A criminal charge for "either A or B"

[Northern_Piper]

@Tom_Tildrum

Doing research for a professor back in law school, I once ran across a case out of Australia where the defendant was on trial for necrophilia and argued that he reasonably, if incorrectly, believed that the woman was alive but unconscious. The court refused to allow this defense, noting that if true, it constituted an admission that he thought he was committing rape.

(Interesting that Swype knows the word “necrophilia.”)

Are you sure you’re not thinking of the case of R. v. Ladue from Yukon, in Canada?

As I posted in a long-ago thread, Is Necrophilia illegal (subtitle: Ewwww…):

@Northern_Piper

In Canada, necrophilia is a criminal offence. Section 182 of the Criminal Code provides:

182. Every one who

(a) neglects, without lawful excuse, to perform any duty that is imposed on him by law or that he undertakes with reference to the burial of a dead human body or human remains, or

(b) improperly or indecently interferes with or offers any indignity to a dead human body or human remains, whether buried or not,

is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding five years.
The major case on point is R. v. Ladue, [1965] 4 C.C.C. 264, 45 C.R. 287 (Yukon C.A.). When charged under this section, Mr. Ladue apparently offered a couple of different explanations as to why he thought she was alive, and therefore he would be not guilty. First, Mr. Ladue, a French-Canadian, said he thought she was English [ed. note - I’m not going to comment on that one], then he said that he thought she was sleeping.

The Yukon Court of Appeal pointed out that if either of those statements were true (which they appeared to doubt), then he was confessing to rape, which could not be a defence to this charge. They upheld his conviction for indecent interference.