But then she agreed to be penetrated by a penis, and was instead penetrated by a strap-on, to which she didn’t agree. Would that hold any water? What a strange, strange case.
Cases where a person has pretended to be a medical professional might be distinguished on public policy grounds; it is important that confidence in medical professionals remain high and people don’t feel uncomfortable?
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But then she agreed to be penetrated by a penis, and was instead penetrated by a strap-on, to which she didn’t agree. Would that hold any water? What a strange, strange case.
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But she did agree to be penetrated and was infact penetrated by a penis…just not a real one…but then she wanted sex with a man, and got a woman…
Makes your head spin.,
Almost a reverse The Crying Game.
They might, but I recall the same principle being applied in cases that did not involve medical professionals (like a “yogi” who told his client that inserting his penis was a necessary step in achieving transcendence or something along those lines).
Im gonna say no .
I feel like if you voluntarily agree to be fucked by a stranger while blindfolded, you can’t claim it was rape if you find out they don’t look like you expected. If you agreed to fuck A, but B was fucking you instead, that’s rape. But if you agree to fuck A, and A fucks you, you can’t claim you didn’t consent just because you (voluntarily) didn’t get a good look at them first. This wasn’t a bait and switch. If not having a flesh and blood penis is a dealbreaker, and you voluntarily waived the opportunity to verify that it was real by sight or touch, it seems to me it was your own negligence that got you into this situation. It is a shitty move not to tell someone you’re going to fuck them with a strap on, but in this situation I feel the accuser is a victim of sex they regret, rather than sex they were coerced into. Don’t agree to blindfolded sex with a stranger if you’re not prepared for a few surprises.
Wait, just for clarification, does this mean that envelopment is not considered rape? That’s definitely lopsided if true.
In other words, consider two scenarios:
Scenario A: Bob sees that Alice is passed out drunk. He penetrates her sexually while she is unconscious. According to the above, he is guilty of rape. The maximum sentence he can receive is life imprisonment.
Scenario B: Alice sees that Bob is passed out drunk. She plays with him until his penis is erect then mounts him, all while he is unconscious. According to the above, she is guilty of “sexual assault” but not “rape” since she never penetrated him. The maximum sentence she can receive is 10 years.
Do I understand that correctly?
From what the UK experts have posted it wouldnt be rape in scenario B because women dont have flesh and blood penises. However, it would be sexual assault and she would be eligible for the same punishment as a man convicted of rape. Its just a semantic difference.
That would be Causing Sexual Activity Without Consent.
Liable for the same penalty as rape if your scenario applies (see section 4).
I’m going to say no rape.
What the defendant did was unethical, but I do not know of any other incident where getting to have sex with someone through deception has been qualified as rape. Is it rape if you get to have sex by making your partner believe that you are a millionaire? That you can make them a movie star? That you are willing to marry them? It happens, and it is bad. But I do not think it is rape.
I’ve seen reference to a two year relationship rather than four. Still, I’m a bit unclear as to how one does not realize that one’s boyfriend, with whom one is having sex, albeit blindfolded, is, in fact, not male, but rather one’s female best friend in a hat?
Here’s a headline you don’t see too often: Prosthetic penis trial defendant suffers panic attack in court and stops proceedings
Correct.
I read the proceedings of the case today in the local paper and I’d be amazed if the jury don’t return a not guilty verdict in about 5 seconds. Utterly preposterous story from outer space given the normal background of the complainant - university educated, sexually experienced woman, ie not mentally compromised and in a care home or something, as you might assume on first read of the allegations.
What sounds like it has happened is closeted lesbian A has a relationship with deeply closeted lesbian B, including some role play that maybe got a bit out of hand [as a subterfuge, or crutch for them to hide their relationship]. Lesbian A comes out, causing lesbian B to panic and bail out - penis ensues.
And the CPS-bots decide to prosecute.:smack:
Sexual Offences cases often end up at trial with evidentiary levels which would get other cases tossed long before. Its part of the whole “we need to increase the conviction rate” panic.
“I can’t do it! It’s only a piece of plastic!” 
God, I would hope that would at least be some kind of assault and battery (or even attempted murder, in the case of a fatal STD), though, same as if you were HIV-positive and went around attacking people with a syringe full of your blood like the woman at the beginning of the film Hannibal. :eek:
I suppose someone could bring a case under the Human Rights Act, but since there are laws that would penalise the same acts equally, even if they are given different names, it might not get very far. Who, after all, is going to go to law to demand they be accused of rape rather than sexual assault, or vice versa?
Not without precedent, though not necessarily in terms of whether or not there was a deception or what was consented to. See:
http://www.rosecollis.com/books/colonel-barkers-monstrous-regiment/
http://www.womenofbrighton.co.uk/victor-barker.html
I must admit this example makes me wonder – ISTM there could be *some *form of sexual offense involved as described, as it’s more than just the accustomed caveat emptor type of situation of someone claiming to be rich or to make you a star. Yet at the same time I’m not sure if it rises to rape.
Right. In some jurisdictions, the penal codes have done away with the word “rape” as the formal legal charge and substituted something along the lines of “first degree sexual battery” so as to be all-inclusive because of the huge weight of precedent that makes the former apply strictly to PIV.
In some other circumstances, however, legislators don’t want to be seen by public opinion as the one who eliminated the specific charge of rape or who euphemized it into a legalistic phrase. You should have heard the froofraw here when incest and bestiality were engulfed into the Sexual Assault statute… they eventually had to restore them as separate self-standing articles in the code.
Gayle Newland has just been found guilty on 3/5 counts of sexual assault, by a majority verdict.
http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/liverpool-news/live-fake-penis-trial-gayle-10060599
Staggered at that, tbh, and not sure how one can split the charges like that in a consistent fashion (having been on a couple of juries, though, maybe I shouldn’t be).
Maybe the incredulous nature of the complaint was what swung it - like this is just too ridiculous a thing to make up and press charges on, so it must be true.
I foresee an appeal. Perhaps all the way to the UK Supreme Court.
How do you construct an appeal for something like this though, doesn’t it require new evidence? It seems like a simple case of she-said / she-said, and Newland obv came across as massively unconvincing in the dock for this to go against her.
Unless the two not guilty verdicts point to an impossible inconsistency, in legal terms - I don’t know if that is the case though.