to think "being drunk" is no defence for raping someone

[SmashingNarcissistsMirrors]

i'm absolutely shocked by this case where a man has been acquited of raping a woman because he was so drunk he thought she was his girlfriend and didn't realise he was in the wrong bedroom.

this is so so wrong. how many men will now use "being drunk" as a defence?

not only this but according to the article the girlfriend had earlier said she was too ill for sex. plus the victims phone was found dismantled in the mans sock when he was arrested.

how can this happen?

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1363964/Haydor-Khan-cleared-rape-said-thought-I-BRUNETTE-girlfriend.html

I would like to ask Kungfu again whether most of her work in these cases has been for the defence or the prosecution.

or has she already said? does anyone else know?

xposts, thank you.

How has it suddenly become "a very large proportion of women are lying"?

Again, do me the courtesy of reading my posts. Evasive? Really? I am answering every point you raise in detail and I am being entirely open about my views on this subject. I am not quite sure what else you want, other than for me to roll over and agree with you.

The thing is, kungfupanda, the fact that there exists fabricated allegations of rape, like every violent crime, is talked about constantly, everywhere. It is not bringing balance to a discussion to bring it up yet again, it is ensuring that no discussion can be had about rape ever without that being brought up.

Not one of us denies that there are false allegations extant in violent crime statistics. We never have, we never do. We are simply trying to discuss the rest. In order to bring balance to the overall, wider discussion about rape. Which tends to be about lying women.

But how do you leave it out and maintain a balanced view? If someone is not guilty then it is because the allegation wasn't true. I am not saying that every time someone is FOUND not guilty it is because the allegation was a lie as some guilty men are obviously found not guilty.

If there is an assumption that every not guilty verdict reported in the papers is a miscarriage of justice, surely that is just as harmful to the possibility of juries reaching fair and unbiased decisions, than the suggestion that the vast majority of rape victims are lying.

Kungfu, but are you surprised to find the views expressed here ?

They can't both be right and agree with your views ?

I think one of the biggest problems is that people really simply do just believe what they read in papers.
As being the territory, and not just a rather blurry map.

If you reckon that at least 14% of women are lying in cases that make it all the way to court, then that indicates many more in the cases that don't - given that logically many of the cases where women are lying must be weeded out during the course of the police investigations.

There was a case recently where a man was sent to prison for murder (not even manslaughter) for accidentally killing someone (he threw a glass in a pub after an argument - not at anyone but at the floor - a shard hit a woman in the neck and she died). People are also prosecuted for killing people when they are driving their cars if they have not been paying due care and attention (which it might be argued that the man in this case was not doing).

Now sentencing is a whole different minefield. 2 years for a rape, no matter what the harm caused, is clearly ridiculous.

It is pretty hard to shift a judge, to be honest. There are professional standards but the first thing that is likely to happen is that a judge will be sent for re-training if they are consistently making poor sentencing decisions. It is unusual to have them removed, but it does happen.

To be honest, it is more common for a judge to be removed because of some non-legal matter, for example a big embarrassment in their personl lives. One judge was removed a few years ago because he was caught engaging in legal, but throoughly unsavoury, conduct.

People do go to jail for killing others accidentally, in car accidents for example

I don't think they do.
Could you give an example.

kungfu in this case the man did rape the woman. He didn't deny it. What he said was that he got the wrong woman.

So someone has been raped and no-one is punished.

That is hardly justification for saying that people on here think that "there is an assumption that every not guilty verdict reported in the papers is a miscarriage of justice". Is it.

Cumfy - I don't expect people to just change their minds and agree with me. I am just trying to shed a bit of light on some of the facts behind the vague ideas given by the papers. What people do with that information is a matter for them.

What I do expect, or certainly hope for, is the courtesy of a reasoned discussion and disagreement that comes from thoughtful argument rather than twisting of my words and suggestions of some weird agenda.

this one?

this one?

This one is quite famous, I'm surprised if people haven't heard of it.

Back to the issue of intent - the jury might have believed that the woman was raped, but if they did not believe that the man had intent to rape they will acquit.

Yes, I think there is justification for saying that many people seek to go behind every reported story and make assumptions about our terrible, weak legal system. It comes up time and time again, based on nothing more than what is read in the papers.

There's a few things there, kungfu, but the one I'll respond to in this post (only because of wanting to divide up my thoughts) is the idea that if someone is genuinely not guilty than the allegation is not true, which you seem to be conflating with 'the accuser is lying'.

With rape, as far as I understand it, a valid legal defense is that the accused thought that the accuser was consenting. It is entirely possible that the accuser did not consent but the accused mistakenly believed that ze did. In that case, legally, no rape, but the accuser isn't lying either.

What I am saying about balance is that the national 'conversation' is hideously skewed against rape victims. Many of the individual conversations that make that up are hideously skewed. There was a gang rape in the US this week, eighteen men and an eleven year old girl, and there are victim-blaming comments all over the news. Eleven years old! So I genuinely want to know this: do you go into those comment threads and try and bring balance by reminding people that most victims are genuine and ill-served by the system? Or is it only where women are talking in support of rape victims that you feel that balance is required?

There was one near me where someone mowed someone down on a pedestrian crossing, when the green man was showing, he had the wrong glasses on. He got a £50 fine.

Personally I feel it is correct that cases like these are prosecuted, and I feel a £50 fine for killing someone is ludicrously lenient.

However our laws seem to be set up to give drivers the benefit of the doubt and regularly they get away with quite outrageous things.

Similar to rape really.

but those aren't pure accidents where the person didn't have the required mens rea but was jailed anyway. Those are cases of basic intent where the person was reckless.

"
There was a case recently where a man was sent to prison for murder (not even manslaughter) for accidentally killing someone (he threw a glass in a pub after an argument - not at anyone but at the floor - a shard hit a woman in the neck and she died)."

do you have a link to this? not saying it's untrue but I really find that very hard to believe.

Leningrad. Please read the post again!

If someone is not guilty then the allegation was untrue - fact. If someone is FOUND not guilty then that may be because of reasonable doubt etc etc.

I said that quite clearly in my post. I am pretty careful to type exactly what I mean. It is really frustrating when people jump on something completely wrongly.

"Yes, I think there is justification for saying that many people seek to go behind every reported story and make assumptions about our terrible, weak legal system. It comes up time and time again, based on nothing more than what is read in the papers."

Or just possibly, people look at things like the official statistics and the Stern Report and come to their own conclusions.

Sardine
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1168214/Teenager-bottle-thrower-jailed-killing-mother-years.html

He threw the bottle diectly at a bouncer who ducked.

Manslaughter.

You really think this was an accident ?