What a fucking nightmare. A 17-year-old girl is allegedly gang raped, and instead of prosecuting the men she said raped her, the girl is prosecuted for filing a false report. Kevin Hayden knows the victim and has some more information on the case. Shakespeare’s Sister has a must-read post on it.
Reporting a rape to the police is a living nightmare. I can assure you that most people would really just prefer rape victims to shut up, go away, and not trouble them and definitely not cause problems for the rapist. I wouldn’t have prosecuted except I couldn’t bear the guilt if he did it to someone else. I still almost didn’t, except at the insistence of my boyfriend at the time that it was wrong to just roll over and pretend it didn’t happen. It took me a week to work up the courage. I wouldn’t have done it if I’d thought I’d get in trouble with the law for seeking justice.
201 Responses to “Victim found guilty…..”
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Thanks for posting on this. The thought that I could have been prosecuted for coming forward chills me to my very bones. The thought that this may well prevent other women from coming forward makes me more angry than I can really describe.
It seems to me that the judge should be investigated. How he could find reasonable doubt one way but not the other when the facts seem to suggest both sides should be given equal standing is beyond me.
But this case seems awfully bizarre to say the least. Something out of a Jerry Springer show.
But everything else said is quite true. I find it ridiculous that a women is supposed to act along a certain manner otherwise she’s faking it. It really all depends on the strength of the women’s character and will.
I would like to see whether the police detectives who interviewed her had any training in rape crimes or cases such as this where the psychology of the victim is all laid out on paper as to how she is supposed to act. Some pencil pusher probably sees how the women wasn’t crying a river, acting suicidal or whatever, and suggests that she is not acting like the profile.
F*ck the profile.
There is more than one way to investigate the possibility that she might be lying that has nothing to do with simply studying her behavior post crime.
Really someone should get the newspapers to do a greater investigation of this to see if all the details truly are known. Simply reading about this is not enough to judge either way.
But if we have a blogger who says he knows the victim, and says she’s not the type to lie, then that should be enough to at least give her the benefit of the doubt and warrant an investigation more detailed than what was probably carried out.
Then again if the prosecutors refused to file charges then there must be some details they are privy to that we are not which swayed their opinion. Until we know more about them and their past record of prosecuting sex crimes such as rape then we really don’t know for sure.
It’s really hard to know how to judge this.
MYOB’
.
Scary stuff
Christ, Amanda. That’s fucked up.
Don’t let VD hear about it; his past several posts on the subject of rape have made me want to hurl.
“A woman’s sexual history has absolutely no bearing on whether she was rapedâ€â€Â?including her past sexual history, if any, with her attacker. ”
Shakespeare’s Sister this is 10000% right in every way. Why the hell is this so hard to understand for some people?
I don’t care if the vitcim was the town whore, the moment she says no she means god damned NO!.
It’s that simple. No means no. End of story.
I would really love to see some of these people who argue that no does not mean no under some circumstances and then put the question to them logically.
I mean let’s be realistic.
Using the town whore analogy, the victim could have been on her back all night. Tired and exhausted, and if some late night jon with $50 bucks shows up at the last minute and she says “No. Not tonite.” If he decides that she’s a whore so she can’t say no to a paying customer and jumps her, is that rape or not? I say it damned well is cause she said no.
It’s pathetic.
Sometimes I’m ashamed to be a man.
MYOB’
.
There are some things missing from the posts:
1) What was the supposed motive of the young woman?
2) Is this on appeal?
3) Were all the participants intoxicated? [tangentally important]
4) What was the sentence?
One thing for sure, if she was raped her behavior thereafter is not predictable. Rape victims deal with trauma differentyl, the same way people deal with grief differently.
Some internalize it, some externalize it. Some even try to appear happy-go-lucky in a usually vain attempt to forget it.
Back to the alcohol. If everybody was so drunk they couldn’t remember much oce can see where the prosecutor (depending on the facts) might not want to prosecute but wouldn’t it then hold that they shouldn’t prosecute her either?
And don’t start on me…no, a woman being drunk does not give anyone a right to rape her. Intoxication, however, can lead to blurred memory. I’d have to know more.
I do know that if it were my choice I would never file these charges without iron clad proof the woman was lying (supposed rapist was out of town at the time or some such).
Hideous, absolutely, hideous.
from the article:
The bottom line, Naemura said, is that people can’t use the criminal justice system to further their own ends.
what ends? seriously. “filing a false report” implies malice aforthought, or reporting a crime with a mistaken ID would be a criminal act (which it plainly isn’t). so what, praytell, is her alleged dark motive?
unless he can, with actual testimony, establish motive, this is a gross abuse of power.”
Can’t get the “Kevin” link to work.
Did find out that it is supposedly going on appeal. Is there a defense fund to contribute to? There should be.
She was convicted of a “Class-C” misdemeanor. Like littering. Now, if she did what they said she did, wouldn’t the charge be more serious? Something is very fishy here!
It’s not just rape, either.
When I finally, after years of physical abuse at the hands of my parents, came forward to police (after running away and DEMANDING to go to juvenile rather than be returned to my parents), I was told that clearly, I hadn’t been abused — because while I was telling the counselors and such what had happened, I never cried.
Clearly, any woman who suffers abuse or rape should be sobbing incoherently the whole time, or else she’s a cold, calculating bitch who’s doing it to get back at someone she doesn’t like.
When I was told why they didn’t believe me, I started sobbing because I knew it would mean I’d end up returned to my parents — the one prospect that horrified me beyond any other. The cops looked at each other and smiled. “Yep,” the one said. “Seems like she can cry when she gets caught LYING!”
They then proceeded to court mandate therapy — for me, and me alone — and put me on probation because I ran away to try and get help.
Thanks, officers. Thanks for the hellish years that ensued afterward, when I ended up returned to my abusers. Thanks for not having the decency to understand that trauma takes ALL FORMS, and doesn’t have to mean heaving sobs. I’m sure this girl is feeling many of the same things I felt. I wish I could give her a hug and tell her I know what she’s going through, and how it feels to end up in trouble for reporting the actions of an abuser.
Whether it’s rape or domestic violence, women are marginalized and oppressed by officers who believe trauma is a one-size-fits-all garment. The more this happens, the more women will be afraid to step forward, no matter what the situation is.
This is not exactly surprising, given the cavalier attitude towards rape revealed in many comments threads on both sides of the political aisle, and the recent Amnesty survey across the Pond…
Since I’ve never been able to get any guy to admit that sexism is real, IRL, even the Dean-voting ones who claim to be liberal, when confronted with actual examples of discrimination, but always to have them minimized or justified, I’m not really surprised by this.
Saddened, outraged, but not surprised.
I mean, half the people in this country think torture is just hunky-dory, so rape? of a mere woman? Pfft! Why, unlike all other crimes, it’s even got a benevolent outcome: it’s a “life-giving” crime, according to the Voxers.
Ohhh, Gods.
I have nothing I can say here, except that in my opinion, by dismissing the problem of rape, the authorities are allowing terrorists close to free reign, and by punishing women for coming forward (with cases like this, and with invasive questions and other bullying from the defense, and the assumption of “no conviction, no rape”), the authorities are engaging in terrorism themselves.
I may be sick now.
Now think how an almost raped woman will be treated in court if she kills or seriously maims a man who is trying to rape her.
Yeah, fucking-A.
3 more years!!!
Since when is “she didn’t cry enough” proof beyond a reasonable doubt of anything?
Insane.
…Then again if the prosecutors refused to file charges then there must be some details they are privy to that we are not which swayed their opinion. Until we know more about them and their past record of prosecuting sex crimes such as rape then we really don’t know for sure….
According to news accounts, this is not the first time this town has prosecuted the woman after an unsuccessful trial.
Bizarre case. From these accounts, it’s hard to see how the judge could find, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the young woman’s account that she didn’t consent was untrue. As Kevin says, if the judge found inconsistencies in everyone’s stories, that would seem to suggest at least reasonable doubt. I certainly hope the ruling is reversed on appeal.
A fair number of judges are real Neanderthals. There was a justice of the Illinois Appellate Court who wrote a number of dissents from decisions affirming rape convictions. He never seemed to encounter a rape victim who hadn’t, in his view, actually consented. His dissents read as though he’d been an eyewitness to the incident. Fortunately, he has since returned to the private practice of law. I’m told that he is much better as an advocate (a brilliant criminal defense attorney, I’m told) than a jurist.
Amanda, if you don’t mind me asking, was the asshole who raped you convicted, and if so, what sentence did he get/serve?
He pled down to a misdemeanor assault–plain assault, not sexual assault–which was something I rolled with, because really by then I was exhausted. He got some kind of probation and a fine.
That sucks, Amanda. I suppose at least if he raped someone else subsequently, at least the prosecution might take it seriously at that point.
I haven’t read the news stories in this case, and I don’t need to. This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.
Had her story stuck, the alleged perpretrators would have done hard time. And yet, for making a false accusation that placed others in that kind of jeopardy, she gets off with a slap on the wrist. It’s just wrong.
Ask any police detective or prosecutor (off the record, because it is politically incorrect to be honest on this topic), and they will tell you that somewhere between 20 and 50 percent of all rape allegations are phoney. There are news stories every week about men being released after 5, 10, 15 or more years in prison, after they have been cleared by DNA testing. And what happens to the women who put them in prison? NOTHING!
So here it is, ladies… if you accuse someone of rape, and your story turns out to be BS — you should be put in prison for as long as the supposed rapist would have served.
I don’t know if this was brought up elsewhere, but the judge still has a web page up from when he was a practicing attorney. His background seems to be more in the area of intellectual property than criminal law. Here’s the link:
Peter A. Ackerman’s website
Warning: I found that the site’s focus on property in its various forms was absolutely infuriating, given the particulars of the case as I understand it from Shakespeare’s Sister, Seeing the Forest, and the Oregonian article.
A quick search suggests that judges are elected in Oregon. Are prosecutors? If so, do either of these have challengers yet?
There have to be at least two people in this jurisdiction who’d like to remove these assholes from power.
Photoplex, I’d be interested in seeing some backup for your “between 20 and 50 percent of all rape allegations are phoney” claim. Everything I’ve seen (not that I claim to be a great expert in the subject) indicates that the numbers are much lower — by a factor of 20 or so.
The cases you refer to about men released after being cleared by DNA evidence typically are misidentifications — i.e. the woman was raped by somebody, and she mistakenly identified the defendant as the rapist. Eyewitness identifications are indeed problematic — which is why it’s great that we now have DNA testing.
In the Oregon case, though, it was undisputed that these men had sex with the woman. The only issue was whether it was consensual. Given that the judge found inconsistencies in everyone’s story, it’s hard to see how he concluded, beyond a reasonable doubt, that she was lying and the three men were telling the truth. I don’t know how the judge can say with such certitude that this woman is lying. And I certainly don’t know how you can do so.
Since I’ve never been able to get any guy to admit that sexism is real,
wait… you can’t get them to admit sexism exists, or you can’t get them to admit they personally did or said something sexist? the latter, I understand. Ampersand has a great post on the similar “how and why of not flipping out when you get called a racist.” people sometimes get defensive.
but “sexism doesn’t exist?” as in “women don’t get 30 cents on the dollar less, women aren’t expected to be the one to give up the carreer in the event of child production, motherfuckers aren’t threatening the lives and liberty of women for exercising bodily autonomy” doesn’t exist?
what circles do you travel in where someone can say that shit and not get smote?
spiritrover, apparently one can be a part-time judge in Oregon. Ackerman’s attorney website says:
Mr. Ackerman also serves as a Municipal Judge for the city of Beaverton, Oregon, one of the most technologically advanced courts in the United States.
On the same page, Ackerman says that at some point in his career he “accepted a position as Deputy District Attorney for Multnomah County in Portland, Oregon.” So he may have had some experience handling criminal cases as an attorney.
http://www.peterackerman.com/background.html
And I certainly don’t know how you can do so.
He didn’t read any of the stories, therefore he doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
As an aside that will doubtless be frightening to many, in response to anti-sexual-assault groups I’ve often heard snide comments a la, “C’mon this makes no sense; who is pro-rape?”
Can’t tell you how many rapes happened in the college dormitories where I went to school. Most of the guys were braggarts about it when they felt the company was secure. The essential theme was, ha ha, cool man, you totally gave her what she deserved [for ____]. It was chilling. Rape was widely accepted as an appropriate punishment for female misbehavior, however defined. I heard at least half the persons in a 200-male dorm voice approval even when voicing approval was not socially necessary, over the course and probably more would have agreed in my company had I not voiced strong disapproval and basically out cast myself.
That was about five years ago and I doubt it changed.
The idea that a woman deserves to be punished with rape appears to be a common “just don’t admit to it around those who might disagree” perspective. Frightening. Kind of like the perspective “it would be enjoyable to see large numbers of non-white people tortured/executed” which I do not exaggerate as a similarly common perspective. Oh, and from personal experience I can of course assert these perspectives are also shared in front of non-whites (though not females generally).
As an aside that will doubtless be frightening to many, in response to anti-sexual-assault groups I’ve often heard snide comments a la, “C’mon this makes no sense; who is pro-rape?”
Can’t tell you how many rapes happened in the college dormitories where I went to school. Most of the guys were braggarts about it when they felt the company was secure. The essential theme was, ha ha, cool man, you totally gave her what she deserved [for ____]. It was chilling. Rape was widely accepted as an appropriate punishment for female misbehavior, however defined. I heard at least half the persons in a 200-male dorm voice approval even when voicing approval was not socially necessary, over the course and probably more would have agreed in my company had I not voiced strong disapproval and basically out cast myself.
That was about five years ago and I doubt it changed.
