Hopefully he searched her purse and other belongings to make sure she didn’t have any drugs on her, too, before letting her in his car. And I assume he’s been trained in telling fake IDs from real ones, just in case.
Sure, that’s a slippery slope. But get real: you’re interested in dating and or fucking someone, and you ask them, “By the way, can I see your driver’s license to make sure you are of age because, though I’m clearly out to be with you, I don’t trust you one fucking bit. But after I confirm your age, we can still like each other a lot, right?”
I guess maybe you see this like condom use. I see it as more or less ridiculous, and indicative of the silly laws on the books with respect to sex with minors.
This actually isn’t an issue of morality, it’s an issue of age. Under the Model Penal Code, if the victim is over 14, mistake as to age is a defense. 14 and under, it is not. There are two reasons why there is strict liability when the victim is 14 and under.
The first is that it is believed that the physical and psychological injury is more severe the younger the child is, hence the need for a greater deterrent - the law doesn’t allow the perpetrator to just think the victim is legal - the perpetrator has to affirmatively investigate the victim’s age.
The second is efficiency. In most cases (though obviously not this one) a fourteen y.o. ain’t gonna look legal. Imposing strict liability eliminates what will in most cases be a fruitless investigation/trial into the mindset of the perpetrator.
Grink got caught in an very odd situation that the drafters of the MPC did not foresee - a 14 y.o. that really did look 21. That does not mean it is a bad law, however - laws have to be drafted for the general, not the particular - a law threaded with caveats and subjective tests doesn’t allow people to know ahead of time what is legal and what is not.
We do have a safety net, however, one that failed here. It’s called prosecutorial discretion. The prosecutor was under no obligation to pursue this case, and properly should have declined to do so.
So don’t be pissed off at the law, be pissed off at the prosecutor without a lick of common sense/with an agenda.
BTW, Dewey, that statute doesn’t say what you think it says. Re-read it.
Do you have more information than I do, Erislover? Did I miss the part of the story where she showed him a fake ID? Or that she even looked 21? Or that he did anything other than talk to her on the internet, go to dinner and a movie, and then have sex with her? Wow, he must have been really, really shocked that GASP! somebody lied to him after he met her on the internet. And she lied in emails. Wow.
The fact is, I don’t know the in’s and out’s or the case, nor do you, nor does the OP. The judge does, and that carries some weight, and if he feels a prison sentence would be too severe for this guy, he may have a point. But unless I know more, I’m not going to jump all over the prosecutors in this case. And I’m certainly not going to dismiss statutory rape laws as stupid or silly based on one case.
And I think we’ve gone around and around enough regarding the propriety of age of consent laws to take this thread there too. i
Sua is right – the definition of “sexual contact” includes “intent to arouse” as part of its definition. That makes sense; otherwise, a parent giving his kid a bath would be guilty of a crime when he scrubbed the kid’s winkie. Contra to what I said, both sexual contact and “flashing” are strict liability with regards to the age of the victim.
I’m pretty embarassed now, because that was an extremely dumb mistake on my part. Verily, I am a :wally
Lesson for the class: it’s a bad, bad, bad idea to just glance at a statute.
Yes. He also introduced her to his parents. That’s a pretty big deal, in my opinion.
And here’s a question for people who are treating matches made on the internet as more suspect than ones made other traditional ways. Do you have any reason to think that this is reasonable, or are you just basing it on “common sense”?
I worked at a private school for rich kids between the ages of 12 and 18. Almost never was a I fooled by a boy into thinking he was much more than a year or two older than he really was (although the guys seem to be getting taller by the year.)
The girls, on the other hand, were a whole different ballgame. Some looked exactly like they were 12, 13, 14…but I swear some of them looked like they were 24! You have to imagine coming from wealth; hairdressers, expensive make up, designer clothing, jewellry, class. It was truly scary. And I was not the only one to notice this. The school director mistakenly thought some new girls arriving on campus were new teachers, only to find out they were all under 16.
I am not saying anything about the specific court case, but if any of you have been anywhere near a bunch of 14 year old girls recently, you might be shocked.
Why would you think, for even ONE SECOND, that people who meet over the internet are likely to be any more untruthful than those who meet in a pub, through personals, or just about any other meeting.
Yes, I met my gf over the internet. No, I didn’t doubt her word, especially after we met in person. Why should I or anyone else meeting any way question potential partners like this?!
