I don’t know, are they both out to their parents? Are they afraid of being harassed once people know they’re heteros, maybe beaten up? Denied any rights recently because of whose genitals they bump? As soon as all that’s cleared up and college douches stop using ‘gay’ as an insult, the situations are more comparable.
Here’s an example of an actual prank that went wrong, though it’s more along the lines of a freak accident.
I think she might have had a case if she chose to go after the friend who did it, but she didn’t (and who knows what the public reaction would have been if she had?). Actually, I saw her on some show and we should all be so positive.
Saying that the resulting death is an indication of the seriousness of the crime is saying that he contributed to the suicide. That’s a huge leap to me. Why not charge him with manslaughter then?
So is the pure act of just “outing someone” an invasion of their privacy? Has this been prosecuted before? Because that could possibly result in all the potential issues you describe: future harassment, future beatings, denial of rights, etc.
According to the education I’ve drawn from countless hours of Law & Order, the prosecution would only be able to present facts pertaining to the actual charges, right? Shouldn’t it be inadmissible to mention or allude to the subsequent suicide in any way?
So assuming that they don’t know anything about the case beforehand, the jurors will be deciding fifteen charges pertaining to a roommate being recorded on on a web cam, end of story. From a legal standpoint, wouldn’t that seem like overkill and (if a conviction is forthcoming) easily reversed on appeal?
Seems to me that the only way a jury could come up with a verdict in favor of a “hate crime” would be if they were taking into account facts they’re not supposed to know.
Bricker, Elendil’s Heir, other legal beagles, what say ye?
Nah, my impression of Law & Order is that there’d be a bunch of sidebar discussions about how “you can’t unring a bell” and such and such is the “fruit of a poisoned tree,” or something like that.
When did such conduct get to be normal in college?
I went to college in Chicago, secular institution. No, no one ever attempted to photograph me having sex, in the shower, while naked, and for damn sure never a “group from down the hall” bust in on anyone mid-coitus. Sure, plenty of sex occurred, but not that other crap.
Where the hell did YOU go to school where such conduct was considered normal?
If two students pulled the same boneheaded stunt, one resulting in getting his ass kicked by his outraged roomie and the other resulting in the roomie offing himself, would the charges in each case be different? (Seriously, I would like to know.)
Was the filming likely to result in harm? Could a reasonable person have expected such an outcome? I suppose not. In that case, the two situations ought to be handled the same. The charges should be invasion of privacy and lying to the police. Driving a person to self-slaughter was unforeseen and unforeseeable.
It seems to me like that the original actions of the two students constitute extremely serious homophobic bullying, if not a full-on hate crime. Yes they didn’t know that the victim was going to kill himself but by the same token they must have known that their actions would cause tremendous emotional and mental harm. I mean streaming the guy having gay sex online when they knew he was still ‘in the closet’ - fucking pathetic and juvenile in the absolute extreme. And if this is representative of the average student’s experience in the US (excepting the suicide obviously) then it sounds horrendous. Further, I find the OP’s barely concealed attempt to excuse these guys extremely disquieting.
[idle thought] I wonder what will become of those two students. It might be interesting to follow up on them in another ten years and see if they did in fact grow up. [/idle thought]
There are a number of different competing principles in play for what evidence is admitted. The first and foremost is: evidence must be relevant to be admissible. Evidence is relevant if it assist the trier of fact in determining any fact in dispute.
If the subsequent death isn’t relevant to proving the truth of any element of any of the charges, it may not be admissible.
However: the argument may be that the death was part of the res gestae of the crime, and is necessary to explain why some future act occurred. To craft an example: the defense may ask that the suicide be excluded, and then say to the jury, “Yes, the defendant erased his previous tweet, but he wasn’t trying to cover up evidence or mislead anyone when he did so – why would he?” The fact that the suicide occurred is very relevant to answering that question, and so these particular circumstances might make it relevant.
One last comment: even if it’s relevant, the death may be so prejudicial that the prejudice to the accused in the eyes of the jury outweighs whatever probative value the evidence has. It’s a matter of discretion for the trial judge to determine if that’s true or not, but if he found that the prejudice outweighs the probative value, he could exclude it.
Based on what I’ve read, I’d opine it’s very likely that the suicide would be admitted into evidence. But it’s not a lock.
There’s no excuse for the Ravi’s and Wei’s actions in the OP. I find the legal aspects of this case interesting. Prove that they are full out homophobe’s with a hate agenda and prosecute them to the fullest. But thinking that’s their agenda or feeling that it must have been their motive is a wide gap from proving that was their motive.
As I said, if Clementi had not killed himself, none of us would be discussing this case.
However, I would think that a good defense attorney could show that the resulting suicide would have no relevancy to the answer of your hypothetical question.