Judge: Law won't protect unmarried victims in rape

LOS ANGELES (AP) — A California appeals court overturned the rape conviction of a man who authorities say pretended to be a sleeping woman's boyfriend before initiating intercourse, ruling that an arcane law from 1872 doesn't protect unmarried women in such cases.

A panel of judges reversed the trial court's conviction of Julio Morales and remanded it for retrial, in a decision posted Wednesday from the Los Angeles-based court.

Morales had been sentenced to three years in state prison. He was accused of entering a woman's bedroom late one night after her boyfriend had gone home and initiating sexual intercourse while she was asleep, after a night of drinking.

The victim said her boyfriend was in the room when she fell asleep, and they'd decided against having sex that night because he didn't have a condom and he had to be somewhere early the next day.

Morales pretended to be her boyfriend in the darkened room, and it wasn't until a ray of light from outside the room flashed across his face that she realized he wasn't her boyfriend, according to prosecutors.

"Has the man committed rape? Because of historical anomalies in the law and the statutory definition of rape, the answer is no, even though, if the woman had been married and the man had impersonated her husband, the answer would be yes," Judge Thomas L. Willhite Jr. wrote in the court's decision.

The appeals court added that prosecutors argued two theories, and it was unclear if the jury convicted Morales because the defendant tricked the victim or because sex with a sleeping person is defined as rape by law.

The court said the case should be retried to ensure the jury's conviction is supported by the latter argument.

The decision also urges the Legislature to examine the law, which was first written in response to cases in England that concluded fraudulent impersonation to have sex wasn't rape because the victim would consent, even if they were being tricked into thinking the perpetrator was their husband.

Willhite noted that the law has been applied inconsistently over the years in California.

In 2010, a similar law in Idaho prevented an unmarried woman from pressing rape charges after being tricked into sex with a stranger by her then-boyfriend.

The judge called what happened "despicable" but said the state's law left the court with no choice. Idaho's law was amended to cover all women in 2011.

Morales' attorney Edward Schulman declined comment when reached by phone Thursday.

Alleged Ohio rapists may not get fair trial: defendant's lawyer

Hello all,

I don't believe there is a solution to gun control that everyone will agree with. We are living in a society where teenagers have been exposed to hearing about wars waging no matter what country they live in. The majority of these teenagers have a father or mother who were in the armed forces and fought in one of these wars. Those that did serve to protect their country do not often discuss their experiences and often answer their children's questions by simply saying that they did what they had to do. However, it is not that simple. When they look at their own child who is asking the question, they do not see their daughter or son. They often see the face of the girl or boy that they had to kill. They had to kill that child because the child in question was getting ready to kill them. As they get their child ready to board the bus to head to school, fourth or fifth grade, they think of that child so many miles away that prepared to head out, not for school, but for the killing fields. No matter what medication a person takes, it will never take all the memories away. For these people, there are only two options. Divorce or suicide. In the United States, there has never been, nor will there ever be enough information giving to a soldier that is going to battle for the first time. Perhaps not at the time of shooting at the enemy, but shortly thereafter, when you see the carnage, and smell the difference in the air, that you realize what war really is. If that is not enough, the next image that hits you is a field full of children in military uniforms. When the soldier finishes his or her commitment, he or she gladly takes his/her discharge papers and heads back home to his/her spouse or family. Within the first year the realization sinks in that this is no longer the world that they once knew. Frustration builds up tempers flare, and someone gets hurt. We have seen this scenario time after time and as long as there is hatred in this world of ours, no amount of laws or punishment is ever going to make it stop. There are no winners or losers in war. Just losers. There is only one thing that every war that has ever been fought has accomplished. They have robbed us all of our innocence. We always say that we don't want our sons or daughters to go through what we went through and then proudly wave to them as they head off to Boot Camp. Gun Control? If not guns there will be knives or Slingshots, or some other means to create havac. We are a proud race, and have learned how to turn on or turn off our emotions. In shot, we are no longer human. We are now a world of Robots or Humanoids. We should never forget what happened at Sandy Hook, but we will. We should never allow what happened to that poor girl in India to happen again, but we will. Guns or no guns, it does not matter. The more henious the crime, the more people like it. Sandy Hook set off a shock wave of violence, and until we decide as a whole to stop being Androids, that wave will continue. Robots, Hunanoids, Androids. I use those three terms because I don't know how we can justify ourselves as being humans unless we start behaving like humans. If you see a woman or child being mistreated, step in and stop it. If someone says that he or she is going to kill someone, tell the authorities. In short do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

GOD BLESS YOU

~Mike~

http://www.countryvalues65.com

"Nobody helped us for an hour:" Indian rape witness

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - Passers-by left a gang-raped Indian student lying unclothed and bleeding in the street for almost an hour, a male friend who was assaulted with her said on Friday in his first public comments on the case that provoked a global outcry.

The 23-year-old student died in hospital two weeks after she was attacked on December 16 in a private bus in New Delhi, prompting street protests over the Indian authorities' failure to stem rampant violence against women.

The graphic account from the man in a television interview is likely to add fuel to public anger over the death in a country where official statistics show one rape is reported every 20 minutes.

The woman's friend told the Zee News television network he was beaten unconscious with a metal bar by her attackers before the pair were thrown off the bus.

They lay in the street for 45 minutes before a police van arrived and officers then spent a long time arguing about where to take them, the man said.

"We kept shouting at the police, 'please give us some clothes' but they were busy deciding which police station our case should be registered at," the man said in Hindi.

Delhi police spokesman Rajan Bhagat told Reuters GPS records show the first police van reached the scene four minutes after it was were called and took the man and the woman to hospital within 24 minutes.

Neither the woman nor her friend have been named. Five men were charged with her gang rape and murder on Thursday. A court is due to consider the charges on Saturday.

TWITTER ANGER

The man's comments caused an renewed outpouring of anger on Twitter. "After reading and watching the Zee News interview i'm absolutely shocked and ashamed of being an Indian," said @BarunKiBilli.

The man called on the protests to continue, but said he wished people had come to his friend's help when she needed it.

"You have to help people on the road when they need help."

The male friend said he and the woman were attacked after an evening out watching a film.

"From where we boarded the bus, they (the attackers) moved around for nearly two and a half hours. We were shouting, trying to make people hear us. But they switched off the lights of the bus," he said, according to a transcript of the interview.

When they were thrown out, they pleaded with passers-by for help, he added in the studio interview, a blue metal crutch leaning on his chair.

"There were a few people who had gathered round but nobody helped. Before the police came I screamed for help but the auto rickshaws, cars and others passing by did not stop," the man added.

(Reporting By Frank Jack Daniel; Editing by Andrew Heavens)