The guy was duped. No-one should have to produce ID, be subjected to cross-examination or anything for a relationship of any sense to work. There must be more than a few partners who met in the pub who shielded all manner of potential obstacles to a relationship (other partners, STDs, drug use, etc). Just because they happened to meet in a certain way doesn’t make that more likely!
But don’t let logical argument get in the way of your supposedly moral statement will you?!
I agree that he shouldn’t go to jail. Introducing her to his parents is pretty good evidence he was completely taken in.
Incidentally, it was pretty sneaky of her to say she was 21. If she had said she was 18, that might have caused him to make sure because it was so close. But by saying she was 21, she put herself well beyond any age that could even bring up the issue of being underage.
Notwitstanding the statute, courts have (in other types of cases) read a scienter element into a law where none was explictly given, citing various due-process-type reasons for doing so. In general, strict-liability criminal offenses are disfavored. Sex with a minor is an exception to this general rule.
I don’t know that they have (or could) do so when the law explicitly disallows mistake of age as a defense.
I wouldn’t mind seeing a test case go forward. At its heart, the Due Process clause is a guarantee of fundamental fairness. This case doesn’t pass that test, in my view.
But it won’t be this case, since a guilty plea pretty much waives all non-jurisdictional claims of defect…
The problem is that removal of strict liability will effectively gut statutory rape laws. In point of fact, there is no accurate way to assess age. Since adults can look like children and children can look like adults, without strict liability there is always a defense - and there would be no effective protection of the underaged.
I’d argue that the underaged aren’t protected now, but that would hijack this thread into a nitpick over prevention versus retribution and we’ve done that one a few times.
I’ll place myself in the SuaSponte camp. It’s unfortunate that this guy was nabbed by this law, but that doesn’t mean the law itself is bad - it means the guy was unlucky. It sounds like he was honestly duped, but I see it as more of a danger to weaken statutory rape laws than to risk the odd case such as this one coming up. I can’t comment on whether or not the prosecutor should’ve pursued this case - if it was within his power to let it slide, he probably should have done so, but if it wasn’t, then he was bound to follow the law.
As for the internet, it’s a pretty notorious breeding ground for dishonesty. When nobody can see what you look like or hear what you sound like, it’s easy to pretend you’re something you’re not. Embellishment is simple to do, and widespread. Heck, go in a chatroom someday and see how many 18y/o hot blondes want 2 cyber with U. Yeah, I’m sure not a single one of them is claiming to be something she (or he) is not. On the internet, I can be a 180lb bad-ass, built like a tank, who knows kung-fu and bears a striking resemblance to Bradd Pitt, instead of a skinny white blonde guy with glasses who likes video games. I completely agree that any information you gain off the internet from someone should be taken with a hefty grain of salt.
Jeff
And once you meet that person? And they look exactly as described? And their interest in you is not feigned? And the interests you chatted about they’re still able to keep up a good conversation about? Once their honesty was confirmed about all those aspects, why should you continue to distrust their other aspects?
Sorry for the confusion - in UK English usage, “x slept with y” would almost certainly imply sexual relations took place. If you didn’t mean that, you would say “x and y slept in the same bed but they didn’t have sex.”
Yes, of course then you have a plausible reason to believe that the person has been truthful. At any rate, my comment wasn’t directed specifically at the Grink case, more at the folks who seemed genuinely shocked that people on the internet might gasp! lie or exaggerate. With regards to Grink, I can’t say if he should’ve been suspicious or not, not having been privy to their conversations. For all I know, she did enough research to be able to back her story with all kinds of credible supporting evidence. Or her story could’ve been so rife with holes that Grink would have to be a complete idiot to have believed her. Can’t say.
Jeff
It is that “Can’t say” bit which is at the crux of the issue. Strict liability is like a zero-tolerance policy. There is no room for “can’t say” in this environment. Either you did or you didn’t. No defenses, no way out. The legal structure and the way laws are written are supposed to model real life. If there is a situation in real life where a guy didn’t deserve to go to jail, then the legal system is supposed to have a way, within the rules, where that guy won’t have to go to jail. Life should not have to conform to the law, the law is supposed to conform to life. In real life there is ALWAYS a chance for a “can’t say” or a grey area. In strict liability statutes, there isn’t. Strict liability statutes do not accurately model life and ruling along their lines occasionally produces injustices. Q.E.D.
If the girl collaborates her testimony to protect the guy from legal consequences, then why not let him go? She must not feel that he’s done anything wrong if she’s willing to defend him.
