When Jamie Lynn Spears first announced her pregnancy, there was a lot of speculation on whether the father of the baby might be up for jail time. The speculation has seemed to die down with media exposure to the case, but I, for one, demand to know the resolution, both out of morbid curiosity as well as settling some legal issues.
Based on various links I found in the archive and on the Internet, it seems to be the general consensus that it really depends on where the baby was conceived since statuatory rape laws vary from state to state. Since nobody knows where the baby was conceived, nobody’s prosecuting. Which leads me to my first GQ:
(1) Is statuatory rape a crime which can be prosecuted without the victim’s consent? I know that some crimes (e.g. domestic abuse) can, ostensibly for the greater protection of women.
If so, considering prosecutorial zeal generally runs high for sex crimes against minors, (2) why doesn’t a California prosecutor simply charge someone with something and force some testimony?
(3) Can the state order invasive medical tests, such as paternity tests, without the consent of the mother or father?
And the least GQ of them all:
(4) What’s happening in the Spears case? Nobody wants to stir the pot?
I don’t know, but my WAG is that they have better things to do. Without some kind of evidence or testimony from the victim, filing charges would seem premature and probably end up backfiring.
I’ll yield this one to a lawyer. My uneducated guess is yes, but they’d need some damned good evidence to get a judge to sign it.
I’d like to think that nobody really cares, and they’re letting Jamie Lynn have her privacy. In reality, though, I think there’s just nothing else to report. She’s pregnant. She’s doing fine. No news.
I am from Louisiana just like the Spears girls. This stuff happens in all states every single day. The one time I saw statutory rape threats made was by the parents of a girl much younger than her boyfriend. I guess theoretically they could push it but what would the point be? Jamie Lynn is rich in her own right so she could afford whatever lawyers she wanted which, oddly, would be to protect the father of their child against supposed crimes committed against her.
You have to ask yourself how such a trial would play out. It would be quite strange and no reasonable DA would attempt to touch such a thing.
“You have to ask yourself how such a trial would play out. It would be quite strange and no reasonable DA would attempt to touch such a thing.”
I live in Louisiana now. We best be quiet. If we ask, some DA will prove how unreasonable he is…
But you are correct. She has enough money that she would embarrass any DA who tried anything. Not good for one’s political career.
A lot of the gossip column I’ve read have said part of the reason this is being clouded now is that the guy she named as the father isn’t the real father. This is a bit off topic but might be fun to discuss in Cafe Society.
While you’d have to determine in which state(s) they actually had sex, in many it’s not a very big deal if there is less than two years difference in age. He is a little less than two years older than her.
I think in some states the parents can draft some sort of document with their lawyers to prevent the older partner from getting in legal trouble… which is slightly odd to sit down with your teenage son/daughter their significant other’s parents and lawyers to discuss their sexual activity but I have heard of ppl doing it to protect their son/ daughter. I think this only comes up in states where the younger partner has to press charges first, the legal doc would prevent them from doing that later- i guess it says they consent and that their parents know whats going on.
on the gossip side- I saw that Jamie Lynn has an engagement ring and plans to marry the father (I assume her bf is the father?).
Scuttlebutt when the story broke was that it was her producer, who is a much older (married) man and of the wholesome Disney family vibe. There was speculation that he paid off her** ex**-boyfriend to assume responsibility for her condition. I haven’t kept up with the latest rumors.
Do you have a site for the parental consent thing? I’ve never heard of anything like that before. I do know that if Jamie Lynn get’s married her husband won’t be liable for statutory rape charges (at least for post-marital sex) and that it’s possible in most (all?) states for a pregnant girl to get married without parental consent.