The idea that a woman deserves to be punished with rape appears to be a common “just don’t admit to it around those who might disagree” perspective. Frightening. Kind of like the perspective “it would be enjoyable to see large numbers of non-white people tortured/executed” which I do not exaggerate as a similarly common perspective. Oh, and from personal experience I can of course assert these perspectives are also shared in front of non-whites (though not females generally).
Well, Karpad, this guy was a local DFA volunteer. I kind of thought he was cute, and was more than a little interested, until it turned out he was as much of an Equalist as Cathy Young, and thought that feminists were just as sexist as any male sexist or moreso (feminist snark about the Patriarchy proves this, you see) , and that things were equal now and any examples I could provide - even from my own personal experience - of rampant sexism were either my misunderstanding *or* statistically irrelevant, because “oh well, that’s just the internet” or “it’s just guys pretending to be macho to show off.”
I used to try to argue against sexists, especially the sophist kind, in high school and college and at home and at work.
I finally realized, long after having watched my mother burn out dealing with endless male chauvinist sophistry (aka “trolling”) that there’s no point arguing with someone who isn’t even the least bit open to the possibliity that you might be right - not in the sense of *debate* at least. So you either have to clobber them until you whack a little bit of awareness into them with the Clue-by-Four, which doesn’t generally make them *like* you, or decide that peace in the office/cafeteria/dinner table is more important.
Since I’m not charismatic enough to sway people in person, I save my energy most times for online dialectic (although I do get my digs in, hoping to chip away and maybe make enought of a crack for some cluefulness to seep in…)
l00n, I’m not at all surprised. Some years back I came across a website or blog post in which the guy was not only saying that he felt that sometimes some women deserved to be punished for being uppity with rape, but asserting moreover that *everyone* out there really agreed with him, whether or not they were honest enough to admit it.
And the just-out-of-college girls I worked with last year thought they were oh-so-sophisticated by talking nonchalantly about the “Rape Trails” on their campus where you didn’t walk alone. (They frequently Defended the Patriarchy, even as they took ambien and other such meds like candy to deal with their depression at their trapped situation and verbally (afaik only so) abusive boyfriends. I was the only one in the office not taking anti-depressants to face the world, which was a shock to me, since I thought I was the only one there who’d had clinical depression, and they certainly thought they were the normal ones and I wasn’t.)
Me, I choose - that being the only choice given to me so far in life - to be Paula…
photophlex -
You can’t be bothered to read one article about the case, but you’re completely certain that the judge (not a jury, just one judge) reached the correct conclusion.
Try to consider that there is complexity in the world.
The just-out-of-college girls seem to be big on Defending the Patriarchy lately — it’s not hip to be all feministy and shit. I’m reminded of a rather hipsterish friend of mine who simply did not believe that my commenters and the commenters on the posts I linked back when we were talking about the “Smile!” demands were representative of the norm. She enjoyed having people tell her to smile, apparently. And that’s fine, but saying that so many other women were just weird for not liking it was fucking annoying.
Oh and l00n - good on you for speaking truth to power.
Lookit, NOBODY in this comment thread knows squat about what really happened, or what evidence is available to support the guilt of innocence of the woman or the men. What we DO know is that the authorities let the men off the hook and decided to prosecute the woman, based on information that they have and we do not.
My whole point is this: the men were placed in jeopardy of doing serious time in prison, and the woman who MAY (there, happy now?) have placed them in such jeopardy falsely has no comeasurate risk.
Nobody wants to place a chill over the reporting of sexual assault. But how about throwing a little cold water on FALSELY reporting sexual assault? Got a problem with that? I suspect that some here may have a problem with it — and those who do could only be described as female supremicists.
Lookit, NOBODY in this comment thread knows squat about what really happened, or what evidence is available to support the guilt of innocence of the woman or the men.
Given that, how could you make your original comment (below)?
I haven’t read the news stories in this case, and I don’t need to. This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.
Lovely, isn’t it, how someone can find a thread below a post where a blogger opens herself up and admits to some painful experiences by spreading nastiness about the honesty of women who’ve been assaulted? Not of course that there’s any chance that advocating for legal measure that would make rape legal in a practical sense by making it impossible for victims to seek justice without fear of prosecution might make those of us who suffered that process feel hurt or anything like that.
Frederick… just think of it as a counter-balance to all of those here who are assuming that the men MUST be guilty.
there’s a presumably different someone doing the same thing over in Keven Hayden’s own post. Unless photoplex is John, too.
See, there ya go…
“spreading nastiness about the honesty of women who’ve been assaulted…”
Not at all… only nastiness about women who LIE about being assaulted. You should be on board with that, because every time a woman does that, it becomes harder for real victims to find justice.
And the rest of your comment is, well, non-sensical at best. Unless, of course, you are actually trying to say what I think you might be, and that appears to be:
“False accusations of rape should be legal and not punishable, because if it is illegal to make a false accusation, that equals legalizing rape.”
But that couldn’t really be what you think, could it, Amanda?
Nope, I’m not John. But John makes an excellent point. Feminist thinking, when it comes to rape, seems to be:
All suspects are guilty.
All victims are innocent.
Women never lie about being raped.
When an accused man is found innocent, justice has been cheated.
Isn’t that pretty close?
Maybe it’s just me. I’m no lawyer, but if there is reasonable doubt is that not viewed as there being some merit to the charge? A prosecutor will not prefer charges unless there is a reasonable prospect for a conviction. If an acquittal results because of reasonable doubt does it not extend to the complaint which loses none of its veracity.
This has a horrible smell.
Photo, you are trying to spread misinformation about false accusations, which are exceedingly rare. There is no reason to make a false accusation and the reasons commonly touted–that women are batshit crazy and that women lie for fun–are sexist stereotypes not grounded in reality.
You are an insensitive asshole. If you think filing charges for rape is so much fun, I suggest you reread my post. Mostly people wanted me to just let it go. If my boyfriend hadn’t stood by me 100%, I would have caved under the pressure to let it go. It’s a nightmare–you’re subjecting yourself to becoming a pariah, in no small part because people like you add to the notion that rape victims are liars and whiners. Why would someone bring that on herself on purpose? Come up with a reason that doesn’t involve stereotypes of women being crazy and/or inherently deceitful.
Lookit, NOBODY in this comment thread knows squat about what really happened, or what evidence is available to support the guilt of innocence of the woman or the men. What we DO know is that the authorities let the men off the hook and decided to prosecute the woman, based on information that they have and we do not.
that’s right. nobody.
as in, neither the judge nor the prosecutor. the only people who know are the victim and the perpetrators.
say my brother and I are bickering. and one of us punched the other in the arm. and it hurts. alot. but doesn’t leave a bruise. does that mean it didn’t happen?
there isn’t evidence, so a court certainly would decline to punish the perpetrator. but not proving the guilt of someone doesn’t mean the witness or victim lied.
Nobody wants to place a chill over the reporting of sexual assault. But how about throwing a little cold water on FALSELY reporting sexual assault? Got a problem with that?
Well, umm, I suppose I do. It’s like having a problem with throwing cold water on a scarecrow. Okay, fine, throw water on a straw man, but that shouldn’t obfuscate more sensible and relevant pursuits or opinion-sharing.
To be honest, there’s such a stigma associated with being a rape victim… keep in mind as I mentioned, the sheer quantity of men who believe that if a woman was raped, it was punishment, and probably just punishment, for some infraction on her part.
There’s no glamour in claiming to be a rape victim. So I don’t see overall why false claims are the principal worry. I kind-of agree that maybe there should be some kind of class-c misdemeanor for accusing anyone of any crime for the purpose of annoying them, and that’s on the books in most municipalities as part of “disturbing the peace” or “obstruction of justice”. But why should such a law apply specifically, or more harshly, to rape accusations? Certainly that is worrisome.
photophlex:
If you had bothered to read the story, you’d know how weak the evidence against her is. Even if the men are in fact innocent, there shouldn’t have been a conviction.
Even though the woman never said she lied or recanted her story, city prosecutors say they took the unusual step of filing charges against her because of the seriousness of her accusations.
See, the prosecutors treated the case more harshly because it was a rape accusation. Furthermore, had it not been a rape accusation, they would not have taken the “unusual step of filing charges”. Why should that additional harshness be imposed?
the men were placed in jeopardy of doing serious time in prison, and the woman who MAY (there, happy now?) have placed them in such jeopardy falsely has no comeasurate risk.
My god, he’s right! What a ridiculously lopsided travesty the justice system is! Clearly, we should try both the accused and the victim simultaneously, and whichever one we’re less certain didn’t do it gets the punishment! That’ll make people think twice about filing phony claims, which of course can be seperated out from real claims because the criminal justice system is infallible, and always punishes the truly guilty and exonerates the truly innocent!
Why on earth didn’t we think of this brilliant idea before? Gods bless you, photophlex, for sharing your simple wisdom with the world!
Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I need to take several dozen scaldingly hot showers. Even mockingly agreeing with that slime makes me feel filthy.
Sorry to burst your bubble, Amanda, but you are just plain wrong. Here, have a look at what I was able to find for you in about 10 seconds flat:
http://www.americandaily.com/article/5075
This article sites Justice Department and university research that indicates pretty cleary that false accusations are far, far too common.
The truth is that, unpleasant as it may be, the process of filing charges is NOT an impediment to a person bent on revenge or causing trouble. It happens. And the price for doing it is simply not high enough.
Oh and l00n - good on you for speaking truth to power.
Umm, I didn’t. Maybe this is a case where my English fails me in the slang? But to speak truth to power, is to inform an authority figure or powerful group of the truth, and call them up on dishonesty, regardless of potential for reprocussion. So I think.
That I didn’t do so much as roundly denounce the hell out of an entire social circle, but they knew the truth already, about how they felt and what it meant, it was a moral discrepancy. There was no lie called up, no truth introduced, no dishonesty disspelled. I just roundly denounced their perspective and made up several new words in the process.
Oh and by the way… when a false accusation is made, now we have a different kind of victim — the men. How am I an asshole for standing up and speaking out for them?
Sheesh… maybe I am insensitive… but at least I’m willing to consider all sides of an issue. I’d have to say that you’ve lost your ability to be objective.
Here, have a look at what I was able to find for you in about 10 seconds flat
Try harder than to link to a site offering prominently, The Complete Story of Chickenman! and a picture inexplicably displayed of this sort:
Not exactly trustworthy material. I mean, it quotes Forensic Science Digest, for goodness’ sakes.
The picture: http://moveoffllc.com/demononwhite-1.jpg
Oops, I see img src tags are (understandably) disabled.
That’s what is called an ad hominem attack, 100n. The ads have NOTHING to do with the substance of the article, do they?
Try reading the piece, and take note of where the research comes from.
Christ on a crutch, you people just slay me.
Ok, FBI and Justice Deptment research is obviously worthless, right 100n? Forensic Science Digest is clearly so much more biased than, say, I don’t know… a rape victim?
OK, I did my part. Now let’s see someone come up with something that indicates that false accusations are “exceedingly rare”, as Amanda claims.
I’ll be waiting right here…
Well, I’ll suggest your reference isn’t as solid as you’re hoping:
That is from Columbia Journalism Review which was cited in your reference. Your reference also attributed Kanin, but omitted that last comment.
Not a problem, there’s plenty more where that came from. I have to admit that the Purdue study was based on a very small sample, but it’s hard to argue with nationwide crime statistics:
http://www.ncfm.org/fact1.htm
Forensic Science Digest is clearly so much more biased than, say, I don’t know… a rape victim?
I don’t know that it’s necessarily more biased, but the Forensic Science article cited is from 1985. That’s — let me count on my fingers here — 20 years ago. Got any more recent evidence?
I noticed that in a lot of those articles that quoted Forensic Science, they conflated false accusations and incorrect identifications. There’s a huge difference between a deliberately false accusation and a mistaken one, yes? Or do you think a rape victim should be prosecuted and thrown in jail because she misidentified her rapist?
Should Jennifer Thompson go to jail because she sincerely misidentified Ronald Cotton as her attacker?
Should Clyde Charles be allowed to have his accuser prosecuted for a false report because it turned out that she was actually raped by his brother and not him?
I dunno. Here’s the results of my Google search — the people discussing the frequency of false rape accusations seem to be all over the map: http://tinyurl.com/78pa3
One of the sources, the CrimProfBlog, cites
CrimProf Michelle J. Anderson of Villanova, one of the legal academy’s most perceptive and prolific scholars in this area. . . . One startling point in the paper was that no reliable statistics exist on the frequency of false rape claims: “As a scientific matter, the frequency of false rape complaints to police or other legal authorities remains unknown.”
http://lawprofessors.typepad.com/crimprof_blog/2004/12/2_false_rape_st.html
Mistaken identity is one thing, maliciously making a false report is something else altogether. Are you suggesting that false-accusers should walk scot-free?
I have to admit that the Purdue study was based on a very small sample, but it’s hard to argue with nationwide crime statistics.
Wait, you’re trying to claim that the National Coalition of Free Men is an unbiased source? Dude, that’s like saying, “The Holocaust never happened — the Klan told me so!”
Also, again, please try to find a source less than a decade old. You’re doing better — this last one was an article written in 1994 using late 1980s statistics that are now at least 15 years old.
Mistaken identity is one thing, maliciously making a false report is something else altogether. Are you suggesting that false-accusers should walk scot-free?
Of course not. But you seem to be arguing that false accusations and mistaken accusations are the same thing and that mistaken accusers should be prosecuted.
