Government must better protect rape case teenagers in light of poll

Many people attach blame to young women who are raped, but these girls don’t have the sexual maturity to negotiate such prejudices, writes Conor Ryan.

‘Without strict liability teenage girls are having to go into the witness box and have their own behaviour scrutinised as if they were adults’

VICTIMS’ groups have called on the Government to better protect teenagers in rape cases after this week’s opinion poll exposed how society can absolve sexual predators of blame.

Rape Crisis Network Ireland (RCNI) said teenagers are particularly vulnerable since the collapse of 71-year-old statutory rape legislation in 2006.

On Wednesday, the Irish Examiner/Red C poll revealed how at least 25% of people will attach some blame to women who are raped based on what they wear, where they walk or what they have to drink.

The RCNI’s policy and communications’ co-ordinator Cliona Saidlear said pre-2006 teenagers were buffered from these attitudes by the laws on strict liability for adults who have sex with minors. She said teenagers do not have the maturity to negotiate the prejudices the Red C survey revealed.

“You cannot expect a teenager to be responsible in these situations or be able to make the same decisions as a sexually mature adult,” said Ms Saidlear.

“But without strict liability in terms of underage consent teenage girls are having to go into the witness box and have their own behaviour scrutinised as if they were adults,” she said.

In response to calls for reform, the government has set up the Joint Oireachtas Committee on the Children’s Referendum to decide the most appropriate way of dealing with the situation.

However, so far it has failed to clearly state when it will hold this referendum or if it will split the issues. This would mean dealing with the statutory rape and age of consent dilemma with independent legislation from new a constitutional protection for the universal rights of the child.

Within the findings of the Irish Examiner/Red C survey, 46% of people thought a man who had sex with a 16-year-old but claimed he did not know her age should not be considered a rapist.

In contrast, two fifths of people agreed men in this situation should treated as sexual offenders.

Ms Saidlear said whatever the solution adults must be held accountable for their actions not children, as fresh cases in this category continue to emerge.

There has been a steady flow of teenagers giving evidence to the Central Criminal Court about whether or not they consented to sex since the statutory rape legislation fell.

It has put into sharp focus the need to amend emergency legislation enacted in the wake of the crisis. There is now also the question whether defendants can exploit the ability to argue they made an honest mistake about a girl’s age.

This debate was central to the trial of a 26-year-old man which end on March 4. He admitted having sex with a 14-year-old girl but said he thought she was older.

He said it all happened in his Ford Mondeo near her parents’ home for 40 minutes and afterwards he fell asleep. After the incident took place the schoolgirl went for an examination to Dr Eliza Joseph who remembered the schoolgirl was “crying and shaking”.

But the fact they had sex is no longer enough. Juries now have to decide if it was a genuine mistake. Was it possible this young girl agreed to intercourse. If so, no rape took place in the eyes of the law.

This was not an isolated case. Last year, a 13-year-old Donegal girl claimed she was the victim of a sex ring operated by older boys.

During the case, she had her sexual history dissected as the defence team presented the argument she had consented.

Mayo Rape Crisis Centre (MRCC) has released its own figures which place an ever darker cloud over the protection afforded to teenagers under the 2006 emergency criminal justice legislation.

Of all MRCC’s clients during a three-year period 50% were between the ages of 15-18.

“Young women under 18 specifically are extremely vulnerable to rape and sexual assault and indeed we believe are targeted.

“None of these young women were in any doubt as to the severity of the assault on them. There was in their view no doubt about their not consenting.

“In all cases they made it clear they did not want to have sex with the perpetrator,” a recent MRCC paper said.

It went on to say the natural turbulence in the emotions and sexual growth of children going through puberty could now be exploited by predators who know how to manipulate the law.

“Teenagers experiment, it is a fact of life. It should be as safe as possible for them to experiment with their identities, their boundaries, how to manage peer pressure, how to manage drink and drugs and how to manage their sexuality, etc.

“They are very vulnerable in this regard and the onus and responsibility must be on any adult engaging with them to take responsibility with regard the age and consent,” it said.

The debate on the need to draft new statutory rape legislation and if it should have to wait to be included in an overall children’s rights’ referendum is not in itself new.

Although the judges who quashed the conviction of a child rapist on the grounds he could not avail of the defence of an honest mistake said it was necessary the committee which guided the 1935 law specifically considered and ruled out any the need such a clause.

The Carrigan Report of 1930, which laid the groundwork for Ireland’s modern laws on sexual offences, said such a defence protects an adult’s right to be reckless ahead of their responsibility to teenagers.

“We consider that a girl of 16 is often mentally and emotionally unstable; she has not finished growing and developing and though she may be excited and her passions awakened yet she cannot really appreciate the nature and result of the act to which she consents.

“If we visualise young girls of 16 in all walks of life, as they appear when congregated in school, at play or in factories we cannot fail to realise that they are growing girls and but little more than children, who require the protection of the law,” it recommended.

During the production of the report the garda commissioner Eoin O’Duffy compiled a data-base of all sex crimes and even then said there was widespread under-reporting.

He said the trial process was treating the victims of sex crime as if they were accomplices to the assault.