What if we were gay and we got married and I skull-fucked you to death in your sleep? That would be something.
And that is why we should not have allowed gay marriage!
I love civics!
Mmm, yes. I’d have to give her a stern dressing-down in the morning.
Actually I have no problem at all with this guy being prosecuted. That was a dildo too far. If the wife made her objections known and he continued then that’s rape however you slice it.
When I married for the first time in the 60s in the UK there was no such thing as marital rape. Consent was implicit in the very fact of the marriage contract. It was a barbarous state of affairs which lasted as long as it did because it was thought preferable to the imagined alternative - domestic quarrels ending in the courts as vindictive wives used a rape charge to dispose of a hated partner. (I’m serious, such twaddle was really spouted as an excuse for keeping the status quo.)
Eventually the law changed, the prisons surprisingly did not fill with wrongfully-convicted husbands and married women were given the power which should never have been taken from them - the right to say no.
There’s a distinction between two types of implicit consent.
The first one, the one that applied in the UK in the 60s and in other places, was an irrefutable presumption; a “it’s reasonable to presume you consent no matter what you do or how much you indicate you don’t consent”.
The second one, the one which applies here, is that when you’re in a relationship, it’s reasonable to presume that the other partner consents to sex unless otherwise indicated by said partner. It’s the same reason that if you walk up to your partner and surprise her by groping her, you ought not to have any legal problems whereas if you walk up to a stranger and surprise her by groping her, you very much ought to have legal problems.
The latter is not like the former. One is about the other partner never being able to say “no” whereas the other one is about starting from the presumption that people who are in a relationship together consent to sex but allowing that presumption to be defeated by one partner communication absence of consent. The former is an irrefutable presumption, the latter is a simple, refutable presumption.
In this case, did she make her objections known (beforehand, presumably)? Perhaps someone can find the part where it says she did.
In Canada, to send someone to prison, you need a blamable state of mind on the part of the accused (would you want to send someone to prison without at least that?). That blamable state of mind has to at least rise to the level of willful blindness or gross negligence. To think that a partner who consents to being choked, one of the most dangerous and extreme sexual practices out there, would also consent to anal sex is not a stretch. I don’t see a blamable state of mind which rises to the level of willful blindness, gross negligence or malicious intent on his part. Not that he’s an admirable guy I’d like to hang out with, he just didn’t do something which ought to trigger criminal liability.
Great movie! To remind people, it was about Great Britain trying to get into Germany through the back door.
Certainly, there may be places where a crooked prosecutor could railroad someone, but then the charge really wouldn’t matter. In the OP, a complaint was made, even though withdrawn later. This falls in line with why a case against a batterer might be pursued even if the complaint is withdrawn. In the case of battery, a complainant might face intimidation to drop the case.
Now, if the difference between the DA overhearing about one being fellatio-ly woken in the morning, and the DA continuing prosecution of a withdrawn complaint from a woman who has prior complaints against a man with three prior domestic violence convictions (two against the woman complaining) isn’t apparent, I can explain no more. Anyone who believes the former watches far too many TV crime shows and draws inferences from them.
WTF are you talking about? If a crime occurred, prosecuting it is not “railroading” even if there turns out to be not enough evidence to convict. Nor is the prosecuted “crooked”.
A batterer can be prosecuted if the battered person never lodges a complaint, based on evidence like medical records.
And lets us suppose that the cops go question the wife based on what someone overheard her say. If it’s true, she might tell the cops, “Well, yes it happened, but I don’t think it was rape, and I don’t want to pursue it”. I wouldn’t call that a complaint, but it could still result in a prosecution.
I’m don’t want to argue the likelihood of something like this, or even whether it is just or not. I’m just making the point that “there is no case without a complaint from the victim” is nonsense.
“To think that a partner who consents to being choked, one of the most dangerous and extreme sexual practices out there, would also consent to anal sex is not a stretch.”
I would see it as the reverse - the more extreme the acts, the more onus would be on the person to show each new act was consensual.
Otherwise its basically arguing for open season once you manage to get one extreme act consented to.
Otara
This goes to my point earlier. The likelihood of being prosecuted has nothing to do with whether or not a crime has been committed. You have broken the law by kissing your wife when she is asleep. People can poo poo the fact that no one will ever be convicted for it, but it doesn’t make it any less illegal.
What I am against is making laws that are ridiculous. It makes those laws that are actually required and important less so in people’s mind.
Vindictive bitch? SHE’s having relationship problems? The guy choked her into unconsciousness! Jesus fuckin’ Christ already.