As far as punishing false rape accusations more severely, we don’t punish false murder accusations more severely than, say, false robbery accusations. A false police report is a false police report. Are you saying it’s worse to be accused of rape than of murder?
photoplex read the frigging article. Top of page 3:
http://www.oregonlive.com/news/oregonian/index.ssf?/base/front_page/1133582149167361.xml&coll=7&thispage=3
“Huhtanen said about 10 percent of Oregon victims of sex crimes file reports with police.
A Portland Police Bureau study estimated that 3 percent of its rape cases were classified as unfounded, she said. Portland police, Huhtanen said, found that 1.6 percent of sexual assault cases were falsely reported, compared with 2.6 percent of auto theft reports. ”
I’ve checked out several other blogs on this topic. Quoting the stats in the article keeps the trolls away. If you leave them out, some men’s right activist quotes some outrageous % of false reports and refers readers to Glen Sacks or some other MRA site.
Sure Fred… that statistics contain a large margin of error. But you are missing (or dodging??) the point, and that is that THIS SHIT REALLY HAPPENS!!
But for some reason, the feminists, the victim advocates, the vaginized men, and people here in this thread… insist that there isn’t a problem.
Well dammit, there IS a problem. Mens’ lives are ruined by this, even when the charges don’t stick, and no one wants to acknowledge that THEY ARE VICTIMS TOO.
So, getting back to this 17-year-old who is getting a slap on the wrist for making a false police report… you all seem to see her as being a double victim, but I see justice (maybe… hopefully… if the authorities have the facts right) being done.
How exactly do you seperate ‘false-accusers’ from ‘people with weak cases’ and ‘people who aren’t sympathetic enough for a jury to listen to’? I mean, OJ was found not guilty, does that mean the accusations against him were false?
you all seem to see her as being a double victim, but I see justice (maybe… hopefully… if the authorities have the facts right) being done.
How can you, in one post, argue simultaneously that men are suffering injustice all the time, then turn right around and argue that this must be justice simply because?
Oh, wait. She’s a woman. Silly me.
So I don’t see overall why false claims are the principal worry.
I think I understand where it comes from. The worry about false claims is grounded in fear and uncertainty. Fear because the consequence of accusations (not even necessarily convictions) for sexual assault are high, and uncertainty because many such cases do come down to the accused and accuser giving different versions of the same event.
At least as compared to other crimes one might be falsely accused of, there’s both more stigma attached to rape (and other sexual assaults), and less chance of definitively clearing one’s name (conversely - also less chance of winning a conviction). If one is accused of, say, robbing a bank, the cops will investigate and the evidence either will or will not support a conviction. The accused, once the trial is over, is either a convicted bank robber or an innocent man. He is not forever labled an ‘accused bank robber.’ In many cases of sexual assault, however, including the one at issue in this thread (according to media accounts, anyway), the evidence is not conclusive either way. Neither side is vindicated in the legal process, and a stigma attaches to the accused. Further, the stigma attached to sexual assault is much higher than for other crimes. There are no convicted bank robber registries posted on the internet to shame and ostracize bank robbers who have served their sentences. There are no attempts to have bank robbers declared mentally ill so they can be permanently confined after their sentences are over.
Of course, I’m mildly paranoid about being falsely accused or framed for all sorts of things, so I perhaps think about this more than most. It’s one of my irrational fears.
Somebody, help me out here…
1.6%… 3%… which is it? That’s a 50% error right there.
Only 10% of rapes are reported? So, if we have, say, 500 rapes reported annually in Portland, there are actually 5000 rapes occurring?? That’s absurd — it doesn’t pass the straight-face test. Cripes, if that were really true, Portland would have been devoided of all women decades ago.
And for Pete’s sake, give up with the ad hominem baloney, would ya? Glenn Sacks may have an agenda (just like the rest of you all), but his credentials are impecable. Everything he quotes is vetted and footnoted. Where is the political interest for the US Dept of Justice to spin these numbers???
If the accuser can be found guilty beyond all reasonable doubt, which was not the case in Beaverton.
Your new reference comes from Hugh Nations and cites, albeit in a different way, the same studies and data. A good half the reference concentrates on the seduction of men.
Garnet, your thinking is faulty. I *just* said “IF the authorities have the facts right”… I’m not making any assumptions about the facts in the case du jour. I’m just saying, that IF the woman was lying, then it’s about damn time that someone gets prosecuted for doing this crap.
Or maybe, you think it’s OK to falsely accuse a man of rape… is that it??
Hmm. I’ve brought up the Gary Dotson case on these threads a few times, but I missed this information from Charles P. McDowell, who conducted that 1985 study on false accusations (emphasis mine in all of the below):
And this is a fascinating bit of information about false accusations I hadn’t known:
I don’t know if Cathleen Crowell Webb was ever prosecuted for making her false accusation — I vaguely remember it, but I can’t find the reference. She has been voluntarily paying money to Gary Dotson for some years now.
The article I’m quoting from is here: http://tinyurl.com/d6tfm
I give up, you people are brain dead.
And so it goes with most feminists, female and male… common sense is an inconvenience, facts mean nothing… you only seek advantage for your cause, regardless of the right or wrong of it.
Garnet, your thinking is faulty. I *just* said “IF the authorities have the facts right”… I’m not making any assumptions about the facts in the case du jour. I’m just saying, that IF the woman was lying, then it’s about damn time that someone gets prosecuted for doing this crap.
Do you even realize that you completely contradicted yourself between one sentence and the next?
You’ve been making assumptions about the case right and left, but the instant we point that out, you start claiming that you haven’t.
Jesus, at least stand by your own statements. Either you think she’s a lying bitch who got what’s coming to her, or you don’t know one way or the other.
We’re pointing out that it’s pretty scary that a rape case that was dismissed for inconclusive evidence was able to be turned into a successful prosecution for filing a false police report.
You do understand the difference between “inconclusive” and “false,” right?
I’m not making any assumptions about the facts in the case du jour.
Of course not. For instance, you would never say something like, this girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy. And I’m sure you wouldn’t make such a baseless assumption as would be necessary to say, And yet, for making a false accusation that placed others in that kind of jeopardy, she gets off with a slap on the wrist. No, no, it’s clear that you’re looking at this with an entirely detached, unbiased mind, free from any kind of assumptions or unfouned beliefs.
How is it, I wonder, that you can have such rock-solid faith in the justice system on the one hand, while screaming that it’s horribly flawed and constantly sending people to prison on the other?
Here’s a law review article that says, like the CrimLawBlog post I mentioned above, that there’s no evidentiary basis for the oft-repeated statistic that only 2% of rape accusations are false: http://llr.lls.edu/volumes/v33-issue3/greer.pdf
I hasten to add that I take have no axe to grind on this issue. I hope the 2% figure, or something like it, is correct. It would be nice to have some sort of reliable evidence for that figure, though.
We’re pointing out that it’s pretty scary that a rape case that was dismissed for inconclusive evidence was able to be turned into a successful prosecution for filing a false police report.
So successful, in fact, that it apparently took three days to prosecute. Hell, I’ve seen cases that couldn’t get through one witness’ testimony in a week, nevermind three days.
Try reading the piece, and take note of where the research comes from.
Dunno, I just saw Forensic Science Digest V. 11, no. 4 cited in there as credible general evidence and, well, burst into snickers. It is probably necessary to explain that the FSD report was an investigation into servicewomen in the US military who accused their commanding officer of sexual assault, which needless to say, says essentially 0 about the general civilian case.
The accused, once the trial is over, is either a convicted bank robber or an innocent man. He is not forever labled an ‘accused bank robber.’
Talk to OJ Simpson about that one. Not to fuel your paranoia any higher
but in our current climate, there is a certain “once accused, always guilty” feeling towards any crime. Hell, the tabloids got a story out of Vince Vaughan being pulled over on suspicion of drunk driving and passing a Breathalyzer.
Part of what’s throwing the statistics off here is that you have women who were assaulted who never come forward, and you have other women who come forward with false accusations (yes, it does happen). If you’re basing your statistics solely on sexual assaults that are reported to the police, they’re going to be skewed.
I also think we have a certain communication problem. I guarantee you that more women in your life have been raped or sexually assaulted than have ever told you.
Take a trip I went on in high school (I think we were sophomores). A few of the girls went out drinking with some townies and came back very late and very drunk. One of them was sobbing, “I don’t think I’m a virgin anymore.”
Is it rape to get a 15-year-old drunk and have sex with her? Or is that just a sexual miscommunication?
Everything he quotes is vetted and footnoted. Where is the political interest for the US Dept of Justice to spin these numbers???
Umm, again, they weren’t researching the general case, they were looking into various very specific types of cases that have no bearing on general truth. So for him to assume these studies have bearing on general truth is improper and irresponsible.
Oh, and one more little anecdote from high school:
On a different trip (this one in my senior year), I was sharing a hotel room with two other girls. One of them was a very good friend; the other was more of an acquaintence.
In the middle of the night, the girl who was an acquaintence started saying, “No, stop, no, please, stop,” louder and louder, until she screamed out loud and woke herself up. (My friend and I were already awake.)
She then cried herself to sleep.
But I’m sure nothing had actually happened to her because the case was never prosecuted, right?
But you are missing (or dodging??) the point, and that is that THIS SHIT REALLY HAPPENS!!
I think we understand each other now.
l00n: Falsely accusing someone of a crime should have some kind of penalty if it can be proven beyond a reasonable doubt that the accusation was false. That simply isn’t true here based on available data.
photophlex: but THIS SHIT REALLY HAPPENS!!
l00n: Fine, but like any crime, there should be proof beyond a reasonable doubt, and there wasn’t here.
photophlex: But you are missing (or dodging??) the point, and that is that THIS SHIT REALLY HAPPENS!!
Let’s let that be a conclusion, photophlex. Good night.
In the middle of the night, the girl who was an acquaintence started saying, “No, stop, no, please, stop,” louder and louder, until she screamed out loud and woke herself up. (My friend and I were already awake.)
She then cried herself to sleep.
But I’m sure nothing had actually happened to her because the case was never prosecuted, right?
I’m sure photophlex would happily assure you that this was no doubt the lying bitch’s conscience pricking her for making dozens of false allegations, for which she should suffer the most horrible tortures imaginable. Because, y’know, women are crazy and will file fake rape charges at the drop of a hat.
Did somebody upthread cite Edward Greer? Frederick? Greer’s central argument was, harsher penalties for rape may be fueled by and may adversely affect race relations in communities where accusations of “black man rapes white woman” lead to immediate assumptions of guilt.
Idea being, a white guy might accuse a black guy of assaulting a relevant female, or the female might propose the accusation or perhaps the wife/gf/daughter/female goes along with it, whichever, the false accusation goes to trial and the man is convicted for the color of his skin. Hence, there need to be objective checks in place to prevent this form of false accusation. Assuming his facts are in order, I think I can agree with his conclusion: taking steps to insure someone is not convicted for skin color is important.
Greer’s argument implies (and probably with some accuracy, he fact-checks) that many false accusations are racist in nature in racist communities with white majorities, etc. That makes sense and might skew the 2% figure significantly, I don’t know, but that’s his argument — race-based accusations are suspect and the general 2% is suspect because of this special case.
Oh, I noticed that none of you shared my thorough disdain for the report photo shared with us through the Forensic “Science” Digest. Let me share this site with you:
http://www.november.org/stayinfo/breaking2/RapeNation.html
…think about it.
Photoplex, people think you’re an asshole because you came in here and decided that since this woman was convicted of filing a flase report, she must have done it, and how dare you sexists defend her.
You bragged about how you didn’t even need to read the news report.
Now, this is a bit of a contradiction; if a false accusation puts men in real legal danger, then that implies the following: Prosecutors, Judges and Juries can be wrong.
You want us to give men the benefit of a doubt, yet you imediately assume a woman is guilty.
More then that, you do it in a conversation where people are being candid about how much shit they had to go through to make police believe they had been raped.
This makes you an incredible shithead, and all the scorn directed at you is utterly deserved.
Photoplex: Only 10% of rapes are reported? So, if we have, say, 500 rapes reported annually in Portland, there are actually 5000 rapes occurring?? That’s absurd — it doesn’t pass the straight-face test. Cripes, if that were really true, Portland would have been devoided of all women decades ago.
This is just such a clueless statement. Portland is pushing 3.5 million, so I would imagine there’s many more rapes annually than 5000.
And even if photoplex thinks this would cause women to “devoid” the city, where does he think they would go? Is there someplace he knows where women can go to be safe from rape? I’d love to send my children there if he does.
Real women live with the risk of rape every day, photoplex. Survivors get on with their life, they are just less trusting. The next time some woman you want to impress looks doubtfully at you, blame the rapists who’ve made her suspicious of non-rapist men.
Every rapist you defend makes women less likely to trust you sexually. How’s that working out for you?
Photo, you’re only purpose here is to spread misinformation.
Every rapist you defend makes women less likely to trust you sexually. How’s that working out for you?
Once rape is completely legal in all practical senses, obtaining women’s trust and consent is irrelevant, I guess. Except of course for those who want it–you know, the majority of men. Only takes a few assholes, I guess. So sad.
You people are amazing. Photoplex, I’m sorry these people are so reluctant to think outside their very narrow box. As for your comment ScaryIntollerantFundy:
If you had bothered to read the story, you’d know how weak the evidence against her is. Even if the men are in fact innocent, there shouldn’t have been a conviction.
If the men are found innocent, then the evidence is in fact VERY strong for a false accusation charge! If the accused are found innocent, then by default isn’t it safe to assume that those bringing the charges against them lied!?
I’m not going to waste my time going into the many reasons women might falsify charges against a man or the way in which such charges can ruin a man even while those women who are found guilty of falsifying charges are still treated like a victim since I know you people will ignore it all anyway in your rush to attack me. So have at it, do your worst. I’d have to care about your opinions before they’d bother me.
