Personally, I find this law to be absolutely abhorrent, and I hope it is repealed.
Court hears 'Romeo and Juliet' laws appea
THE Supreme Court has been urged to overturn as unconstitutional the so-called "Romeo and Juliet" laws which allow the prosecution of teenage boys for having sex with teenage girls but prevent prosecution of the girls.
The court is hearing an appeal arising from a 15-year-old boy being charged under the Criminal Law (Sexual Offences) Act 2006 with having sex with a 14-year-old girl in the Donegal Gaeltacht.
The boy is also charged with buggery and his trial is on hold pending the outcome of the appeal, which opened yesterday and will resume on a future date.
Section 3 of the 2006 act created an offence of defilement of a child under 17 and provided for a sentence of up to five years' imprisonment. Section 5 of the act stated a girl under 17 cannot be guilty of such an offence.
In the High Court in March 2010, Ms Justice Elizabeth Dunne ruled, while the law did amount to gender discrimination, that discrimination was not invidious, capricious or disproportionate.
As the risk of pregnancy as a result of underage sex was borne by girls only, not boys, society was entitled to deter such activity and to place the burden of criminal sanction on those "who bear the least adverse consequences" of it, she said.
Outlining the boy's appeal against that decision, John O'Kelly SC said the kernel of the appeal was that both parties involved in this sexual act were children in law aged under 17, with only about a year between the two of them.
The boy's case was they engaged consensually in an act of sexual intercourse but under the act, one of them was liable to be convicted and possibly jailed for up to five years while the other was guilty of no criminal offence at all.
Mr Justice Nial Fennelly noted the 2006 act is neutral as to whether the act of sexual intercourse is consensual or not and the court was not getting involved in that issue in the appeal.
John Finlay SC, for the state, opposed the appeal and argued the High Court decision should stand. The disputed provision was a proportionate measure on grounds of pregnancy, he submitted.