And who says ‘crying rape’ but an asshole, anyway? It’s supposed to hint at ‘crying wolf’ and too many comments here say just that.
God, the degrees to which guys will go to excuse rape.
Exactly. These threads really show who’s who.
Yeah, every discussion on rape brings up assholes who want to talk about ‘false accusations’-----something that has not happened to them yet, has very little chance of happening, and doesn’t involve forcible penetration, and about which they do nothing but derail discussions about rape.
In case you missed: The Supreme Court of Canada said that if you do anything sexual to your partner without consent it is sexual assault eg. Rape. (how about shaking them vigorously to wake them up because they are late for work? Plain old garden variety Assault?). It also negates the consent given while they were conscious, so if they said it was okay to kiss them goodnight while they slept, that was negated.
Now you may not think that kissing your partner while they sleep is sexual assault, or that no one will ever be charged for it even if it occurs, but the fact of the matter is, the highest court in Canada says it is. That’s the law. You have broken it.
Now reasonable people can see a difference between kissing a loved one good night and shoving a dildo up their ass after choking them unconscious, but apparently not the law enforcers in Canada.
Dead people don’t complain either, yet we prosecute murderers. What’s your point? Even the assault analogy doesn’t work. There will be no rape trial without a complaint because an offhand statement is not evidence of a crime. Hearsay to a neighbor who calls the police because she thinks oral sex is dirty is not evidence. Broken bones, bruising, etc. are evidence that can be shown to a jury. Experienced medical personnel can tell the jury that certain types of injuries could only come from some type of battery, instead of an accident. [And it will still be insanely difficult to try if the plaintiff doesn’t point and say “s/he did it” (assuming no other witnesses).]
But let’s say the police question a spouse based on a statement made directly (so it is not hearsay) to a prudish third party, and the spouse admits to administering oral sex to a sleeping partner. It will still go nowhere. Most prosecutors have neither the time nor the staff to chase such a hopeless case, and it would be a hopeless case.* The only way a prosecutor could even get this past a grand jury is if the defendant has Porky Pig for an attorney - and I’d even give Porky great odds of getting it tossed out before trial. And decent defense attorney will have the statement thrown out, and even if admissible, there will be nothing to corroborate the statement. Do you think the DA is going to get any answers from either spouse on the stand? Do you think any jury is going to convict on just a statement from a third party? Do you think a DA is going to waste time and money on a case he cannot win?
I stand by my statement. Without a complaint, this prosecution goes NO-FUCKING-WHERE.
*By hopeless, I’m talking about the assertion that some PO or DA is going to pursue a case based on an offhand comment about a man being waken by a blowjob given by his wife.
Most men have never raped anyone. The only ways rape could affect me directly* are if I were raped, or if I were falsely accused of rape. I suspect some male posters on here focus (perhaps to a fault) on the idea of false rape accusations because they don’t plan to rape anyone, either, and they are viewing it in terms of how they might possibly be personally affected. A selfish viewpoint? Yeah, but that’s human nature.
- Of course I could be severely affected, indirectly, by the rape of a friend or loved one.
This is a correct statement. Assuming similar rules of evidence as the US, however, how would this (a kiss to a sleeping mate) ever get to court? And don’t use ‘fer’instances’ that are as likely as me finding the winning Power Ball ticket discarded on my sidewalk. Just because it is against the law doesn’t mean that your average Canadian needs to fear kissing his sleeping child on the forehead.
As best as I can tell, it isn’t the law enforcers, nor even the judicial branch. The judicial branch does not make the law (something many forget when they dislike a ruling). They should only rule on what the law says. Even law enforcement does not make the laws. They only go after those they believe are breaking the laws and turn them over to the judicial branch. This is the legislature’s problem.
ETA: Sorry, I didn’t see your earlier post when replying. I understand your issue, Uzi. That said, I’m not going to fear nor regret breaking a poorly conceived law that has zero chance of being prosecuted.
So, you are saying it isn’t illegal then?
Whether the DA gets any answers from the accused depends on whether the accused decides to testify. If he testifies, he can be cross examined. When you testify, you have to answer.
As for the alledged victim, the DA can subpoena that person and again, that person would have to answer.
People who testify don’t get to choose what they do or do not answer.
Without a complaint, there is no prosecution, true. That complaint can be made by a third party or by the alledged victim.
An alledged victim would never do such a thing, you say? What if a man once performed oral sex on his girlfriend to wake her up and she laters accuses him because they’re having an acrimonious child custody dispute. Or is it misogyny to think a woman could accuse her former partner of sexual assault because they’re having an acrimonious child custody dispute?