So I don’t see overall why false claims are the principal worry.
I think I understand where it comes from. The worry about false claims is grounded in fear and uncertainty. Fear because the consequence of accusations (not even necessarily convictions) for sexual assault are high, and uncertainty because many such cases do come down to the accused and accuser giving different versions of the same event.
While this may be partially true, I think the real reason is that most people who worry a lot about false accusations of rape believe that women are cruel and vindictive as a general rule, and will do whatever they can to “get back” at men. Many of these people probably also feel unjustly persecuting by women who are disgusted by their attitudes towards women, reinforcing the “women are out to get me” feeling. I think this is why arguing statistics is pointless — since these people who obsess about false rape reports are going to be misogynistic no matter what, statistics aren’t going to convince them that women are no more likely to be vindictive and vengeful than men.
Nonetheless, I can’t help throwing out a statistic that Amanda has mentioned before — many (perhaps most) false rape reports do not accuse a specific person, they are just “I was raped.” The conflict between studies showing high fractions of false rape reports and studies showing very low fractions of false rape reports is almost certainly due to this fact. If you consider how many false rape reports are filed, you get a much higher number than if you consider how many false rape charges are brought.
Oh, folks, come on. It’s been what, eight hours, and already this photophlex psued has a sockpuppet pseud of its own?
And yet the one pseudonymous commenter you can be absolutely confident will show up any time he thinks he can fit Amanda’s attitudes about rape into the conversation mysteriously hasn’t shown up even once.
People, please. It started out non-linear, and it’s honing its message as the conversation goes on for maximal offensiveness. Do not help it by responding to it.
This is not an area where I like to see cowardly little boys having fun at the expense of, well, anybody. Just leave it alone, and they’ll go back to worshipping at the shrine of John Galt and wondering why the women in their lives don’t seem to warm to them.
Julia:
I was going to respond to Photo but you talked me out of it.
I will only say that reporting statistics are of no moment in this case or any case. Something just smells fishy here and I think the prosecutor has a dead carp in his pocket.
On a non-troll feeding note, Dan Drezner is blogging about the Human Security Report (funded by the Rockefeller Institute and several European countries). Despite substantial decreases in intra- and inter- state political violence over the past 30 years, the number of reported rapes has doubled worldwide (from ~6 per 100,000 to ~13 per 100,000) in the past seven years, a disturbing trend to say the least. Two quick points: first, I don’t know enough to assess whether this could reflect an increase in rape reporting, but I’m pretty skeptical, considering the rapidity of the spike. Second, the report also points out that refugee displacement has been increasing, despite the decrease in political violence, and displaced refugees are much more likely to be raped than those who remain in their homes.
While in no way trivializing the problems of reporting and dealing with rape in this country, I think it is important in these discussions to realize how far we have to go worldwide, and to know that, despite the fact that the end of colonial and cold-war associated violence has started to make the world a safer place, that progress has not translated to making women any safer, and we need to figure out what to do about that.
photophlex,
If you look at my first post, second from the top you will see that I try to take an objective view of this event, and am not drinking the koolaid here or anywhere on the subject. What I take issue with are certain aspects of the subject which made me ashamed and for which I found disturbing.
I’ve gone on record here and on other blogs I frequent that the intricasies of these kinds of rape cases make finding the truth a case of psychological study. In such an event the exact actions and state of mind of each person needs to be known up and until the moments after the events were over.
I would not be surprised if the women in question agreed to take part in the event, caught up in the rush of alcohol and sexual fantasy, but sobered up enough afterwards to feal a bit used and abused. Should this have followed with any of the men acting or saying things which perpetuated those fealings on her part she might have felt something that encouraged her to think this was a violation.
Then again this might not be the case at all.
In virtually every state in the union it is unlawful for a couple to get married while in a state of inebriation or under the influence of drugs which can affect one’s mood or otherwise state of mind. The idea being that these persons cannot properly judge the seriousness of their actions while under the influence of drugs and/or alchohol.
In this case the daughter was or had been drinking.
Without having met the women in question or the accused it’s hard to say what kind of people they are.
It has always been my mindset that any man that would want to share a women, his girlfriend/wife, with another man or in this case two, does not care for her in the slightest cause any man who doesn’t feal some sense of possession for his wife or girlfriend is not a man who really cares if he has her or not. Men of this ilk are lowlifes whose moral behavior is questionable.
It is from this standpoint that I am taking the women’s point of view. The guys in question were also 18 and she was 17 so the underage aspect could also play a part even though I am iffy on that subject.
Where I take issue is why the woman changed in the boyfriend’s bedroom and not the bathroom where the mirror was located(assuming he didn’t have one in his own bedroom?)
See? The step by step events in this case make it next to impossible to truly get a state of mind approach but the clincher is, despite the statements made by others, to indeed take her sexual history into account.
I would have problema with anyone telling me that a particular sexual history suggesting that the subject would be more willing to engage in threesoms or foursomes with more than one man. When it comes to sex I myself would be more than open to multiple women but I know that men’s attitudes about sex are quite different than a women’s and as such they would not be as easily inclined to jump in with multiple men despite what we see in porn movies. Even then if you were to interview some of the porn actresses they would suggest that multiple partners may be something they’d get paid to do if the money’s good but never do in their private lives.
After all of this I am going to try and stay as neutral on this as I can but accuse the judge of being sexist when he’s too willing to judge the woman for making a false accusation when there is enough evidence to suggest she might yet be telling the truth and that is the real subject of this thread. That despite the evidence the males in charge decided to punish the women.
For any of us to judge this properly one way or another we’d have to know all the details that the investigators know. Including personal notes, etc.
And even then I would have to have a fairly high idea what kind of investigators these people were. Are they all men, or mixxed? Were there disagreements between them, etc?
The members of this site may be taking one side, and perhaps to the extreme but you are easily taking the other extreme as well.
From one man to another(I hope) try to judge your own fealings about this first to see if they aren’t affecting your own judgements.
If they aren’t then plead your case objectively. Just don’t get upset when or if you don’t succeed. I often take sides against the flock around here and it doesn’t bother me if they disagree or not. We are not clones. We all have different opinions.
But what you also have to consider is the chance that some or more of the women who frequent this site have gone through similar cases and are rape victims themselves. Please keep that in mind.
MYOB’
.
Some of the comments here remind me of a comment I heard from a male acquaintance about the rape statistic that 25% of women will be sexually assaulted while in college. He said, “Well, that’s okay. Sexual assault isn’t rape.” So, apparently, if you’ve been groped, touched inappropriately, had your clothes forcibly removed, or something similar, you haven’t really been attacked, ladies! It’s only rape if he orgasms! Great to know. I suppose that’s how my ex-boyfriend was able to live with himself after forcibly going down on me when I was a freshman in high school. I wasn’t really violated.
Needless to say, I don’t speak to that acquaintance much any more.
“It has always been my mindset that any man that would want to share a women, his girlfriend/wife, with another man or in this case two, does not care for her in the slightest cause any man who doesn’t feal some sense of possession for his wife or girlfriend is not a man who really cares if he has her or not. Men of this ilk are lowlifes whose moral behavior is questionable.”
This is a bit off-topic and not very relevant to the case (as we don’t know the attitudes of the boyfriend). I think it’s possible for a man to care a lot for a woman and still feel no particular sense of possesion over her. Some of these men will also have no problems with group sex situations. I don’t think it’s necessarily indicative of any moral failing. I think a much bigger problem are men who *do* feel possesion over their women, and who feel it’s perfectly within their rights to subject them to group sex, and expect them to participate voluntarily, as their “filial duty” or something.
“For any of us to judge this properly one way or another we’d have to know all the details that the investigators know. Including personal notes, etc.”
I think knowing everything the judge knows would be what’s pertinent to saying if he judged correctly.
If the men are found innocent, then the evidence is in fact VERY strong for a false accusation charge! If the accused are found innocent, then by default isn’t it safe to assume that those bringing the charges against them lied!?
Shorter niceshirthugh: The absence of evidence is so the evidence of absence!
MYOB, thank you for your thoughtful post. You are quite perceptive on a number of points:
Yes, I am a men. Yes, I have to allow that I have something of an axe to grind regarding pro-woman bias in the legal system. (long story short — four years ago I was divorced from a habitually unfaithful woman in a “no fault” state. She trashes the marriage and gets to walk away with the house, the kids and a nice tax-free income. Two years later, she manages to het herself addicted to methamphetamine… she loses her job, gets evicted from her home, spends 10 months living on the streets… and then when she declares herself clean and sober for all of 30 days, a female judge gives the kids right back to her, over my objections. Yeah, I’ve been burned by feminism. Does this make me misogynist… or merely “educated” by the system, as a victim of another kind… decide for yourself. But enough about me.)
The upshot is that there is very little objectivity among this group of people having this discussion. On the one hand we have past victims, shrilly declaring that rape victims (real or otherwise, it matters not) can do no wrong. On the other hand, there is me, just trying to say “look, it’s not nearly so simple, and sometimes the accused is actually a victim of the accuser.” I bring statistics, however imperfect, that show there is at least a kernel of substance behind my assertions. The other side has anecdotes and emotion-driven rhetoric, and little else.
My bad for thinking that the past victims might listen to reason — they are the first ones to admit that their views are clouded by past experience.
The post that *really* slays me is the one where I am accused of not understanding the difference between “inconclusive” and “false”, by someone who has no understanding of a statement containing “if… then”. This is the person who, when cornered with the statistics on false rape reports, wants to scroll all the way up to my original post for some new words to twist. And what was the essense of that original post? Merely that filing a false police report for rape should carry a harsher penalty than filing a false report for, say, vandalism. No one wants to address THAT, and it seems to be because, as I said before, their point of view is that all victims are telling the truth — they MUST be telling the truth, because reporting and prosecuting a rape is just sooo unpleasant. And damn the facts, “I know what I’m talking about… I am a victim, so therefore I am an expert and can do no wrong.” It’s the weakest argument imaginable, but by golly they sure do cling to it.
This is the person who, when cornered with the statistics on false rape reports, wants to scroll all the way up to my original post for some new words to twist.
You can take your statistics and cram them into your ears; at least then you’ll have something in your skull. I have no interest in lies, and less in damned lies, so why would I care about statistics?
And how can I twist your words simply by quoting them?
That you for making my point, Garnet. You are not reasonable, and not objective… nor do you care to be.
Reasonable and objective with a self-described MRA-er whose first response, without even reading the news report, was ‘bitch got what was coming to her’? No, I have no particular interest in being reasonable and objective with regards to you and your prattle.
But since you’re neither reasonable nor even remotely objective, I suppose that makes us even.
My bad for thinking that the past victims might listen to reason — they are the first ones to admit that their views are clouded by past experience.
As was said in the spectacular movie 12 Angry Men, this isn’t your situation. You’re letting your own circumstances and experience cloud your interpretation of a completely unrelated event. Fallacy of the vivid example. You seem to be in a great deal of pain over your difficult circumstances, and have projected that pain onto this discussion. Hurting others, mind you, in the process.
Remember, photo, you can walk away from this. It’s the next day after our evening discussion. There is no need to continually sear others with your statements to soothe your own hurt. You’re being hurtful to strangers, many of whom have been genuine victims in their lifetimes, and on their turf. I wouldn’t do that to you. Chances are, neither would they.
From what I’ve seen, throughout this discussion, you’re essentially insisting that falsity *has* occurred in unrelated cases, therefore, falsity *did* occur in the specific case under discussion.
Nobody has disputed (or dodged) your claim that false accusations do occur. Your pain is blinding you to this tacit agreement. We dispute your implication, your logical extension of this fact into an argument.
It’s been what, eight hours, and already this photophlex psued has a sockpuppet pseud of its own…
Hmm. “Don’t feed the troll” is quite different from photophlex pouring his heart out in the form of a divorce story. Even if it’s falsified, which frankly I somehow doubt… trolls don’t tend to do that; persons in pain do. The former laugh at their mischief and go; the latter don’t wander off indefinitely, but tend to inflict pain on others until a moment of recognition occurs.
Point well taken, 100n. If I have hurt the feelings of some in the group… well, that was not my intent, and I am sorry for that.
That being said, there is no getting around the idea that sometimes, the truth hurts. Lies hurt too.
And again, my words have been twisted. I never tried to make the leap from “false reports occur” to “THIS was a false report”. Instead, I am trying to kill the notion that was in fact floated here: that false reports seldom or never occur, because going through the process of filing/prosecuting a false case is such a bitch to go through. It’s not “false reports occur in unrelated cases so therefore it happened in this case”, rather it’s “false reports occur, so therefore it could have happened in this case”. It is intellectually dishonest to dismiss the possibility out ot hand.
And all of that still overlooks my *real* point in the beginning — that the level of legal jeopardy between the parties is grotesquely out of proportion. That is a valid problem with the system that needs to be addressed every bit as much as the problems that genuine rape victims face.
My own divorce is entirely irrelevant to the discussion of the day. I mentioned it out of candor and in the interest of disclosing those things in my own background that probably color my point of view. We all have a past that makes us who we are here and now — knowing one another helps us to understand one another.
And finally, I take exception to the proposition that a MRA and their grievances are to be discounted as biased, while a feminist is an agrieved party with issues that are valid by default. People should remember that the Men’s Rights movement is a creation of the Feminist movement. Feminists: YOU made us what we are. We would not exist had the balance of political power not shifted so far your way.
