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Old Laws: Rape And Civil Rights

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Rape has been defined as a nonconsensual sexual acts of violence, and for many centuries, it was a widely known phenomenon in the private life and women had to face the repercussions of the violent act without receiving justice and prosecuting her perpetrator. Many years has since passed and in the year 2016, there are Federal Laws such as the 14th and 19th amendment, along with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that ensure the perpetrators are punished and that women are protected however, there are many obstacles in the way of achieving rape law reform like old laws based on misogynistic theories, laws differentiating state by state, unfair treatment by the government and law enforcement that prevent women from fully being protected. Women have …show more content…

Code § 920 - Art. 120. titled “Rape and sexual assault generally”. It correctly defines rape and sexual assaults as “administering to that other person by force or threat of force, or without the knowledge or consent of that person, a drug, intoxicant, or other similar substance and thereby substantially impairing the ability of that other person to appraise or control conduct” (Legal Information Institute) however, the punishment for the perpetrator is, they are “guilty of rape and shall be punished as a court-martial may direct” (Legal Information Institute) and although they would be considered guilty by court order, it is up to the judge or jury to decide the fate of the perpetrator. This allows the perpetrator to go scot free if the judge or jury feels he is being punished unjustly, thus leaving no justice for the victim. Another downside is the rape law varying state by state. An example, in the state of Idaho, “Rape of a female under the age of 18” the punishment may be “One year to life in prison” yet no recognition of rape of a male or female over the age of 18. In the state of New Jersey, “Aggravated sexual assault is sexual penetration with a victim under age 13” gives the perpetrator “10 to 20 years in prison” whereas “sexual assault is sexual penetration with a victim between age 13 and 16 when the actor is at least four years older” and their punishment is “Five to 10 years in prison” (Sandra Norman-Eady). Unlike the state of Idaho, there is no gender assigned to the law yet victims over the age of 17 nor punishment for those perpetrators are not acknowledged in New Jersey’s state law. Having the federal law put the punishment of the perpetrator in the hands of the court opens the door unfair punishment or a lack thereof and the difference of state laws complicate rape law reform and deny women their right to be protected by the Government and receive a fair

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Court’s Opinion: The crime of rape is defined as follows: § 3121. Rape A person commits a felony of the first degree when he engages in sexual intercourse with another person not one’s spouse: (1) by forcible compulsion; (2) by threat of forcible compulsion that would prevent resistance by a person of reasonable resolution; (3) who is unconscious; or (4) who is so mentally deranged or deficient that such person is incapable of consent. The victim of a rape need not resist.

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In Warriors Don’t Cry, Melba Pattillo Beals describes her arduous battle for racial equality in the brutal town of Little Rock, Arkansas in the late 1950s. When she was only twelve years old, Melba survived attempted rape by a white man. Scared and confused, Melba went home and told her family. However, they instructed her to keep quiet about the abuse because they believed getting the police involved would only make things worse. Unfortunately, thousands of sexual assaults still go unreported for a myriad of reasons, including distrust in law enforcement and the criminal justice system, the possibility that the abuser will not be punished, and victim blaming, a common occurrence in our society.

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[7] In his book, “Missoula,” John Krakauer analyses the issue of rape in the college town of Missoula. Krakauer begins his work by quoting the article False Allegations of Sexual Assault: Rape is unique. No other violent crime is so fraught with controversy, so enmeshed in dispute and in the politics of gender and sexuality… And within the domain of rape, the most highly charged area of debate concerns the issue of false allegations. For centuries, it has been asserted and assumed that women “cry rape,” that a large proportion of rape allegations are maliciously concocted for purposes of revenge or other motives.

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The Court also noted that most states declined to impose as harsh a penalty as death. Georgia was the only state that authorized the death penalty for rape of an adult woman. Rape does not involve taking another human life therefore, the Court found the death penalty was excessive in severity and revocability (Oyez, n.d.). The Court also stated that in Georgia since 1973, for most of rape convictions, the juries have not imposed the death. That Georgia was one of only two states that allowed the death penalty when the victim was a child (Oyez,

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The rape would be a class B felony which results in a maximum sentence

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Do you view the young woman as a victim of rape, even though she was under the influence and the defendant never penetrated her with his penis? - Yes, I see the young woman as a victim of rape because whether or not he penetrated her with his penis, he had the intent to because her underwear was off, her legs were spread open, he was erect, and he was on top of her as if he was having sex with her. Also, the young woman was unconscious at the time and had no idea this was even taking place. Brock Turner clearly had gone after someone he knew he could get something out of because at the time the victim could not verbally consent to him.

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Supreme Court heard and ruled 7 to 2 decision it was unconstitutional to impose a death punishment on someone for rape. The court reasoned that punishments violate the Eighth Amendment of the are “excessive in relation to the crime committed”, that determination about excessiveness are properly informed by the “country’s present Judgement” and that the Georgia law could not survive this type of inquiry because no other state subjected persons convicted of the rape of an adult woman to execution. Moreover the Court explained the Eighth Amendment bars not only those punishments that are “barbaric” but also those that are “excessive” and unconstitutional if it makes no measurable contribution to acceptable goals of punishment and hence is nothing more than the purposeless and needless imposition of pain and suffering, or is grossly out of proportion to the severity of the crime (pp. 433 U.S. 591-592). ‘The death is disproportionate penalty for rape is strongly indicated by the objective evidence of present public judgement, as represented by the attitude of state legislatures and sentencing juries, concerning the acceptability of such a penalty, it only State authorizing the death sentence, it appearing that Georgia is currently the only state authorizing the death sentence for rape of an adult woman, that it is authorized for rape in only two other states, but only when the victim is a child, and that in vast majority of rape convictions in Georgia

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In the book, Missoula: Rape and the Justice System in College Town, by Jon Krakauer, the reader delves into how rape and sexual assault are treated in the town of Missoula, and the University of Montana. As the reader, we are informed on how the university, the police department, the district attorney’s office, and the community reacted to these rape and sexual assault allegations. We see how the criminal justice system has failed the victims, and are forced to live with what happened to them, while their assailants are free of any burden. The law is set in place to protect people from victimization, but when the men, in this book, are not legally held accountable, then any woman, or man, is more susceptible to victimization. It is interesting

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Rape is something that many warn us about and tell us to be careful about. What many do not realize is that it can happen in a matter of seconds and there is nothing that can be done to stop it. Often it happens, but people find it difficult to report it because of the person who committed the crime, this was the case in the book Missoula by Jon Krakauer. The book begins with a woman, Allison Huguet, who was raped by a member of the football team in the University of Montana, Beau Donaldson. This case was not the first incident to happen in this city and the author does a great job in letting his readers be aware and know it has happened before.

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“Although concerning sexual practices between adults and children have existed throughout history and across cultures, whether such behavior was conceived of and defined as ‘abuse’ has been dependent on the societal values of the particular period” (Denov, 2004). In today’s society, sex offending has become an increasingly, concerning phenomenon that individuals must become more aware of. Although generally regarded as a male phenomenon, over time, female perpetrators have become equally important as male perpetrators. Due to the lack of public awareness, female sexual predators go unreported. As a result, society must become more aware of female sexual perpetrators, as many incidents of females assaulting both young men and women have gone unreported for some time.

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