Nineteen- year-old rapist sues 15-year-old rape victim for child support. And wins.

The teenage woman is not a rapist, she had intercourse with a minor who was 15 years old at the time, and she was 19 years old.

The 19 year old teenager became pregnant and carried the baby to terms and
is asking for child support.

The word 'rape' appearing in the term 'statutory rape' is an artefact of US legal terminology.

From http://www.sexlaws.org/what_is_statutory_rape via wikipedia:
Statutory Rape Is Illegal Sexual Activity Between Two People When It Would Otherwise Be Legal If Not For Their Age: In accordance with the FBI definition, statutory rape is characterized as non-forcible sexual intercourse with a person who is younger than the statutory age of consent.

Child support payments are for the benefit of the child, not the parent. If the mother received custody of the child, and the father is capable of providing support, then the father should pay support. One may question why the mother, currently under indictment for a sex offense, received custody of the child, or why a judge determined that a now 17-year old father has the financial means to pay child support (is his paper route doing that well?), but those aren't the questions that you asked.

The fact remains that custody and child support determinations are separate from the criminal case. Also, the mother isn't a criminal -- she's an accused criminal. Remember that whole "innocent until proven guilty" business?

it would be highly helpful if we had a new term for what we know call stat rape. I don't think that 19-15 year old sex should be criminal, but the fact is if it was the male who was 19 and the girl was 15 it might very well land the male in a jack-pot. Also, the hypothetical 19 year old male would never be given a chance to use the courts to gain custody rights. There is a huge current of sexual bias in our rape laws, as I have pointed out before.

I must dissent from your premise
that the boy was a victim.
He got lucky; he had a good time.
He shoud have been more careful.
Presumably, he knew the consequences.

If I had been the judge,
I 'd have ruled the same way.

If a legislature enacts a bill that it is bright out at nite,
or hot in the winter,
it is still as cold n dark as ever; ( a rose by any other name ).

I cling to the concept that rape can apply only to females.

A legislature can only FAKE that it is otherwise
and have the justice system conspire in the deception.


I think we know better.

As to custody,
it seems to me, that women are NATURALLY better suited
to take care of their own children, tho this is not always the case.

By co-incidence, during the last 2 weeks, I 've had 2 guys and one woman
tell me of very severe abuse from their mothers; one called it torture.
These r exceptions.

I believe that a mother shoud raise her child,
in the absence of bad indications to the contrary
( e.g., complaints from the juvenile victim, if such there be ).

I am with Mysteryman here... the law is clear and asking the victim of a crime to pay the perpetrator is ridiculous.

This is another example of sexism toward men prevalent in our society. As was pointed out... people tend to take 19 year old men having sex with 15 year old girls very seriously.

But OmSigDavid makes this point better than I.

care to explain how a 15 year old who is deemed legally not responsible and thus not allowed to consent can be responsible for the event to the degree that he must pay child support?

everybody involved will be a loser because of the idiotic way we treat sex in the law.... the mother will be impoverished by legal bills, the boy will be induced into playing the victim, and the kid will have a mom and a dad who are fighting with each other and will lack financial support that might be available had it not gone to the lawyers. Had the two parents been dealt with in counseling the best likely outcome would have been better. Had social assets gone into helping these three rather than the fight between the two parents and the other one between the mom and the state we would have spent our money more wisely.

Which law are you talking about? The law that says accused criminals cannot have custody of their children? The law that says a father cannot be compelled to support his child if that child was the product of statutory rape? I'm not familiar with those laws. Maybe you're looking at a different set of laws than I am.

How about the principle that one shall not be allowed to profit from the crime? In this case the female gets both the sperm to make her baby as well as financial support in raising it...sounds like profit to me.

A child is not a bag of money. A child is not a stolen television set. A child is a human being, with needs that must be provided for by adults. Unless you're arguing that the child was an accomplice in the alleged criminal act, then I can't quite understand how you can argue that the child ought to be punished for the consequences of that act.

it was the mother who committed the crime, it was the mother who decided not to abort, it was the mother who was more than half responsible for no contraception being used.......it is the mother who has the primary responsibility for well being of the child who was created as result of all of those choices. You can't let the well being the child shield the mother from the consequences of her actions....if you did you would need to open the doors of the prisons and let hundreds of thousands of so female convicts go home to take care of their kids....so that the kids will not be hurt. In this case the consequences would be that she has to raise the baby on her own as best she can, and if she can't do it well enough then the child goes into foster care.......don't make the victim pay for the sins of the perp.

Alternately, how about agreeing that the law can not handle this situation, that no crime should be judged to have been committed, and let the social workers help these three as best they can? It rings a bit hollow for someone who maintains that the punishing legal system should handle this situation to also object to the results of justice on the grounds that a child will be hurt.....the legal system hurts, that is what it is designed to do, very often it hurts children who are left with out parents to raise them and with out resources devoted to them. Kids who's parents go to prison for any length of time start life with a big strike against them.

In this case the male should not be made to pay for the bad choices that society has made in deciding how to address this sexual encounter between to young people.

Do you think the custody order was a "get out of jail free" card for the mother? If so, you're clearly getting far more out of that newspaper article than I am. There's no reason to think that the judge in the custody case can't review the custody decision if -- if -- the mother is convicted. We're not talking about letting the prison gates swing wide for all the incarcerated mothers in Ohio, we're talking about a custodial parent who has been indicted for a crime and who remains innocent until proven guilty.


How do you figure? The father seems to be involved in the child's life: he has weekly visitation rights, he is fighting for custody. How is the mother raising the baby on her own? Why would the baby go into foster care if the mother can't take care of it?


You can make this into yet another thread about legalizing sex with minors if you want, but you'll excuse me if I don't help you do it. Why don't you see if Agrote will lend you a hand?

thats when you shoot the bitch in the head.

Jane I wonder if the girl knew the boy was 15 at the time. Some lads that age are pretty grown up looking.

I am talking about the law that says that statutory rape is a crime. Again I ask how your opinion would change were this a 19 year old boy having sex with a 15 year old girl.

For the record, the two issues that annoy me in this discussion are crime and sexism. There is a real double standard on how we treat boys and girls.

Let's consider what would happen if a 19 year old boy had sex with a 15 year old girl.

1) First... there is no way in hell that the perpetrator (if he were a boy) would get custody of the child.
2) The victim would have the option of becoming a parent or not. If she decided that she wasn't ready to be a parent, she could either choose abortion or she could put the child up for adoption.
3) The act would be treated as a crime... both legally and in the eyes of posters here.

A 15 year old victim of a crime is a 15 year old victim of a crime. Whether the victim is a boy or a girl shouldn't matter.

That girl victims have all the advantages they should... including choices on whether to be a parent or not and support of the society at large is a very good thing.

The victim in this story has been given no options. He has to sit and accept what the perpetrator decides.

How is this not unfair.

As are many 15 year old girls, but its still a crime to have sex with them.
Why should this be any different just because the victim is a male?
There is no way he should have to pay support, and he wasnt given the choice about wether or not he wanted to be a parent.