Some of the comments here remind me of a comment I heard from a male acquaintance about the rape statistic that 25% of women will be sexually assaulted while in college. He said, “Well, that’s okay. Sexual assault isn’t rape.” So, apparently, if you’ve been groped, touched inappropriately, had your clothes forcibly removed, or something similar, you haven’t really been attacked, ladies! It’s only rape if he orgasms! Great to know. I suppose that’s how my ex-boyfriend was able to live with himself after forcibly going down on me when I was a freshman in high school. I wasn’t really violated.
Needless to say, I don’t speak to that acquaintance much any more.
My eyebrows are raised more at the “That’s okay” part. As the emoticon puts it: 0_o
I never tried to make the leap from “false reports occur” to “THIS was a false report”.
You did, in fact. It was in your first godsdamned post. Remember?
I haven’t read the news stories in this case, and I don’t need to. This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.
Had her story stuck, the alleged perpretrators would have done hard time. And yet, for making a false accusation that placed others in that kind of jeopardy, she gets off with a slap on the wrist. It’s just wrong.
Right there; you admit you didn’t bother to read the news story, then declare that the girl is guilty and, not content with just that, you also state that her punishment wasn’t severe enough. You didn’t say anything about how this could have been a false report, you didn’t offer any qualifiers or say that if… then…, you flat out declared, with zero evidene, that she was guilty.
the level of legal jeopardy between the parties is grotesquely out of proportion.
Jesus Christ, do I have to mock this stupid statement again?
Feminists: YOU made us what we are. We would not exist had the balance of political power not shifted so far your way.
Awww, poor widdle snookums! Did those meanie feminsts hurt your fee-fees by trying to tear down your precious widdle patriarchy? A task still far from being accomplished, I might add.
Gods damned MRAs, whiniest bunch of fuckers. You think women bitched like this back when they had to get back alley abortions and live under the ‘rule of thumb’? No, they sucked it up, got on with their lives as best they could and worked like machines to change the system. But I guess the power of the institutionalised patriarchy in which women were non-persons is as nothing, NOTHING, compared to the galaxy-spanning might of… feminists!
Does anyone know of a legal defense fund for rape victims? If we all contributed, and made this information avaliable to women’s groups and rape crisis centers, maybe we could keep this sort of thing from happening in the future?
Oh, okay, so a bitter MRA who wants the law to punish women for him. Sorry your divorce sucked, bub. Divorce sucks. That’s the way life goes. But the problem is that bad relationships are not the law’s business to handle. Rape is and allowing rape to be tacitly legal by making it nearly impossible for women to press charges is not a good way to get revenge for ugly relationship matters that are personal.
Bitter MRA… snotty feminist… and the difference is?
MRAs seek to restore balance. Feminists want supremacy. I could go on for a long time about this, but it’s not all that relevant.
Nobody wants rape to be “tacitly legal”. Some of us just want justice for everyone. Apparently some of you are not in that column.
MRAs seek to restore balance.
You can’t restore something that never existed in the first place.
Feminists want supremacy.
Nope.
Jesus. Every time a story like we heard in an earlier thread about child custody issues makes me ever so slightly less disgusted with MRAs, a bunch of dumb dickless assholes swarm on something like this and remind me what’s what.
“And again, my words have been twisted. I never tried to make the leap from “false reports occur” to “THIS was a false report”.”
Except when you said,
“I haven’t read the news stories in this case, and I don’t need to. This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.”
Well, if she wasn’t guilty, then there’s no “getting off too easy” is there?
For blatantly misrepresenting your own arguments in this very thread, I dub thee troll.
Snotty feminists have a point, MRAs are whiny. Big difference.
Plus, we’re cuter.
Photo- I’m actually intrigued. What do you consider the definiton of feminisim to be? Can you enlighten me as to what feminism is?
With the false rape statistics debate, and l00n’s mention of McDowell, a bit of googling confirmed for me that only McDowell asserts that 60% of rape allegations are false. No other study supports this or even comes close to the same figure, and McDowell’s work is entirely discredited. This is one of the reasons that the armed forces no longer (officially) use the McDowell “rape allegation checklist”, a decision signed off on by none other than Dick Cheney back in Bush I’s White House.
Photoplex used the term “straight face test”: try this. Scoring only 16 on the McDowell was sufficient to be evaluated as a “possibly false allegator”. Any woman who claimed she knew her attacker, asked for a female ob/gyn for examination, asked for a female legal officer, and admitted drinking scored 10 points already. It appears virtually impossible for anyone but a 13-year-old kidnapped from her bedroom the night her family moved into town to score less than 16 on McDowell’s checklist.
Every other study seems to put the value at well under 10%, most of them report under 3%. But the MRAs still jump up and down with McDowell’s figures.
There are a lot, a LOT of weird things about that story.
First, a criminal conviction without a jury? Why? Even on a misdemeanor charge, she has a Constitutional right to a jury trial. Did her attorneys waive that? Why?
There’s no real discussion of what the status of the investigation was, and whether the alleged perps were charged at all. I mean, was there a rape kit done? There were obviously statements taken, but if they’re not even releasing the names of the alleged perps, it’s unlikely they were even arrested, since arrests are public information. Who made the decision not to prosecute? Who was the expert who testified on the “proper” reaction a rape victim should have?
It could just be the way the story was written, but there are gigantic gaps.
With the false rape statistics debate, and l00n’s mention of McDowell, a bit of googling confirmed for me that only McDowell asserts that 60% of rape allegations are false. No other study supports this or even comes close to the same figure, and McDowell’s work is entirely discredited. This is one of the reasons that the armed forces no longer (officially) use the McDowell “rape allegation checklist”, a decision signed off on by none other than Dick Cheney back in Bush I’s White House.
The story reports that 3% of rape accusations are unfounded and 1.6% (presumably a subset of that) are false reports. In comparison, 2.6% of stolen-vehicle reports are false reports.
“If the men are found innocent, then the evidence is in fact VERY strong for a false accusation charge! If the accused are found innocent, then by default isn’t it safe to assume that those bringing the charges against them lied!?”
I’ve gotta jump on this one here. First, Civics 101: No one is ever found “innocent.” People are found “not guilty;” that isn’t the same thing. It’s widely-recognized fact that many guilty people go free because there simply isn’t enough evidence to convict them, or because they can’t be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. There are also, of course, innocent people who are convicted, and that shouldn’t be ignored. But the idea behind our criminal justice system is that it’s better to let 10 guilty people go free than have 1 innocent person go to jail.
So no, just because someone is found “not guilty” does not mean that they’re innocent, or that the person who brought charges against them lied. And by the way, prosecutors bring charges in criminal cases, so we’re in for a lot of trouble if we start prosecuting the charge-bringers.
niceshirthugh:
If the men are found innocent, then the evidence is in fact VERY strong for a false accusation charge! If the accused are found innocent, then by default isn’t it safe to assume that those bringing the charges against them lied!?
That would only make any sense if criminal trials had a burden of proof of a preponderance of evidence. But they don’t. It’s proof beyond a reasonable doubt. The fact that there’s reasonable doubt doesn’t mean the accused didn’t do it, even though it does mean he should go free.
photophlex:
Evidently it did make you a misogynist. You had a bad experience and developed an animus against women. But the problem isn’t women, the problem is sin. Your own reaction is also sinful. You need to repent and your ex needs to repent, and even if she doesn’t, you should go ahead and repent anyway. Don’t let her behavior destroy you; it’s just not worth it.
Hey, Garnet;
is it OK with you if I accuse this guy of thnking like a rapist?
Just thought I’d ask.
Zuzu, you do realise that everything you just mentioned as being missing from the report of the case is protected by a person’s right to habeas corpus.
There IS still a legal right to that atm isn’t there?
Oh and here’s a partial version of the kanin study that MRAs reference ad nauseum: http://www.menweb.org/throop/falsereport/kanin.html
(if anyone has a complete version they can link to I’d be much appreciative)
Points of note:
Study examined rape reports from a community of 70,000 people, with a total of 109 rape cases in total and 45 of them (the false claims) were later admitted by the accuser as being false.
The FBI uses the exact same measure of deciding how many rape reports are false, their figure is about 9% of all rape charges in the US.
The Kanin study found that reports of rape that were later admitted to being false never involved accusations of non-vaginal penetrative acts.
What zuzu said. There is a LOT of weirdness in this news report.
I’m really, honestly surprised why anyone bothers to give people like photophlex the time of day. I understand the need to lash out at someone who’s been so obtuse and hurtful in a thread like this, but isn’t it possible to have a serious discussion about how horrible this is without it degenerating into an “MRA pisswad!” / “feminist bitchtits!” shouting match? Can’t a bunch of feminists have a conversation without having to give up everything to feed and kowtow to these man-trolls EVEN MORE, AGAIN, STILL, FOREVER?
AMEN! And my apologies for feeding the troll. I’m just flummoxed at the sheer nastiness that it takes to post in a thread about my experiences with filing a rape report and make it about how he thinks womenz are all liarz.
you do realise that everything you just mentioned as being missing from the report of the case is protected by a person’s right to habeas corpus
Huhwhat? zuzu asked why this was a bench trial, and whether there was any physical evidence. You do realize that habeas corpus is not about the Sixth Amendment or anything, so what are you talking about?
I’m easily confused that’s what I’m talkign about aparently (thought it refferred to a person’s right to a fair trial before being convicted and permanently detained, meh.)
Why is it so damn difficult to understand that a system that is sometimes unfair to men is not evidence that the system is broken? Courts get stuff wrong ALL THE TIME. And the random element is particularly high when you ask a court to do something really hard, like unwind a marriage that the parties aren’t able to sort out on their own. Sure, family courts could be a whole lot better, but when you suggest that the most important thing is to rewrite the rules to prevent injustice toward men, what you’re saying is that you want a lot more injustice toward women. Unjust results are going to happen. When you suggest that none of the injustice can be allowed to fall upon men, you’re asking for more injustices toward women. That’s why people just might get the idea that there’s an element of sexism involved.
Reading photo whimper about how feminists now rule the world reminds me of Christians complaining about how the secular humanists have taken over society, and the Rethuglicans whining about the all-powerful liberals. Give me a frigging break.
DaveL:
Partway there, I think. The simple fact is that human dynamics around gender and relationships are complex, more fluid than a turbulent sea, contradictory, and centre on the basest human emotions including (and often especially) the need for control. The court system embodies these dynamics within its designs and redesigns while at the same time it tries to apply predictability and consistency. The surprise is not that the courts sometimes err, the amazing thing is that they get things right at all.
Worse, when they do get things right, or do their damndest to be just and fair, that paradoxically increases the likelihood that they will be attacked in all forms of media by people who have agendas: “You’re not just towards (a) Men (b) Women (c) Children (d) other..”, and so forth. This problem is worsened by the fact that the media that cover both the court and the people who have a vicarious stake in the court can’t seem to decide whether incompetence or deliberate twisting or just plain lazy incomplete work shall govern how they provide us with the information on any given day.
Simple rule? You can walk into Courtroom One and find some dinosaur asshole fucking over some poor woman because he’s a patriarchal swine who still regrets giving women the vote. Wait ten minutes, and then stroll down to Courtroom Two, where you will find some poor schmuck getting fucked over by a feminist judge who thinks that women are always right. Take fifteen for a coffee, stroll down to Courtroom Three and you’ll fiind a judge who genuinely tries to be neutral and openminded, but is so dumb his family still puts cork on the end of the forks, and in Courtroom Four is the smart judge who hates Evvveerryyyybody. And the only, ONLY thing that I guarantee is that when you pick up the newspaper the next day it’s description of events will bear, at best, a limited connection to what actually happened.
Photo - It’s hard to get overly concerned about false allegations of rape when the number of true allegations which do not result in conviction is so much larger. False crime reports are bad, but in the case of rape the difficulty of getting a conviction for the genuinely guilty is a much more serious problem. Incidentally, given your stance on the reliability of the justice system, can I assume you oppose the death penalty?
There’s a lot of truth in what seeker6079 says, unfortunately.
Zuzu:
She does have that right. There is not necessarily a jury in a minor criminal case unless you ask for one and why in the name of God her attorney didn’t ask for one is beyond me. Maybe he/she thought the points of law were so obvious he’d summarily dismiss. Doan know.
I would presme that the same man who decided NOT to prosecute the ‘boys’ is the same man decided TO prosecute the young woman. I don’t know if a rape kit was done but she obviously has something on her side if she refuses to recant.
“Class-C” misdemeanor???? Maybe that’s Oregon law but it sure seems weird to me falsely charging a felony is such a light charge. Who the hell prosecutes Class-C’s???” That’s like a jaywalkinging ticket you just pay and not bother with.
I hate to jump on the bandwagon without knowing the facts but this is weird. I think the prosecutor has an agenda here. Can anybody say “malicious prosecution.”
Mal pros is a federal civil rights claim (yay section 1983!). But she needs to be acquitted first, iirc.
Mal pros is a federal civil rights claim (yay section 1983!). But the conviction needs to be overturned first, iirc.
Crappity. Sorry about the double post. Got an error message the first time.
zuzu:
I typed in “Malicious Prosecution Oregon” in good old Google and zippity do dah! Looks like you can file a civil suit under Oregon Law but 1981/1983 works for me! Let’s git the sumbitch!
I dunno the law in Oregon, but in Illinois one can bring a malicious prosecution claim if one succeeds in overturning the conviction. The requirements for it are not easy, though: among other things you have to show that there was no probable cause for the prosecution.
As to whether there’s a federal constitutional claim for malicious prosecution, that’s questionable after the Supreme Court’s fragmented decision (multiple opinions; no “opinion of the Court”) in Albright v. Oliver, 510 U.S. 266 (1994). The Seventh Circuit (the court of appeals encompassing Illinois, Indiana and Wisconsin) has held that Albright destroys any constitutional claim for malicious prosecution when state law supplies a damages remedy. Newsome v. McCabe, 256 F.3d 747 (7th Cir. 2001). I don’t know what the Ninth Circuit (the federal court of appeals that encompasses Oregon) says.
