Statutory rape and gender equality

[Peter]

ATLANTA, Dec. 18 — Genarlow Wilson, 20, is serving a prison sentence that shocked his jury, elicited charges of racism from critics of the justice system and even acknowledgment by prosecutors and the State Legislature that it is unjust.
Skip to next paragraph

Genarlow Wilson, 20, has been in prison for nearly two years.

He was sentenced to 10 years in prison without parole for having consensual oral sex with a 15-year-old girl at a New Year’s Eve party, an offense that constituted aggravated child molesting, even though Mr. Wilson was 17.

With Mr. Wilson — a football player, honor student and the first homecoming king at Douglas County High School — nearing two years in prison, the Georgia Supreme Court declined last Friday to hear his appeal.

Mr. Wilson, who is black, is trapped in a legal vise intended to ensure severe penalties for child molesters and other sex offenders, navigating a maze of legal technicalities that for him seems to hold nothing but dead ends. Some critics of the sentence also say Mr. Wilson is caught in a system that metes out disproportionately harsh sentences to black defendants.

Disturbed by Mr. Wilson’s conviction, the Legislature changed the law in March to ensure that most sex between teenagers be treated as a misdemeanor. But the State Supreme Court said legislators had chosen not to make the law retroactive.

“While I am very sympathetic to Wilson’s argument regarding the injustice of sentencing this promising young man with good grades and no criminal history to 10 years in prison without parole and a lifetime registration as a sexual offender,” wrote Justice Carol W. Hunstein, “this court is bound by the Legislature’s determination that young persons in Wilson’s situation are not entitled to the misdemeanor treatment.”

The problem with that argument, legislators on the judicial committee said in interviews Monday, is that the State Constitution prohibits retroactive laws.

Even more confounding, at the time of Mr. Wilson’s offense, a so-called “Romeo and Juliet” exception had already been made for sexual intercourse between teenagers.

“Had Genarlow had intercourse with this girl, had he gotten her pregnant, he could only have been charged with a misdemeanor and punished up to 12 months,” said Brenda Joy Bernstein, Mr. Wilson’s lawyer.

Her client is not eligible for parole, only a reprieve that would not remove his name from the sex offender registry, Ms. Bernstein said.

The prosecutor, David McDade, the district attorney in Douglas County, west of Atlanta, says he has repeatedly offered Mr. Wilson the opportunity to resolve the case with a plea deal, adding that he would have to be treated similarly to the other defendants in the case, who are serving five- to seven-year prison sentences with a chance at parole. They, too, will have to register as sex offenders.

Mr. Wilson is adamant that he will not plead.

“Even after serving time in prison, I would have to register as a sex offender wherever I lived and if I applied for a job for the rest of my life, all for participating in a consensual sex act with a girl just two years younger than me,” he told a reporter for Atlanta magazine last year, adding that he would not even be able to move back in with his mother because he has an 8-year-old sister. “It’s a lifelong sentence in itself. I am not a child molester.”

On New Year’s Eve in 2003, Mr. Wilson and several friends rented a hotel room for a party at which they planned to have plenty of alcohol, marijuana and sex. One friend, goofing around with a video camera, captured much of the action on videotape. A 17-year-old girl reported after leaving the party that she had been gang raped. The tape showed that she was severely intoxicated.

A second girl, 15, also attended the party, but did not drink or smoke. She had what she later said was consensual oral sex with Mr. Wilson. But according to the law, a 15-year-old is below the age of consent. Mr. Wilson went to trial on charges of rape and aggravated child molesting.

After watching parts of the tape, the jury decided that Mr. Wilson had not raped the older girl. But it was bound by law to find him guilty of molesting the 15-year-old. Jurors said afterward they did not know that the charge carried a minimum sentence of 11 years, including 10 without parole.

Juannessa Bennett, Mr. Wilson’s mother, said her son was crushed by the Supreme Court decision.

“We’ve got people that is in power that don’t have no emotions,” Ms. Bennett said. “They don’t sympathize.”

Discuss.

If two people under the age of consent have sex, who, if anybody, should be charged with a crime?  And if two people are separated by a couple of years and straddle the AOC, should that be a crime?

[Calandale]

They both should. Dirty little buggers.

They should learn their sex from an
elder master.

[Litigious]

 

Seriously speaking: this is just one example of how sick and twisted politically correctness is.

