Should she be punished as well?

[MassNole]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

I know you've passed your law exam. I'm sure that you'll always be that guy that defends everything to the book.

But, be honest here, you've gotta agree that there are going to be situations where this strict law is going to hurt a man that really had no idea.

Do you have any idea how you would fight such a crime if you were asked to defend this man? I don't remember exactly what type of law you wanted to practice so perhaps you wouldn't even be in this position. But if you were, or knew a colleague that was, how would you or he/she try to help this man?

Honestly, I would plead it out and hope the DA would be merciful. I could try to get favorable Jury instructions, but that would probably be unsuccessful as the Jury would be instructed if they found that this man had sex with the girl they must find him guilty of the crime. As such, I would strongly try to persuade my client to not take the witness stand, and then I would use every bit of latitude the Judge would give me to bring her prior history in front of the jury. Since I would never actually ask my client if he had sex with her I would argue that she is a lying whore who is seeking to put another man into prison because she gets a perverse pleasure in destroying the lives of men. This guy though shot himself in the foot when he admitted the sexual relations to her father, but as best I ethically could I'd try to paint her father as a liar who has the same sick perversion of destroying the lives of innocent men.

I am very much a proponent of these laws being amended so that there can be some defense as to the lack of knowledge of the girl's age.

[mgoblue]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Honestly, I would plead it out and hope the DA would be merciful. I could try to get favorable Jury instructions, but that would probably be unsuccessful as the Jury would be instructed if they found that this man had sex with the girl they must find him guilty of the crime. As such, I would strongly try to persuade my client to not take the witness stand, and then I would use every bit of latitude the Judge would give me to bring her prior history in front of the jury. Since I would never actually ask my client if he had sex with her I would argue that she is a lying whore who is seeking to put another man into prison because she gets a perverse pleasure in destroying the lives of men. This guy though shot himself in the foot when he admitted the sexual relations to her father, but as best I ethically could I'd try to paint her father as a liar who has the same sick perversion of destroying the lives of innocent men.

I am very much a proponent of these laws being amended so that there can be some defense as to the lack of knowledge of the girl's age.

I agree...I hate to sound like David Stern, but the law in this case currently doesn't give a judge any leeway (or a jury for that matter). The guys slept with the girl, the fact she lied to them about her age doesn't matter. Do I think it should matter? Yes. These laws are meant to protect minors who aren't mature enough to understand the impact their decisions make, I'd challenge that this girl knew exactly what she was doing.

There's just nothing they can do now except reevaluate the law, but I doubt that'll happen, people will never vote for a law that lessens pedophilia penalties and whatnot.

[MassNole]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

I agree...I hate to sound like David Stern, but the law in this case currently doesn't give a judge any leeway (or a jury for that matter). The guys slept with the girl, the fact she lied to them about her age doesn't matter. Do I think it should matter? Yes. These laws are meant to protect minors who aren't mature enough to understand the impact their decisions make, I'd challenge that this girl knew exactly what she was doing.

There's just nothing they can do now except reevaluate the law, but I doubt that'll happen, people will never vote for a law that lessens pedophilia penalties and whatnot.

That is the exact problem, changing the laws because of this one little sociopath would be a huge detriment to countless numbers of other children who would be taken advantage of by sleeze balls.

[Trevytrev11]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

That is the exact problem, changing the laws because of this one little sociopath would be a huge detriment to countless numbers of other children who would be taken advantage of by sleeze balls.

They always say "better to let one hundred guilty men free than to put one innocent man behind bars."

In the case of consentual statatory rape, I think I agree. However, being a father to a one year old daughter, I may see things differently down the road in 12-13 years.

[SPTO]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

That is the exact problem, changing the laws because of this one little sociopath would be a huge detriment to countless numbers of other children who would be taken advantage of by sleeze balls.

Well there are such things as extraordinary circumstances. How do you think Legal Precedents come about?

[SidVish]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

I thank God that I've found the girl I'm going to spend the rest of my life because this is some pretty scary ****. In this day and age how the hell would you know that she was 13? I know I sure as hell wouldn't. I really feel bad for that guy because he didn't do anything wrong. Her parents are obviously in denial because they've couldn't have possibly bred a little conniving ho.

[MassNole]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Well there are such things as extraordinary circumstances. How do you think Legal Precedents come about?

That is true and perhaps this case could be the one that changes the law, it would be hard to come up with a better case to change the law actually.

[fishepa]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Don't go sleeping around with every girl you meet and you won't have a problem.

[youvalss]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Chastity belt?

No, dude, I meant to a vibrator...LOL

[ESPNdeportes]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

You'd still be guilty of statutory rape. Statutory rape is a strict liability crime, basically meaning unless you are insane or involuntarily intoxicated if you have sex with a person who is not of age you are more or less automatically guilty of the crime.

Would you be able to file any charges against the bar? Just wondering if you'd at least be able to get some $$ to help straighten out your life.

[MassNole]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Would you be able to file any charges against the bar? Just wondering if you'd at least be able to get some $$ to help straighten out your life.

As far as the system would be concerned you'd be just another felon and in most states you'd also be a high level sex offender who has to register in the database.

I would suppose you could file suit against the girl and her family under the theory of Intentional Infliction of Emotional Distress and argue that this was a calculated action to ruin your life. The problem there would be that they'd file a motion to dismiss and cite to the criminal statute test, I don't know that any suit would survive that, but under these extremely unusual circumstances where there is at least one other documented instance of this behavior you may be able to. As unlikely as it would be that would be the guy's only possible remedy. You can't go after the DA for malicious or tortious prosecution because you broke the law and the DA properly charged you.

If I had my way the law would be changed to be able to account for some accountability on the minor's fault and to be able to show that you reasonably believed that the person was over the age of consent. I saw the picture of the girl and whereas I don't think she looks 19, she sure as hell looks 16 which I believe is the age of consent in Florida. The thing is even in my version of the law I'd have a cut off age of 14 (age of a HS freshman) so this guy would still be in trouble. This area of the law is very complex, but in the end the DA could have easily chosen to not prosecute this crime, but the down side would have been that whoever ran against them the next election would trash them on the issue of being light on child molesters and they would likely not be reelected.

[jmood88]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Man it sucks to be those guys.

I always wondered what would happen in a situation like, say, he had met her at a bar. Say it was an 18+ night at a bar, she had a fake ID and snuck in, he meets her and has sex with her- would the bar have any liability in that situation? Interesting indeed.

I think that that has happened a few times actually.

[pfunk880]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Don't go sleeping around with every girl you meet and you won't have a problem.

I agree.

This situation is still horrible and unfair though.

[youvalss]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

Become a catholic priest and u don't have any problem...

[p_rushing]

Re: Should she be punished as well?

It depends on what the laws are in the state, but if its like most rape and other crimes against kids, they have to be taken to court by the DA. You basically can only try to prove that you had no knowledge or way to prove she wasn't 18, but its all going to rest on what the law says. Like MassNole says though, you can't get out of the crime, maybe the judge could suspend the sentence or something, but there is most likely some mandatory jail time.