollywood, media, and public schooling rules and regulations. Thanks to these influences our children are no longer children, by 12 years of age (some younger) they know it ALL. A lot of women use their children against the men in their lives, some out of greed, some out of pay-back,some for benefits and the judicial system doesn't mind getting involved because the court system benefits also.
Posted by: LC in Texas | Mar 19, 2017 11:52:02 AM
More in the annals of unbelievable lawyer sentencing stupidity. Guy kidnaps, kills 13 year old girl, and hides the body under a porch. Gets seven years.
http://www.naplesnews.com/story/news/nation-now/2017/03/17/man-charged-1982-killing-13-year-old-gets-7-year-sentence/99332476/
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 19, 2017 12:22:28 PM
@David
You should start you own blog about sex. Call it "Sexaul Treats for David" or std for short.
Posted by: Daniel | Mar 19, 2017 1:57:20 PM
@Daniel. Only if you promise to serve as its resident expert.
Posted by: David Behar | Mar 19, 2017 4:19:00 PM
@David
Gladly. And as the blog's medical resident the first thing I will do is sedate you into a coma.
Posted by: Daniel | Mar 19, 2017 5:08:43 PM
I know its probably not mentioned but states have held that an male who is a "victim" of statutory rape could be held liable to pay child support. Thus a female could simply use that threat if a male victim goes to the police/da and presses charges as female could not be forced to get an abortion.
State courts have said that since the "child" is innocent, the father should pay. Also its ironic that many conservative states want to try juveniles as adults,but when it comes to things like sex/abortion they think they are "too immature".
Posted by: ash | Apr 16, 2017 1:32:24 AM