[Peter]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

[Litigious]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

There was a man falsely accused for incest and rape on his daughter in Sweden. He got 8 years in prison and spent 3 of them, before some reporters found out that he had been convicted on totally false accusations and cops and prosecutors lying and forging evidence. Who are they trying to charge for this? The cops? The prosecutors? No, his then underaged daughter, whom the cops and the prosecutors made testify falsely to her own father! 

[purposefulinsanity]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

I was intending to comment on this thread earlier but my connection went down again (not sure how long it will be working for this time).  I did have some links on this subject that were interesting reading but firefox ate all my bookmarks last week 

I'm not going to add anything else right now- the kids are having some loud time, and I'd rather comment when I can hear myself think.

[Calandale]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

There was a man falsely accused for incest and rape on his daughter in Sweden. He got 8 years in prison and spent 3 of them, before some reporters found out that he had been convicted on totally false accusations and cops and prosecutors lying and forging evidence. Who are they trying to charge for this? The cops? The prosecutors? No, his then underaged daughter, whom the cops and the prosecutors made testify falsely to her own father! 

Conniving little wench deserves it. First, she seduces her father, and then puts him in jail?
Where's your sense of misogyny?

[paradox]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

and thats the point he broke the law it is there to protect children
there are reasons for these laws. children should be protected from the manipulation of older people who have more experience at it. but that sentence is a little harsh for the crime.

[Litigious]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

There was a man falsely accused for incest and rape on his daughter in Sweden. He got 8 years in prison and spent 3 of them, before some reporters found out that he had been convicted on totally false accusations and cops and prosecutors lying and forging evidence. Who are they trying to charge for this? The cops? The prosecutors? No, his then underaged daughter, whom the cops and the prosecutors made testify falsely to her own father! 

Conniving little wench deserves it. First, she seduces her father, and then puts him in jail?
Where's your sense of misogyny?

But you forget that I also hate government people and jurists. I'd love to see district attorneys and judges go to jail even more. 

[Peter]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

and thats the point he broke the law it is there to protect children
there are reasons for these laws. children should be protected from the manipulation of older people who have more experience at it. but that sentence is a little harsh for the crime.

How does a law that imprisons a child for 10 years and marks them as a sex offender for life protect that child?  And how does it protect the 'victim', who'll have to live with the fact that a boy's life was ruined because she gave him a blow-job?  It's a law that merely serves to create criminals and victims, sending one to prison and the other to therapy (where they'll be convinced by the therapist that they were actually raped), traumatising both, and for what?  Consensual oral sex between a guy and a girl with a 2-year age gap?  Thank god that monster was locked away!

[Litigious]

I think the real issue with cases like the one Peter posted is that the law that is there to protect minors is being used to prosecute them.

I like PI's comment.  Laws that are meant to protect people shouldn't be turned into a hammer for moralists to use to smash the very lives of the people the law intended to protect.

and thats the point he broke the law it is there to protect children
there are reasons for these laws. children should be protected from the manipulation of older people who have more experience at it. but that sentence is a little harsh for the crime.

How does a law that imprisons a child for 10 years and marks them as a sex offender for life protect that child?  And how does it protect the 'victim', who'll have to live with the fact that a boy's life was ruined because she gave him a blow-job?  It's a law that merely serves to create criminals and victims, sending one to prison and the other to therapy (where they'll be convinced by the therapist that they were actually raped), traumatising both, and for what?  Consensual oral sex between a guy and a girl with a 2-year age gap?  Thank god that monster was locked away!

The "legal" system is sick and twisted in most countries. I agree with Francis E. Dec that the law is "the lowest form of gangsterism". You can put an innocent man in jail through cops and prosecutors forging evidence and you can put a boy in jail for having consent, if not formally legal,  sex with a girl. At the same time the big gangsters go free. The ones who mostly belong in jail are politicians and power-abusing cops, prosecutors and judges. 

[Kosmonaut]

I think in the example given, it is more a case of racism.
The law is obviously antiquated. If every under-age boy who got an underage girl was prosecuted for statutory rape, then sooner or later the law would have to change. As it stands it can be used depending on who the male.
You would have to be careful if you are a black guy shagging the vicar's daughter.

[Nomaken]

I just think the age of consent should be lowered.  Or better yet, have some other form of qualification besides age to determine if the person is capable of making fully aware personal decisions.

[Kosmonaut]

I just think the age of consent should be lowered.  Or better yet, have some other form of qualification besides age to determine if the person is capable of making fully aware personal decisions.

you mean like pubic hair?
well i mean the maturity to grow it.

[Nomaken]

I mean psychological and emotional maturity and awareness.