Well, mal pros is a more difficult claim than false arrest, generally. In New York, it’s pretty common for someone who’s had their conviction overturned to at least file the claim. It’s often the only claim left when the statute of limitations on a false arrest claim has run.
togo: yes, I do oppose the death penalty.
I used to support capital punishment, even when I was young and (ahem) liberal. Now older, I’ve moved to the right on most issues… but since DNA forensics have begun to expose the undeniable faults in the system, I have retreated from c.p., even in cases where it is obviously appropriate. You can’t release an innocent person once they have been executed.
Sorry, for straying off topic. What can I say, I have a hard time not sharing my opinion when it is asked for.
“”Class-C” misdemeanor???? Maybe that’s Oregon law but it sure seems weird to me falsely charging a felony is such a light charge. Who the hell prosecutes Class-C’s???” That’s like a jaywalkinging ticket you just pay and not bother with.”
Heh. It’s nice to see someone who “gets it”, even if it is by accident.
photophlex:
My aren’t we a snot.
YOU didn’t get what I was asking. I was wondering if there was discression available to the prosecution. If there was they are obviously ashamed of their action. But may they’re not. I would agree that filing a false allegation should be equal to that charged; i.e., felony to felony. And, I’m not *accidently* saying it. Doing a prosecution on any Class-C is silly.
The point that we’re trying to make is the Court’s admission that there were incosistancies all around. So, nobody should have been charged (I guess, I haven’t seen all the evidence).
1st post
how braindead do u have to be to think not guilty=innocent and ergo plaintiff=guilty.
i can’t believe what an absolute dunce photophlex is.
i have to applaud tigtog’s post:
“Photoplex: Only 10% of rapes are reported? So, if we have, say, 500 rapes reported annually in Portland, there are actually 5000 rapes occurring?? That’s absurd — it doesn’t pass the straight-face test. Cripes, if that were really true, Portland would have been devoided of all women decades ago.
This is just such a clueless statement. Portland is pushing 3.5 million, so I would imagine there’s many more rapes annually than 5000.
And even if photoplex thinks this would cause women to “devoid” the city, where does he think they would go? Is there someplace he knows where women can go to be safe from rape? I’d love to send my children there if he does.
Real women live with the risk of rape every day, photoplex. Survivors get on with their life, they are just less trusting. The next time some woman you want to impress looks doubtfully at you, blame the rapists who’ve made her suspicious of non-rapist men.
Every rapist you defend makes women less likely to trust you sexually. How’s that working out for you?”
photophlex’s stupidity knows no bounds. “the straight face test.” i guess he missed the obvious fact that ppl in portland are basically same as those anywhere else.
)
and he missed the entire history of humanity; maybe he still can’t understand why the earth isn’t devoid of women. (ya, he wishes
how fucking stupid do u have to be to not realize that women basically have to live in sexist societies that tolerate rape and sexual assualt?
i guess he never heard that most rapes aren’t even reported. (and he didn’t say a GD thing about that did he? not even token disapproval. he just wanted to attack a rape victim.) guess he can’t see that rape is very traumatic and that being a rape-victim carries a strong stigma.
i guess he never heard that most rapes are commited by non-strangers, or that marital rape was extremely common, even routine.
photophlex: “MRAs seek to restore balance. Feminists want supremacy. I could go on for a long time about this, but it’s not all that relevant.”
so equality=supremacy; patriarchy=balance.
if there’s anything more pathetic than xians wallowing in victimhood, it’s men doing it.
guess he can’t see that rape is very traumatic and that being a rape-victim carries a strong stigma.
Upthread you’d see this is a personal issue of photophlex’s involving his divorce.
Sorry, for straying off topic.
photo. You’ve been off-topic for most of the entire post, ever since unadmittedly backing off from your original claim about not needing to see evidence, knowing the woman involved was guilty. I can’t say whether your apology was accepted, but it does help to stop saying hurtful things. In your case, it would help your goal of not hurting others (as you’d stated above), to stop posting anything at all on this site. It’s a good time to leave here, at least, better than any time upcoming.
I can perceive and comprehend your pain over your divorce and ensuing struggles, however much this thread seems to me an inappropriate place to display it, but nonetheless: you should instead consider finding someone who can give you more personalized attention than any of us here might, and discuss your past with that person in that context, professional or no. Good night and good luck.
Corcorant, you need to go back and reread. You missed the part where I said that IF the woman made a false report, THEN she needs to be punished. Why is that sooo hard for some of you to understand? How does being female give one a license to falsely accuse men of rape?
And the idea that rape is underreported by a factor of 10… that’s just ludicrus. Sure, some FRACTION of rapes go unreported, no argument there. But 90%? Be real. That’s just feminist political propaganda. If there is any basis in fact, then where is the data to support it?
And yes, men are victims sometimes, too. Only we aren’t wallowing in it, like some of the females in this comment thread who refuse to face cold, hard facts and expect the rest of us to be as ignorant as they are out of sympathy. No, the men are fighting back. Not fighting for patriachy (the repeated use of that word… there’s your feminist “wallowing” for you), but fighting for the very fairness that feminists ostensibly wanted to begin with.
If you knew the first thing about the Men’s movement, you would know that our first and foremost priority is to mitigate the damage to CHILDREN that is caused by feminist meddling in the family law system. THAT is the centerpiece of our agenda. If you want to go on the record as being anti-children, go join N.O.W.
there are so very many things wrong with what you just wrote, I can’t even begin to vet that.
You missed the part where I said that IF the woman made a false report, THEN she needs to be punished. Why is that sooo hard for some of you to understand? How does being female give one a license to falsely accuse men of rape?
You’re backpedalling and trying to blame us for “misreading you” the first time. “This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.” is a declaration that she IS guilty, not “might be” after all, if she did nothing wrong, she isn’t “getting off easy” even if she isn’t punished. When you finally did get to your if-then statement, you didn’t actually SAY that, you said “my words meant that” which means you never actually took back your “bitch deserved it” sentiments.
And the idea that rape is underreported by a factor of 10… that’s just ludicrus. Sure, some FRACTION of rapes go unreported, no argument there. But 90%? Be real. That’s just feminist political propaganda. If there is any basis in fact, then where is the data to support it?
the DOJ is a feminist organization? who knew?
and underreported rape sure is Dirty South style, dig?
And yes, men are victims sometimes, too. Only we aren’t wallowing in it, like some of the females in this comment thread who refuse to face cold, hard facts and expect the rest of us to be as ignorant as they are out of sympathy. No, the men are fighting back. Not fighting for patriachy (the repeated use of that word… there’s your feminist “wallowing” for you), but fighting for the very fairness that feminists ostensibly wanted to begin with.
Yes, men ARE victims too. in myriad ways. no one here EVER claimed “man, being a man is easy. I wish I was born with a penis.” however, being falsely accused of raping someone and getting off scot free is no where near as bad as being raped and having no one believe you (or worse, beign put on trial because everyone believes your attacker). You have any siblings? When I was a kid, something would get broken, and my brother and I would try to pin the blame on the other. and I gotta tell you, when you get accused of doing something you didn’t? frustrating as all get out. but getting punished for tattling and not being believed? that shit is infuriating.
If you knew the first thing about the Men’s movement, you would know that our first and foremost priority is to mitigate the damage to CHILDREN that is caused by feminist meddling in the family law system. THAT is the centerpiece of our agenda. If you want to go on the record as being anti-children, go join N.O.W.
what “Damage?” Making it possible for a mother to split from a husband entirely when he’s abusive? and if you want to go on record as anti-children, publicly fight a tax hike aimed at supporting schools, and join Zero Population Growth.
look, you had a messy divorce, and I feel for you, but a 17 year old girl who allegedly was gang raped didn’t make that happen. nor did the people who point out and feel that this girl is being mistreated by the prosecutor.
Your ugly divorce is the product of your disagreement with your wife. this happens because few entities can be more childish than someone going through a divorce. You might be a saint, but some other divorce is just as likely to have the manipulative monster be the man, trying to ruin the life of his wife and children because if he can’t have them, no one will.
and you aren’t fighting for any rights. you’re wallowing in self pity and relying on the fact that this is a feminist forum, and hope that means “women will just take verbal abuse” because, sadly, that’s usually true. But do you honestly feel any better after all the mean, nasty ugly things you’ve said here?
photophlex: “Corcorant, you need to go back and reread. You missed the part where I said that IF the woman made a false report, THEN she needs to be punished.”
why do u keep BSing?? the 1st thing u said was that u didn’t need to see the facts, and that
“This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.”
and i think u mean condorcet: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marquis_de_Condorcet
Give it up Photo, clearly the fact that the girl was found guilty by a judge who has all the facts and not just the anectodal asides mentioned in the article is a raving mysogynistic pig. I mean that is the fair assumption that should be reached by any reasonable person. Also photo, you have no larger point, that is to say women never make false rape claims. If a woman says rape then its rape. In fact, there should not even be a trial when a women claims rape. The accused should be immediately castrated and sent to jail for life.
“This girl is going to get off wayyyyy too easy.”
I know it is a *fact* that she was found guilty and all, but the judge is a a liar and mysogynist, and the only proof of that I need is the verdict itself, GUILTY. Therefore your statement above is evidence of *YOUR* ignorance.
Photo–
Many of the assumptions you are making above reveal your bias that women are liars, cheaters, and that the judicial system is anti-men. You accuse other of ignoring facts while not being well informed yourself.
Please read the facts of the case first.
-17-year old girl accuses adult boyfriend and two of his friends of raping her
-They say it was consentual, she says it wasn’t, she never changes her story
-DA decides there isn’t enough evidence to charge them, there is no trial, they are accused but never found guilty OR innocent
-She can’t make her case so she gets charged with filing a false report regardless of the fact that there is NO CONCRETE EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER that she’s lying. There is no one saying that she privately admitted she lied, she has never recanted or changed her story. They had sex with her, she says it was against her will, the judge sides with the men. End of story.
If you had a 17-year old daughter who accused her boyfriend and his friends of gang-raping her and stuck by her story through all of this, would you believe the boys or her?
Regardless, your lack of sympathy is dizzying. Clearly you have some serious issues to work out when it comes to women. I’m sorry your own personal bitterness has made you view men as victims and women as evil.
You seem to think that women have more power than men or something, which means your views are pretty detached from reality. Maybe you should get some help for that. For starters try not projecting your own anti-woman bias on 17-year old girls who claim they were gang-raped, OK?
-She can’t make her case so she gets charged with filing a false report regardless of the fact that there is NO CONCRETE EVIDENCE WHATSOEVER that she’s lying. There is no one saying that she privately admitted she lied, she has never recanted or changed her story. They had sex with her, she says it was against her will, the judge sides with the men. End of story.
What a load of horse shit. She got charged because there is a case against her. It has nothing to do with the fact that she doesnt make her case. Its not one or the other. The prosecution has to *prove* their case against her.
Nobody here knows what the prosecution had for evidence other than whats in the article. Do you think maybe just maybe there are a lot more facts in the case that are not mentioned in the article. I suspect there is some damning evidence against her. Damning enough for her to keep her mouth and her lawyers mouth shut. If not, we will find out on appeal won’t we.
This is the type of case that probably makes most prosecutors cringe. I doubt they would have pressed the matter if they werent very very confident they would win. This is the type of case that can ruin a career if they are wrong.
guilty verdicts only don’t matter when a man is accused of rape THEN they’re insignificant.
I shall match your bias with even greater slut shaming based bias! take THAT feminazi hordes!
How utterly wonderful and original, now as people are obviously too stupid to click links around here I’ll quote the original peice…
“Even though the woman never said she lied or recanted her story, city prosecutors say they took the unusual step of filing charges against her because of the seriousness of her accusations.”
*snip*
“After a day-and-a-half trial, Municipal Judge Peter A. Ackerman on Friday convicted the woman of filing a false police report, a class-C misdemeanor. Ackerman explained his decision, saying there were many inconsistencies in the stories of the four, but that he found the young men to be more credible. He also said he relied on the testimony of a Beaverton police detective and the woman’s friends who said she did not act traumatized in the days following the incident.
The woman’s lawyer, Jeff Napoli, said he plans to appeal the case to Washington County Circuit Court, where a new trial would be held.
The woman, who was 17 at the time of the April 30, 2004, incident, testified Friday that she was attacked by an 18-year-old boyfriend and his two friends. She said she was in the boyfriend’s bedroom preparing to go to a party when she was sexually assaulted by the men.
The three men testified Thursday that the acts were consensual and at the girl’s initiation. ”
prosecuted for the seriousness of the charge = class C misdemeanor, uh huh…
Judges accepts the men’s word over hers despite inaccuracies in their statements…right…
she’s obviously just a wanton whore, it’s so obvious when you put the facts together!
I don’t know if she was raped or not, I wasn’t there, but neither were you or the judge. The fact is that she does not deserve to get punished for accusing men of raping her– otherwise every woman who is raped must be prepared to prove her case without a shred of doubt or be willing to suffer prosecution herself.
Maybe you don’t know much about typical rape cases– usually there are only 2 people there, the woman and the rapist, and the odds are high that the woman knows the man. That is what makes the crime of rape so difficult– it’s usually hard to prove and the woman risks a lot coming forward. But you don’t seem to care much about that or have much sympathy for rape victims. You assume the men are innocent based on what little you know, you seem to trust that one’s judge’s ruling means the men must be innocent. I wonder why?
