Because a man didn’t varrify his facts, a court
is letting him off
because he didn’t know the age of consent had changed.
CALGARY – A misunderstanding of the age of consent will keep a Calgary man out of prison, court ruled.
The Alberta Court of Appeal, in a ruling released Tuesday, rejected a Crown appeal to increase the man’s 17-month jail sentence.
The high court judges agreed there were substantial mitigating circumstances which justified a punishment below the three to four years sought by the prosecution.
Among those were the offender’s misunderstanding of the age of consent, despite researching it before succumbing to a 14-year-old girl’s persistent sexual advances.
The man, then 25, had initially told the girl, a neighbour, she was too young for him to have sex with, despite her “begging” him to.
In April, 2008, he went to a library and learned the age of consent at the time was 14, and they began having sex on June 19, 2008.
However, in May, 2008, Parliament amended the Criminal Code to raise the age of consent to 16, making the contact unlawful.
“He was operating under a mistake of law, which does not provide a defence but may mitigate the sentence,” wrote Justice Peter Martin, in handing down the appeal court’s unanimous ruling.
Martin also noted the offender, who told police after his arrest he plans to marry the girl when she is 18, didn’t prey on his young victim.
“The sexual relationship was the complainant’s idea – she begged him several times and the respondent (to the appeal) had said no many times before relenting,” he said.
“The respondent was never manipulative, predatory, or abusive, nor had he ‘groomed’ the complainant,” Martin said.
“Also, the sexual relationship was never aggravated by use of alcohol or drugs.”
Court of Queen’s Bench Justice Peter McIntyre handed the man the 17-month term last November, after concluding his blameworthiness was on the low end of the scale.
in my opinion, you didn’t varrify your facts, so you should pay for breaking the law.
No matter if the girl was pushing, it’s your responsibility to know and abide by the law, simple as that.
This is a tough one…As a father, I agree with you. Someone tries to have sex with Lex when she’s that age, whether she initiates or not, I’ll likely kill the motherfucker.
On the other hand, if the change in law wasn’t publicized, I don’t know about you…But I sure as hell don’t have time to check the laws daily to make sure they haven’t changed…If it was 14 when they started…He was reasonable to assume it was still lawful a couple months later.
But the real issue here is, what the hell does ANY 25-year-old see in a 14-year-old? Forget legalities and all that…Other than sex, what do these two POSSIBLY have in common?
All changes to laws are publicized.
That’s not an excuse. she keeps pushing, you want to give in, it still should be your responsibility to make sure the law you read about last month is still valid.
And as for what the hell a 25 year old saw in a 14 year old?
I have no clue.
He aughta be locked in a padded room.
For the sake of stirring the pot over here, I probably aughta point out there’s no real, practical difference–okay, laws aside–between a 25 year old dating and/or having sex with a 14 year old and a 40 year old dating and/or having sex with a 29 year old, which happens a lot more often–mostly, I’d imagine, because that one’s not illegal. Hell, I’ve met some 14 year olds more capable of making that kind of decision than some 29 year olds, honestly. I don’t really agree with either one, for reasons like what Wes just mentioned re: what the hell would they have in common besides sex, but there’s people out there, both 14 and 29, who do. Yeah, okay, that doesn’t make it right, or proper, or whatever–by our standards. But then, all 3 of us have girlfriends we met online–and, as far as I know (feel free to correct me), one of us hasn’t met ours in person yet. And there’s people out there who find that nearly as wrong as having sex with someone 11 years younger than you–again, legally or otherwise notwithstanding. If you could have only heard some of the questions I got asked when Jess and I started dating. No, seriously. And she’s only 6 and a half years older than me–and both of us are legal in either country.
@Shane: In the guy’s defense, and this goes with any law or other political decision that eventually ends up trickling down from down town, that one didn’t exactly get a whole lot of publicity when it was changed. Yeah, okay, I saw half a dozen articles about it when it happened–but then, I’m a little obsessive when it comes to Canadian law and/or politics. US, too, to an extent. Joe Shmuck’s not going to have half a dozen Government of Canada RSS feeds or related websites bookmarked for reference. Especially considering he’d *just* done what he thought was adequate research when the topic first came up. And the research he’d done said this was the law at the time. Unless, again, you’re obssessive about any and all things legal/political, you’re not going to know that even then the guys on the hill were bouncing the idea back and forth about changing the law–I’ve got $5 says CPAC isn’t as high on his list of regularly watched channels as it is on, say, mine. Just something to consider. No, that doesn’t make what he did right–or, if you want to be a prick about it, legal–but, really, that’s like the FDA deciding to change its mind and pull some previously approved drug from the market. Okay, so the law was enacted this morning. Wonderful. Grand. Have a freakin’ cookie. Guarantee a week from now, some local pharmacy’s still selling it. Illegal? Sure. But you wouldn’t shut down the store because they hadn’t boxed up every last bottle of whatever within the first 10 minutes of it’s having been yanked.
Replying to my own comment. Go me. Something else to consider, as well. Let’s assume, just for shits and giggles, they’d started having sex in April–after he’d done his research and found out the law was 14 rather than–I don’t even know what the hell it is right now, that’s how obscure the law is. Great. So they do the do, all’s well and good. They still get dirty looks because, well, yeah, she’s 11 years younger than he is and presumedly incapable of making a decision like that (that’s assuming he’s capable, but well, the law already does that, so why not). Fine. Then, they decide to keep it up–it’s an actual, legal relationship at this point. Wrong, but legal. At least until May, when the law changes. Day after the law changes, they decide to go have a little fun at his place. Boom. Somebody with your or my level of obsession with legal/political stuff catches wind of it, goes and rats to her parents. Poof, instant sexual offender. Nevermind that 1: she instigated (if she’d been at the age of consent that would kill any rape charges right there, regardless who pushed them), and 2: 2 days ago, they were completely within the boundaries of the law. Her parents might break the flip-a-shit-ometer, but that’s about all they’d be able to do. At least until the day after the change. If as far as you knew what you were doing was completely legal, and you’d done the cover your ass routine, would you still expect to get slapped in jail for it? Probably not. What reasonably inteligent person would? At least he did the research. Most people don’t even bother doing that–and some of those do more damage on purpose than this guy.