Quote:
Originally Posted by afc wimbledon
While I agree there is a burdon of proof up until now it has been met by testimony of witnesses (barmen friends etc) as to how much a person drank, their behaviour etc. Thus far the courts havn't required blood tests as proof, they have been clear for years that rape victims are not always able to come foward immediatly and make unclear witnesses etc and have, fairly or not, bent over backwards to help get them into court.
in this case she is also a minor, and whilst at 16 able to give consent, still not considered responsible, I would not like to defend the adults that are charged if the defense rests on her 'consent'. I have no doubt the judge will shoot that down from the begining.
|
Her being a minor has nothing to do with her ability to consent in this context, this isn't a contract case where being under 18 makes any consent invalid. I don't see any reason the judge would even consider shooting that argument down, I actually don't see how he could do so unless it's a bench trial.
The issue with meeting the burden on the whole intoxication thing is that a party like this is lacking for credible witnesses who can testify as to the condition of the aprties involved. There will probably be people that claim she was absolutely smashed, but of course so were they. There will probably be people who say she was fully aware and lucid, even if that isn't true. It gets into pretty muddy waters when you have a bunch of drunk people serving as witnesses, meeting a burden in that situation is tough. Hopefully there was someone who was sober and witnessed what happened.
This is somewhat unrelated, but incidents like this always make me shake my head at the 21 drinking age in the US. Of course parties will always happen, and bars aren't always safer, but forcing young people to drink in secret just opens the door to situations like this due to the lack of any type of authority/control. I don't want to derail the thread, this just reminds me of some of the dangers I saw at parties in US college towns.