My previous post is directed at “I don’t care” not R. Mildred, obviously.
To clear up the law:
No, you are not entitled to a jury trial for a petty offense, meaning one that is not a felony and does not have the threat of incarceration for a year or more. You are entitled to a lawyer if you are given any jail time.
This young woman is getting an appeal, the original article states “The woman’s lawyer, Jeff Napoli, said he plans to appeal the case to Washington County Circuit Court, where a new trial would be held.”
This form of appeal is called a trial de novo. Like the latin suggests, she gets a whole new trial that has nothing to do with the first one. I’ve never been in a state that has this system, but I know Marlyand has it as well. The way it works is that you can have a bench trial (trial by judge) first, and if the defendant loses, they can have a jury trial. Defense attorneys like that because it means that they get two bites at the apple–they can determine if a defense won’t fly.
BTW, when it comes down to looking at false rape report studies in the military, it is important to remember that in the military, you can be prosecuted for fraternization or adultery. So there is a much stronger incentive to lie, and the results, even if correct, do not apply to civilian situations.
“How utterly wonderful and original, now as people are obviously too stupid to click links around here I’ll quote the original peice…”
“Even though the woman never said she lied or recanted her story,”
Oh, she never said she lied, wow case closed. Hear ye Hear ye, not admitting guilt automatically makes you innocent. Wow, that’s great.
“city prosecutors say they took the unusual step of filing charges against her because of the seriousness of her accusations.”
Yeah, furthering my hypothesis that they have substantial evidence. If not, it would be a usual thing for prosecutors to pursue those who accuse falsely.
“she’s obviously just a wanton whore, it’s so obvious when you put the facts together!”
Yeah Mildred, Im sure the 3 lines you posted from a newspaper article represents all the evidence/facts.
Mildred, answer one question, do you know anymore about the story other than what you read in the article?
Second, if a woman accuses a man of rape and it is proven to be a lie, does that woman deserve to be prosecuted.
I base my opinion about this *specific* case on the premise that the judge and prosecutors came to a conclusion based on *all* the evidence. You base your opinion on a few lines from a newspaper article.
Even if Im wrong, and the girl is found innocent on appeal, at least my opinions were formed based on the theory that more evidence is presented in a day and a half court trial than in a few lines from a newspaper article.
“How utterly wonderful and original, now as people are obviously too stupid to click links around here I’ll quote the original peice…”
“Even though the woman never said she lied or recanted her story,”
Oh, she never said she lied, wow case closed. Hear ye Hear ye, not admitting guilt automatically makes you innocent. Wow, that’s great.
“city prosecutors say they took the unusual step of filing charges against her because of the seriousness of her accusations.”
Yeah, furthering my hypothesis that they have substantial evidence. If not, it would be a usual thing for prosecutors to pursue those who accuse falsely.
“she’s obviously just a wanton whore, it’s so obvious when you put the facts together!”
Yeah Mildred, Im sure the 3 lines you posted from a newspaper article represents all the evidence/facts.
Mildred, answer one question, do you know anymore about the story other than what you read in the article?
Second, if a woman accuses a man of rape and it is proven to be a lie, does that woman deserve to be prosecuted.
I base my opinion about this *specific* case on the premise that the judge and prosecutors came to a conclusion based on *all* the evidence. You base your opinion on a few lines from a newspaper article.
Even if Im wrong, and the girl is found innocent on appeal, at least my opinions were formed based on the theory that more evidence is presented in a day and a half court trial than in a few lines from a newspaper article.
Even if Im wrong, and the girl is found innocent on appeal, at least my opinions were formed based on the theory that more evidence is presented in a day and a half court trial than in a few lines from a newspaper article.
Obviously you’ve never been to a real court trial; you could easily go for a day and a half and not manage to finish up even one witness’ testimony, nevermind the girl, her ex, his two friends, her friends and a police officer.
And if you can get through at least seven witnesses in a day and a half, not a one of them can have much at all to say, which seems to me to be a little less than would be required to prove anything, one way or the other, about a crime as complicated as rape.
Feminism is the bizarre notion that women are people. And when, after the struggle to codify that position into law, women are considered people, at least to a small degree, a woman who behaves as a person and does something that is wrong or ill-conceived or illegal, is used as a justification for the position that all women are not people and should be returned to their true state as property.
I don’t know what the truth is behind the case being discussed, but I do have ancedotal evidence about rapes and false accusations. Among the women I know (acquaintance or close friend) the ratio is more like 9 out of 10 have a sexual assault or rape experience. And in the majority of those instances, the attacker was someone she knew and trusted.
I know one woman who has made a false claim of rape. In her case, since she pretty much is a habitual liar, no one was surprised when the whole mess turned out to be round 716 in the battle between her and her boyfriend (who both used really foul tactics against each other as they proclaimed their undying love, very weird).
Most of the women I know who had a real sexual assault or rape did not report it. Some I knew at the time of their experience, some long after. None had the same reaction, even years after the event.
I would never report a sexual assault. I know that I would never be believed and the whole mess of the court system would only add more hell to my life, and even if convicted, it’s not going to stop the rapist from raping again. He might get some jail time, but once he gets out he will continue to assault women, because he hates them already, or he wouldn’t rape, and now he can hold up his jail time as a rationale for raping the evil women who ruined his life.
I don’t see any solution for situation such as in this news report, or the experiences detailed by people in this thread, or my own.
I will the first to acknowledge that verifiable false accusations do make victims out of men, they can ruin lives, and ultimately they do make it worse for the real rape victims, the many women who do come forward but can’t prove without a doubt that it was rape. Women who are raped have it hard enough and any person who offers support to the notion that women lie about rape deserves to be held accountable for hurting real victims.
Therefore, in certain very limited circumstances I could support prosecuting a woman who makes false rape allegations. However, there needs to be hard, concrete evidence that she lied, there must be proof that she made the charges with malice and forethought. Even if she herself says that she lied and she should have to offer some kind of proof that she isn’t just getting cold feet or feeling overwhelmed/bullied/demonized. But the bar for such a prosecution must be high enough that it does not hurt the real rape victims.
That being said, a judge believing that she wanted it is not concrete evidence that she lied. This case is not a good example of the kind where a woman should be held accountable for false allegations. End of story.
BTW, “I don’t get it” is the perfect name for you to post under. It’s pretty damn clear that you don’t get it and that you’re woefully naive. I personally cannot assume that the judge isn’t some old fart who thinks she’s a slut or that the prosecutors aren’t warped and think that she asked for it. You assume they are fair and just because of the outcome, but I do not trust the judicial system that much because there are such things as bad judges and vindictive prosectors.
Only time will tell in this case, if this woman was indeed raped then just like many other victims this woman may not see justice. But the outcome of the case does not make it so the rape didn’t happen, it just means certain people in power didn’t believe her. Sadly, this is hardly anything new.
“Obviously you’ve never been to a real court trial; you could easily go for a day and a half and not manage to finish up even one witness’ testimony, nevermind the girl, her ex, his two friends, her friends and a police officer.”
Actually I have, and I would imagine so have the judge and prosecutors involved in this case.
They were there, you and I weren’t. Nobody on this thread heard what the judge heard. Im going with my gut and assuming there was a lot more to the story. Silly me.
>>(the false claims) were later admitted by the accuser as being false.>>
I know it’s been left behind, but I noticed this bit about how false-accusation statistics are arrived at. I don’t have any idea how any statistician would arrive at a more likely number. However, given the gauntlet women who accuse must run, I’m skeptical that all of the women taking it back are doing so because they repent of a false accusation.
I will concede that if the judge made his decision based on only what was printed in the article, then this whole thing is a sham a disgrace and the judge should be relieved of his duties.
I have no evidence that’s what happened.
>>Oh, she never said she lied, wow case closed. Hear ye Hear ye, not admitting guilt automatically makes you innocent. Wow, that’s great.>>
The fact is that _no one_, excepting the men involved, say she’s lying or inconsistent in her testimony. The article was fairly detailed; it seems strange that neither it nor the judge who had to justify his decision would mention anything about evidence other than a hunch that the accused men were more credible.
>>”city prosecutors say they took the unusual step of filing charges against her because of the seriousness of her accusations.”
Yeah, furthering my hypothesis that they have substantial evidence. If not, it would be a usual thing for prosecutors to pursue those who accuse falsely.>>
Explain the light sentence, then.
“Explain the light sentence, then.”
Good point.
If you were the judge in this case, wouldn’t you want to appear as reasonable and as free of sexist prejudice as possible? Wouldn’t you want to explain yourself as well as you could? If so, why wouldn’t you make mention of the smoking-gun evidence against the young woman that led you to determine that she was guilty? If you in fact had something that much more convincing than either a hunch about the credibility of certain witnesses over others or a mistaken belief that trauma manifests in a particular way, why not describe it?
Piny, because it’s obvious. His belief that trauma manifests in a particular way is universally held, so there’s no reason to explain something so self-evident.
Piny
Im not sure why the judge didn’t explain himself better for the press. Maybe he felt the judgement rendered against the defendant was punishment enough and didnt want to get into the sordid details.
Why do you suppose he didnt throw the case out or find the defendant not guilty. Is he evil, stupid or both? It would have been easier and safer career wise to throw the case out or find her not guilty.
“His belief that trauma manifests in a particular way is universally held, so there’s no reason to explain something so self-evident.”
I definately don’t get that.
I am going to print this in 1000 px letters on a piece of paper the size of a bedsheet and hang it on the wall above my computer.
In other words, AMEN, MARY.
Mildred, answer one question, do you know anymore about the story other than what you read in the article?
well I know that I wouldn’t base my verdict on whether a rape victim wasn’t reacting to how I’d expect a rape victim to react to a rape by her boyfirend and his best friends, it’s not a normal reaction to rape to press for a conviction at all but it’d be stupid to think that any woman who presses charges is making a false claim, but then again I ain’t no high faluting judge who has been specially trained in the psychology of rape victims. Oh and that one of the witnesses to the victim “not behaving like a standard rape victim” was her substance abusing mother who’s boyfriend was doing time for sexually abusing his daughter in the first place. Gotta love that sort of evidence. Oh and that it was those two witnesses who got the victim to go to court in the first place with the accusation (yet no charges were brought against them, not that I want to imply the judge is rankly incompetent and only consistent with his inconsistencies).
You’d know this too if you could summon the strength to click…those…links…
Also, you’re not merely basing your judgement of this case on the information you have, otherwise you’d not be outdoing the people you’re arguing with as far as jumping to conclusions goes, what we have is evidence that the judge’s words are not consistent with his actions and those words that are consistent with his actions are the standard misogynist bullshit that’s been heard a million times before in cases like this.
you’re basing your conclusion that she is lying on the trust you have that the judge is not a misogynist asshole (which in turn is based on nothing) whereas everyone else is basing their conclusion on the actual statements coming out of the court house.
Idunno, your question is just plain stupid, yes if torture worked it would be useful, yes if we could be 100% certain she was lying, but if ifs and buts were candy and nuts it’d still be a stupid thing to do, what’s the point? to diswade the 9% of rarely brought to trial false rape allegations from being made? using sentencing to discourage crimes from being committed in the first place didn’t work for draco and it won’t work in this case either.
you could easily go for a day and a half and not manage to finish up even one witness’ testimony, nevermind the girl, her ex, his two friends, her friends and a police officer.
and note, not a single psychologist to verify what a “normal” reaction to rape IS in the first place either.
Of course, the possibility is that the victim’s lawyer wanted to exercise the trial de novo thing from the start exists, though that the judge decided that not only was the victim’s sexual history admissable as evidence (which, given that one of the accuseds was her boyfriend to begin with is unadalterated slut shaming or just something for the judge to whack off to after the trial, this isn’t that judge who got caught masturbating in court is it?) it is also very likely that the judge just shut down the victim’s case as best he could.
Time to quit while we are still ahead. Current score:
Men — found not guilty
Woman — convicted of filing false report
At least we can all agree on that much. Let’s allow the womenfolk to have their little “Damaged Goods/Woe is Us” coffee klatch.
Com’on guys, we’re outta here.
“you’re basing your conclusion that she is lying on the trust you have that the judge is not a misogynist asshole (which in turn is based on nothing)”
How does one argue with this type of B.S? Yes Mildred, I don’t assume someone is anything unless they prove themselves to be.
The judge has not proved himself to be a misogylnist. You havent proved that you arent a serial killer. Are you?
“whereas everyone else is basing their conclusion on the actual statements coming out of the court house.”
They are basing their opinions on statements given to a newspaper Mildred. Not only that, but how often do newspapers print only partial statements, or selected quotes. Telling you to stop being an idiot is getting to be a full time job around here.
Get the court transcripts and we can have a real argument about guilt. Until then, Im going with the judge.
Here is what I find interesting, photo. Instead of sympathizing with the person who very well may be getting screwed over by the judicial system, just like you feel that you were, you allow your hatred of women to cloud your judgement. This woman is your natural ally, not the men, she is the one who isn’t taken seriously, whose name is being dragged through the mud based on sexist assumptions about behavior. But your own bias against women prevents you from ever thinking that way.
“I don’t get it”– Do you know anyone who has been raped? Have you ever spent any time with a woman who is dealing with the aftermath of rape? You don’t have to answer that because the answer is clearly no, otherwise you might express one iota of sympathy or compassion. I can’t help but wonder if you have a rape accusation in your own past…
Photo, don’t let the door hit ya on the way out. You can’t seriously believe that the I or most of the other men who read this blog and comment here are suddenly going to go hang out with you and the rest of the MRA Neanderthals, can you?
Oh man, I am dying of laughter. “Com’on guys, we’re out of here“! ?????
BWA!!!
