The Appeals Court of Massachusetts ruled in Commonwealth v. Christie, 2016 WL 3581839, 2016 Mass. App. LEXIS 79 (July 6, 2016), that the conviction of a man on charges of statutory rape, indecent assault and battery on a boy had to be reversed because of improper evidence based on the defendant’s possession of videos depicting “generic same-sex sex” involving adults. At the same time, the court affirmed the defendant’s conviction on a charge of … <Read More>
statutory rape
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Divided Over Strict Liability in Statutory Rape Cases
In Fleming v. State of Texas, 2014 Tex. Crim. App. LEXIS 879 (June 18, 2014), nine members of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals fractured over whether the defendant in a statutory rape case could argue in defense that he believed in good faith that his sexual partner was not underage. In common with most states, Texas has traditionally treated statutory rape as a strict liability offense: the prosecutor need only prove that the victim … <Read More>