Hunh?

[pecunium]

I don't know quite what to make of this.

The recent flap about the rape case in Illinois, where the judge wanted to force the complaintant to watch a videotape of the event; which she says she has no memory of, because she was blackout drunk, because the defense claimed it would jog her memory.

Ok. I think the odds of it being probative were small, but if the judge decided the arguments were persuasive, and so allowed the thing, then she was compelled to watch.

So far so good.

But in the various too and fro-ing I saw lots of people making the arguments that the forcing her to watch the tape wasn't just something which a judge might acede to, but was in fact imperative.

One person argued that it never should have gone to trail, but she ought to have had counselling instead.

I waded into a few of those, with some snark, and what I know of procedure and evidence.

Two of those the person said they agreed with me, as though I hadn't just said they were wrong, one of them (a lawyer, who confessed he didn't really know anything about the case, but when did that stop a good argument...?) said I was right, on everything (even the legal stuff, which while I might be more familiar than most layman, it's not my profession, just an interest).

I don't know what I'm doing... if my snark is dead, or I have (at least on this issue) managed to be both so smooth, and persuasive, that the people I am ripping into not only don't care, but they don't notice.

The real annoyance is I don't think they've really changed their mind (esp. the one who thinks that there was a rape, but that prosecuting it would be bad) but I can't see any way to really go back and address the things I still think them wrong about.

Comments

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

Ok, I the fact of the matter is, for all that I care about the case, I didn't want to seem as if I was beating the drum for my persuasiveness.

But here's a link to the story.

Details

[ourika.livejournal.com]

I don't understand why she would have to watch it? I can see why they'd show it to the jury, but why force her to watch it (let alone put her in jail for refusing)?

[ourika.livejournal.com]

I'm also confused - if it was consensual, why did they mark her legs up with vulgar words? The only time I've heard of things like that happening were rape cases.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

The case goes like this (as I understand it).

She goes to the party.

Gets drunk.

Has some sort of physical interaction with one boy, after this another boy tapes her having sex with a second boy... somewhere in this she passes out. I think a third boy then has sex with her.

After that they write on her.

The one kid (with the camera) pled guilty to child porn (because she was under 18... had she been 17 that would still have applied; Rob Lowe got off lucky, the 16 year old he was taped having sex with was above the age of consent, but had he made the tape [which I don't recall the details of]he could have been nailed for child-porn. If she made the tape, then no, but that's the only loophole, and some have tried to prosecute people for making tapes of themselves, when they were minors, but I digress).

One kid has fled the country.

One is on trial (as I said, the third I am not sure of).

There is no point on the tape which has her giving consent. The defense claims she did give consent, at least tacitly, before the tape began to roll (this might not matter, since a different part of the Illinois statute says that someone as drunk as she was, de facto, can't give consent, but that's not the issue here).

The defense tried to say that she might recall her actual consent (or her state of mind) if she saw the tape, and the actual events were refreshed in her mind. They argue she did give consent, and want to use some "shock therapy" to jar her memory.

TK

[ourika.livejournal.com]

That's horribly ridiculous. "Shock therapy" so to speak by a lawyer? Funny, I thought that psychiatrists were supposed to do therapy, not the prosecution.

[pecunium.livejournal.com]

The term was mine, by way of summing up the general argument.

The defense is doing this.

If you ask me the point was to show the early part of the tape, and so make her look as if she were of loose morals, and so, "of course," gave consent/was of such nature that she, were she sober, she wouldn't have refused.

TK

[ourika.livejournal.com]

Whoops, I mixed up the sides.

Because, of course, a woman of loose morals automatically consents to sex with anyone and thus can't be raped *rolls eyes*

I really, really hate reactions to rape cases.