We Can't Consent to This: all the "sex game gone wrong" defences

[WomanDaresTo]

Hello - doing this under my semi-public NC.

On FWR we've been grimly collating the stories of women killed by men who claim they've died in a "sex game gone wrong". Given Natalie Connolly's killer's sentence has received rightful outrage, and given even the excellent Harriet Harman thinks this is an unusual defence, I thought it time to pull them together in one place:

www.wecantconsenttothis.uk

It's not a fun read, of course. I know it's not also complete - will keep updating but do of course let me know of other cases, and mistakes.

But perhaps we can help get to a place where women are not deemed to have consented to bodily harm, or to death.

and unmumsnetty Christmassy hugs to the families and friends of these women.

if anyone wants me I'll be having a humungous

[vicviking]

Thanks for this OP. I am at a loss over this. These men are getting away with murder and the criminal justice system doesn't seem to care. There needs to be some sort of judicial review.

[IfyouseeRitaMoreno]

Fucking hell.

[SonicVersusGynaephobia]

Thank you for doing this OP.

This verdict has been one of those moments that made me want to give up. Everyone I've spoken to thinks it was a terrible decision, but very few seem to really grasp what it means, that murdering a woman is not murder if you do it, or say you've done it, as part of a "sex game".

[Anlaf]

I think I feel less disheartened the more sunlight this gets.

The Mandy McDonald case in 2000 was the first time I'd heard this - in reality she was incredibly seriously assaulted by her husband. The defence QC's comments in court will make your BLOOD BOIL.

This will get better.

[RJnomore1]

That's a chilling read.

So many in the last couple of years and so many of those by men they had just met.

[OrchidInTheSun]

Wow. What a horrifying read. I think it would be worth sending it to Ms Harman. When she was interviewed on Woman's Hour, she said she thought that Natalie Connolly was the first case where this had been used as a defence. I know it isn't but I hadn't realised the scale of the problem and I think she should know.

Thank you for doing this. It can't have been easy

[NineNine]

What freaks me out about these cases is the possibility that men will learn that if they beat and abuse a woman, they are better off raping and killing her than if they left her alive and able to press charges.

Though I suppose that assumes that the living beaten woman would be given any more voice than the dead one...

[IamThereforeIdontIdentify]

Thanks for doing this.

[HamiltonCork]

Very powerful

[Mariotta]

Thank you so much for doing this.

[Ereshkigal]

That is brilliant OP. But awful reading. Thank you for doing it and I will share widely

[GCSocScientist]

Thanks OP. You’ve done some fantastic work there. It’s so powerful having them all listed in the one place. We can’t and won’t let the courts fake our consent any longer.

[Iused2BanOptimist]

This is so important OP.
I was struck, listening to Harriet Harman on woman's hour, that she said this was the first time she had heard of this defence.
She obviously doesn't come on Mumsnet or even spend much time on twitter. But whilst I had read of one or two cases, the headlines are usually so horrid I raise my eyebrows and move on without reading so perhaps that is what Harriet was doing.
You NEED to see the numbers to recognise the pattern and appreciate the full horror.

[WomanDaresTo]

Thanks all.

And yes do please share widely. I think I've sorted all the spelling fuck ups now. Depressingly there are at least 5 more women to add.

Special Christmassy to the family of Katie Locke, who was a 23 year old history and politics teacher and who died on Christmas Eve 2015.

[WomanDaresTo]

Though I suppose that assumes that the living beaten woman would be given any more voice than the dead one...

This will have to wait til after xmas but suprisingly many men use this defence when the woman survives:
www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-42182525

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3417716/Property-developer-convicted-battering-woman-head-champagne-bottle-refused-sex-avoids-jail.html

www.scotsman.com/news/woman-strangled-raped-by-man-in-nun-costume-1-3459528

[RubyViolet]

Thanks so much for doing this.

[IHATEPeppaPig]

Good Lord, that was a chilling read.

Two things stuck out for me:

1. How many of the recent murders are young women. Violent porn has a lot to answer for in today's society as well as 50 shades of Grey that glorifies DV and violent sex.

1. I can't help feeling that men feel entitled to do this to women as punishment for sexual liberation - you wanted sexual freedom well

Here it is.

Vile vile vile. I worry for my children, we are going backwards!!!

[Gileswithachainsaw]

Thank you for this.

It's awful to read but somehow I almost think we owe it to them to read it and put faces to the names that float around news reports and Twitter.

I hope that people involved in the legal system see all these women together like this and that something clicks with how rough sex is a get out clause for far too many cases.

to all the friends and family of these poor poor victims. I'm so sorry for your losses. And I'm even more sorry for what are jokes of sentences and verdicts with some of these cases.

[sackrifice]

Thank you - it is chilling and heartbreaking.

[BoreOfWhabylon]

This has been going on for far too long

VIVIENNE SCOTT, 19
1979, South Shields
Vivienne is strangled by John Dudgeon (aka John Taylor) "when he was a 21-year old DJ in his home town, he suffocated 19-year old Vivienne Scott, who had refused him sex. Taylor dumped her body near his home and later claimed her death was the result of a prank which had gone wrong during a sex game. The judge said Vivienne died after "horseplay". Taylor choked Vivienne so violently that he broke her back www.shieldsgazette.com/news/psycho-in-bid-for-freedom-1-1256846
After release, he went on to rape and attempt to murder a woman in her home, and then later to murder two women in the Sheffield snooker Hall murders.

Manslaughter, 4 years

Thank you for doing this. I will be sharing widely.

Could you post on Chat or AIBU?

@MNHQ could you consider a Mumsnet campaign on this?

[WomanDaresTo]

Could you post on Chat or AIBU

DONE: www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3459382-Women-cant-consent-to-death-Natalie-Connolly-is-not-alone?watched=1

[dotdotdot3]

Thanks for doing this - a campaign is long overdue.

I was involved as a witness in one of these types of cases, having heard the violence and found the body of my neighbour. The defence was 'sex game gone wrong' and the guy was found not guilty as - unbelievably - he claimed he'd been asleep.

My experience led me to think there are huge problems in bringing these cases to trial satisfactorily for a number of reasons:

1, The CPS in 'my' case would not accept the case as a straightforward violent assault and murder, and knocked back the police several times before allowing the case to go through as a 'sex game gone wrong'/manslaughter thing, even though no one involved - witnesses, the accused etc - described it as such, making a nonsense of the case.

1. I was told the CPS are reluctant to prosecute these cases because they are notoriously difficult to win. This is due to lack of jury understanding/sympathy, and - crucially - the difficulty of getting evidence other than hearsay etc. The only real witness is dead, of course.

The victim in my case had over 30 injuries and had been hanged by two ropes. There were so many inconsistencies and problems with the case it was unreal. I don't want to say too much as the defendant was found not guilty and I'm unsure about what can be said.

Another thing to note is that information about this case is slowly disappearing from the web (local paper reports have gone), so I guess any case where the verdict is 'not guilty' will be increasingly hard to find and thus collate as a statistic.

Here's one of the few remaining reports: jezebel.com/man-accused-of-killing-cousin-during-sex-game-gone-wron-1600982758

[BoreOfWhabylon]

That is truly shocking dotdot. What a dreadful experience for you.

[TheCountessofFitzdotterel]

This is just horrendous.
If all these women really had died in sex games gone wrong, then at the most we should be making strangulation during sex illegal in itself and at the very least there should be a public information campaign about it, because clearly it is terribly, terribly difficult not to just kill someone accidentally while you're doing it.
Wonder how that would go down...