Silly trolls! I know it’s awfully cute when they stamp their little hoofs and squeal for attention, but damn, am I sick of ‘em.
There really is nothing more pathetic than the so-called men’s movement. In some respects they may even have some valid points (mother custody assumptions, etc.) but they get totally lost as they shoot themselves in the knees by turning what has happened to them personally into some big charge against all women in general. The way that most of them write/act I wouldn’t want my kids around them either– bitter, angry, adolescent, vindictive assholes who turn their sense of being a “victim” into an assault on all women everywhere.
I find it just as ridiculous whenever women blame “men” for problems they’re having with one particular man.
Com’on guys, we’re outta here.
Don’t… no, y’know what? Do let the door hit you on the way out.
Nobody on this thread heard what the judge heard. Im going with my gut and assuming there was a lot more to the story. Silly me.
Yes, silly you. Seriously, a day and a half! A day and a half to interview the girl, her ex, her mother, her friends (at least two), his two friends and a police officer? Eight witnesses in a day and a half, and not a single psychiatric health professional called to testify about the incredibly broad range of ‘normal’ reaction to rape?
It must be nice to live in a world where officials are inherently both wise and just, where they always have impeccable reasoning, even if you don’t see it, even if there’s not even the slightest hint of it. If it weren’t for the crushing misogyny there, I might be tempted to move to your wonderful little dream world.
“I don’t get it”– Do you know anyone who has been raped?” Have you ever spent any time with a woman who is dealing with the aftermath of rape?”
Look Zoe, I havent said anything on this thread that suggests I’m not sympathetic to rape victims, to imply otherwise is dishonest and really does nothing to help actual rape victims. I am sympathetic to those who have been raped, I am also sympathetic to anyone who has been falsely accused of a crime. Are you?
“I can’t help but wonder if you have a rape accusation in your own past…”
Because I don’t believe the judge is a mysoginistic asshole based on a newspaper article?
Show me some proof that the judge made the wrong the decision and I will be on the bandwagon, but Im not willing to trash someone based on a whole lot of speculation and a newpaper article. And by the way Zoe, fuck you.
Garnet -
You seem to have missed it hon, they are only unruly biased activist judges when they don’t rule the wingnuts’ way. As soon as they do, of course they are upstanding moral citizens that are perfectly able to make an unprejudiced and objective decision, and it is just our petty victim-nature that leads us to ignorantly criticise and question them.
It’s oh so clear
Ismone:
In my state you can demand a jury trial for a misdemeanor. My JP court has them fairly often. This isn’t a Constiutional right for petty offenses, but it is, in some places, a statutory right. Oregon? Dunno.
Alas has a thread on this. Bean apparently has some knowledge of the case that shows up there. As far as I can tell (Please see the original thread at Alas, a Blog), the state system only allows a rape kit to be taken if the victim files a police report. The state then chooses to prosecute or not to prosecute the case. The state apparently has a history of then prosecuting the victims if they don’t wish to cooperate with going to trial when the DA does - in order to recover the cost of having the rape kit done.
What a thing to have to go through if you’ve been raped! I can see why they think this wouldn’t cause fewer rape reports - there’s no way in hell you’d get me to report a rape under those circumstances.
IDGI– You might think that your so-called sympathy for rape victims has come through in this discussion, but it really hasn’t. You’ve come off as a misogynistic asshole. Your mind seems pretty closed to trying to understand a woman’s position on this issue, why we would think the way we do or why we think this case is bad precedent. I don’t assume that she was or wasn’t raped, but you assume that she lying slut because a judge says so.
I’m not saying that men’s views on this don’t matter, but most men really have no clue what it’s like to be afraid of being raped or assaulted. Ask any woman and she’ll tell you that her safety is something she has to calculate often. Do most men understand this or ever think about this? Oh, sorry, whenever a woman suggests such a thing as a man thinking about what it’s like to be a woman she’s automatically a raving feminazi.
It seems to me there’s a wide gulf between “she’s lying” and “a prosecutor who can’t or won’t do his job failed to prove beyond etc. that she had been raped.” All the sensible people take the second view. IDGI and photo take the first.
You know, I avoided this thread yesterday because it had been going on too long already, and the trolls had already had the shit kicked out of them, so there wasn’t even any fun left.
But…
Don’t speak for me, you pitiful, hateful little man.
Zoe,
My sympathy for rape victims has not come through on this thread because I havent shown any sympathy on this thread. Based on the information I have, I don’t believe the girl was raped. Also the threshold of proof that the girl in question has been wrongly convicted of filing a false report has not been met, at least not for me and I’m guessing plenty of others who have read this thread. Therefore, I don’t have any sympathy for this particular woman. The logic does not follow that I do not have sympathy for rape victims, sorry but it just doesnt.
You see Zoe, I wear braces on my legs to prevent my knees from jerking too violently, maybe you should be fitted for a set. I hope there is more to come on this story that will give us more insight to all the facts. Right now all we really have is a verdict based on all the facts and a newspaper article that has a few anecdotal facts. Im going with the opinion of the person who heard all the facts and you and others are going with the article.
False rape accusations can ruin a persons life a fact that you seem to be rather cavalier about.
You are not willing to give the judge the benefit of the doubt based on a newspaper article and at the same time you finger me as a rapist simply because I don’t like the koolaid of the day. I would say you have proved my point in grand fashion, but the reality is that you have only proven that you’re a knee jerk idiot.
shorter IDGI:
“I don’t have sympathy for rape victims who are persecuted for having been a victim, because prosecutors ALWAYS have a good reason for there actions. There’s no such thing as a false conviction.
unless it’s a man, falsely accused of rape. those guys go to jail all the time, and it’s wrong.”
Magis,
I tried to research Oregon rules of court (ugh–always tough to navigate, better to ask a practitioner) but here’s what I’ve got.
-The woman was convicted under Oregon Revised Statute 162.375, Initiating a false report, which is always a class C misdemeanor.
-ORS 221.390 establishes that municipal court convictions are appealed in circuit courts by the provision of a new trial
-Like you thought, ORS 136.001 permits a jury trial in ALL criminal prosecutions, so there is a statutory provision for jury trials.
I think what happens (if this is like Maryland, which has a trial de novo appellate system) is that the defendant gets a bench trial in the district court and a jury trial in the circuit court, unless he or she waives the jury trial right at the circuit court level. I haven’t been quite able to piece this together from the rules. Any Oregon lawyers/law types out there?
I actually called the municipal court yesterday, and learned that the judges don’t electronically publish slip opinions, which doesn’t surprise me. Wish I could read the transcript.
Ismone
Based on the information I have, I don’t believe the girl was raped.
Based on what? Do you know anything more than a judge’s ruling that he believed the 3 “boys” rather than her? That is all the evidence you have, isn’t it? It’s hardly a preponderance of evidence to base such a strong opinion. And you have the balls to call me knee jerk?
I personally don’t know what happened, I don’t have enough information. However, I do think this is very bad precendent and that there is something “off” about filing charges against a rape victim because she doesn’t have enough evidence to prove she was raped. (Very typical in rape cases, especially in cases where the woman and man know one another.) Charging a woman who admits she lied is one thing but a woman who still insists she was raped does not deserve to be prosecuted and branded a liar. There is a huge difference between not getting a conviction and innocence.
I’ve known quite a few women who never made their rapes public because of what this woman has gone through– public speculation about her integrity, that she must have wanted it but changed her mind, etc. So, yeah, call me inclined to believe a woman is telling the truth unless there is some serious proof that she isn’t. Punishing her for not being able to prove her case without a doubt is just bad law.
Overall, your attitude about this whole case really stinks to high heaven of serious issues with women. Your levels of condescention towards women who feel as though they are defending a victim are off the charts. You might want to go back and read some of your posts. You might understand why people are being so hostile towards you.
Here’s a shocking thought for you - RAPE RUINS A PERSON’S LIFE, a fact you seem to be rather cavalier about yourself.
And for some more personal anecdotes as to the suckiness of the system when it comes to rape accusations:
I was raped when I was four years old, by my babysitter, a sixteen year old neighborhood kid. My rapist was never convicted, never spent a day in jail or even in juvie, despite ample evidence - my ripped up little girl vagina, a used condom in the trash basket, and my inconsolable sobbing. He was a ‘good kid’ - therefore, no punishment was necessary. Of course, my punishment didn’t end when he went home. My punishment is only now starting to fade, and I’m twenty-fucking-six years old.
So if a judge can stand there and look at a crying four year old girl and let her rapist off without even so much as a slap on the wrist because he was being a “boy”, I don’t see how anyone would actually dare try to claim that the system is biased in favor of women. I can only assume those people live on Mars and have never actually had contact with human society before.
For the record, IDGI, I’ve never been cavalier about false accusations and I think most women understand how serious an issue they are. I wrote above that I support filing charges against women who blatantly lie about rape– that being said I think the bar should be set very high for such a case. (See comment December 5, 2005 12:53 PM)
I had a very good friend in college who was falsely accused of assault and he paid a very high price for it. (He and woman are friends, she falls asleep while they’re studying, he puts her to bed when she’s half asleep. Suddenly she wakes up and thinks he’s trying to do something. He wasn’t.) She later recanted and said she misunderstood what happened but he was still thought of as an untrustworthy guy. I stood by him through the whole thing, but ultimately saw the whole thing from both sides. In this case they were both victims.
So call me knee jerk all you want, but you only see what you want to see, apparently. If you weren’t so goddamn hostile and condescending from the getgo we might have been able to have a civil discussion about this.
shorter IDGI:
“I don’t have sympathy for rape victims who are persecuted for having been a victim, because prosecutors ALWAYS have a good reason for there actions. There’s no such thing as a false conviction.”
Shorter Karpad: Even though the woman was found guilty of filing a false report, everyone accept the girl was lying. I don’t need to know all the facts of the case, the article is all I need to base my conclusions.
“Here’s a shocking thought for you - RAPE RUINS A PERSON’S LIFE, a fact you seem to be rather cavalier about yourself.”
Not at all, I don’t believe the girl was raped. I could be convinced, but not by a bunch of knee jerk morons. Sorry Ill pass on the koolaid.
Not sure what’s so hard to understand here, a judge who heard *all* the facts renders a verdict of guilty. Knee jerkers read an article containing anecdotal facts about the case and render their own verdict. Im going with the verdict which is based on all the facts. I may be wrong, but in the absence of all the facts I remain unconvinced that she was wrongly convicted.
Despite what some of you may think, I could easily change my mind on this specific case if I saw all the evidence. Could you?
Stop feeding the troll, people.
Well, gosh, then perhaps the defense should have called you as a witness, since you seem to know EXACTLY what went down in this situation.
“If you weren’t so goddamn hostile and condescending from the getgo we might have been able to have a civil discussion about this.”
Geez, have you re-read any of your posts on this thread and others?
Pot meet Mr. Kettle. Hi Kettle.
“Stop feeding the troll, people.”
i.e. stop responding to people who don’t have koolaid mustaches.
IDGI etc don’t seem to have read Amanda’s initial post very carefully: one very good reason people here are concerned about this young woman is that a blogger read by many people here is a personal friend of the family and has known her all her life.
Kevin was in the courthouse for the trial and was stunned by what he considers a total miscarriage of justice.
So, we’re not only going on newspaper articles. We’re going on the gut feeling of a blogger well acquainted with the case whose opinions on other issues we consider wellfounded.
Does he have a personal bias in favour of a girl he knows well? Quite possibly - but he doesn’t have any trouble describing her mother as an alcoholic bimbo, so if he thought the girl was just as unreliable, would he be this upset?
mea culpa, lizard.
Squeal, stamp, squeal, stamp. Such a cute little troll, watch him go!
ANYWAY, to get back to the conversation, I agree that final judgement can’t be made on the case while all the facts are not known. However, I do agree that the short length of time taken to decide the case against the girl and the (apparent) absence of any kind of expert testimony about “normal” reactions to sexual assault, makes the judgement against her seem awfully fishy.
I wonder what kind of appeal the girl is setting up. If the judgement against her was made as we tend to suspect it was–i.e., based on one judge’s “gut feel” about what is or is not a “normal” reaction to rape–I’d say the girl definitely has a case for suing the living fuck out of the court.
Isemone:
Oh, I say, well done!
Here’s one for you, our JP courts where most midemeanors are tried aren’t even courts of record! So it has to be de novo because you can’t appeal on error. There’ s big brouhaha over this currently.
Isemone:
Oh, I say, well done!
Here’s one for you, our JP courts where most midemeanors are tried aren’t even courts of record! So it has to be de novo because you can’t appeal on error. There’ s big brouhaha over this currently.
Isemone:
Oh, I say, well done!
Here’s one for you, our JP courts where most midemeanors are tried aren’t even courts of record! So it has to be de novo because you can’t appeal on error. There’ s big brouhaha over this currently.
Isemone:
Oh, I say, well done!
Here’s one for you, our JP courts where most midemeanors are tried aren’t even courts of record! So it has to be de novo because you can’t appeal on error. There’ s big brouhaha over this currently.
Im going with the verdict which is based on all the facts.
What’s that Britney Spears line Moore uses in F9/11, something about just trusting people and supporting them no matter what…
It’s not even a verdict, it’s a judgment. Juries do verdicts.
“What’s that Britney Spears line Moore uses in F9/11, something about just trusting people and supporting them no matter what…”
The no matter what is the important part of this quote and as I indicated above several times, its not no matter what, its in absence of all the facts of the case. The judge heard all the facts, you didnt. The judge made a “judgement” happy zuzu, based on *all* the facts. Maybe he’s evil, crazy or both, I don’t know, and neither do any of you no matter how big and fancy your tin foil hats are.