Seriously though, how the hell does one prosecute or convict a minor of prostitution? I mean, prostitution is consensual. Rape is not. Having sex with a minor is rape. Apparently if you pay the minor, it’s magically not rape anymore. Just like if you pay the family, the murder victim magically comes back to life as the murder is undone.

And these people have allowed years of legal training to be swept aside by their sick social convictions. If you’re not going to use the actual law to practice, please stay far far away from the justice system. Thanks.

http://www.komonews.com/news/17760689.html

She never contacted the police about the killing, who did not find out about it until three days later even though she had talked to the police a few minutes after the killing. She admits to coming back to the scene before the police found about it and took his laptop and other evidence and probably took his wallet as well. Does not mean she did not act in self defense, but it also looks like she might have been looking to rob him all along or at best decided to take his stuff after she had killed him. It is easy to see how the prosecuters doubted her story after she admitted to taking his laptop and the related actions.

I believe that two adolescents close in age can consent in some cases. There is a big difference between adolescent and adult. And generally, the law allows for this. I think that there are, in some places, broken laws where it’s deemed that a 16-year-old cannot consent with an 18-year-old and I disagree with the law in those cases. I personally think that the law should be more nuanced. Others may disagree with me and say that since there is such nuance that the cutoff age should in fact be 18 all together, since that is the legal age of adulthood. I do think that in any case, the legal adult is the one who had the responsibility to follow the law, and that they must as a result live with the consequences of breaking it. But we’re talking about a case here of a 15 or 16 year old girl and a 49-year-old man.

i said “consent is generally taken to mean saying yes and allowing the activity to happen, and taking part”
and then
“when this is not present, when one of the participants says no and tries to stop the activity from happening, and the other party forces it, a rape has occurred.”

my definition included giving permission, not just sitting still.
consent
-saying yes, allowing it to happen (not trying to stop it after saying yes), and taking part

i think that is fair if not perfect. in the second half just saying no would be enough to establish rape. the scenario i describe in the second half was not meant to be the absolute minimum scenario that would establish rape, but rather a clear example of a scenario in which forcible rape had occurred.

why don’t you tell me why you think there should be no moral or legal distinction between forcible rape and (otherwise consensual) statutory rape between two consenting adolescents close in age?

I said no a bunch of times. Then I was afraid, and I gave up. But I did not consent. And I was raped. A woman who does in fact not say no at all has not necessarily consented. The answer is not “yes” until shown otherwise — quite the opposite. Consent does not exist until it is given. Women (and all people) are not in a permanent state of consent. Consent means giving permission, not sitting still.

in statutory rape, the activity happens, is allowed to happen, is condoned, is participated in. traditional literal consent is present. however, the legislature has made a judgment that because of the age of one of the parties that consent is void as a defense to statutory rape. the older party is subject to legal discipline. however the sexual encounter could have been significantly different than a rape. it could have been a twenty year old and a sixteen year old who knew each other well and knowingly and unreservedly participated.

in the statutory rape scenario literal consent was present, but was void for purposes of the statutory rape law. it is clear that there are two type of consent here because if literal consent was absent, they would be prosecuted for rape (though a statutory rape charge could be tacked on). if literal consent was present, the crime is a different (and less serious) one.

if every statutory rape was treated as morally and legally equivalent to a Rape, the results would be absurd. statutory rapes would often be punished more harshly because the victim was a child (for purposes of law), even though literal consent was present and there was no violence, and even if the participants were close in age.

to make a long story short though, if there was only one kind of consent there would be no need for a distinction between rape and statutory rape.

i think that rape and statutory rape are not morally equivalent. rape generally carries higher penalties. rape is a crime of violence, statutory rape is generally not. in some jurisdictions, you can commit statutory rape as a crime of omission, by not knowing the age of your partner. normal rape is never a crime of omission.

what constitutes statutory rape differs widely across jurisdictions even within this country. rape is more straightforwardly defined. as a matter of morality, is the fact that something is illegal on one side of a river and legal on the other have much bearing?

statutory rape paints with a broad brush, lack of capacity to consent is a legal fiction. it is not necessarily the case that all sixteen year olds lack capacity to consent to sexual intercourse with a nineteen or twenty year old, the law makes a policy judgment that they shall be deemed to lack such capacity.

i think this is a permissible determination for legislatures to make, but i do not think it
makes all statutory rapes equivalent to traditional rapes. i think the two consents under discussion should not be conflated.