Today on AirTalk, we examine an archaic California law that caused a rape conviction to be overturned and consider the issue of "outing" perpetrators of sexual assault via social media. We'll also discuss mandatory retirement ages. On FilmWeek, Larry and the critics review "Allegiance" and "Only The Young," and later look at the depictions of race and violence in "Django Unchained."
Rape conviction voided thanks to archaic 19th-century law
A woman comes home from a party with her boyfriend. They fall asleep together, and she later wakes to find he’s having sex with her — she thinks. Turns out, it wasn’t her boyfriend, who had left, but another man pretending to be him. When she screamed and resisted, the man left. Is he guilty of rape?
This was the case before a Los Angeles appeals court, which unanimously – albeit reluctantly – overturned the rape conviction of Julio Morales this week. The reason? Morales’ attorney had invoked an obscure law from the 1870’s that determined that such an act would only be rape if the perpetrator were impersonating a woman’s husband – not her boyfriend. In his ruling, Justice Thomas Willhite Jr. wrote, “We reluctantly hold that a person who accomplishes sexual intercourse by impersonating someone other than a married victim’s spouse is not guilty of the crime of rape of an unconscious person.”
The justices urged the legislature to change the outdated law to correct the obvious incongruity. But as it stands, their ruling is legally correct, however morally incomprehensible it may seem to 21st century sensibilities. Whether it was her boyfriend or someone else, some might argue, a sleeping woman cannot consent to sex, and therefore it was a rape. But it was unclear to the appeals court whether the first jury had convicted Morales for tricking the woman into having sex or the “sleeping person” charge.
Do you think the court made the right decision? How could such an archaic law remain on the books for so long? Does a sleeping person have the right to be protected from non-consensual sex, no matter who the perpetrator is?
Guest:
Stanley Goldman, professor of law at Loyola Law School
Vigilante justice, social media and gag orders
As social media and digital technology continue to spread, they are challenging some legal and journalistic principles. In a rape case last year, Savannah Dietrich was ordered by the court not to out her attackers by name or talk about what happened to her. When she went to Twitter and did just that, she faced legal charges.
Meanwhile, in Steubenville, OH, a rape case from last month involving one girl and two boys is becoming complicated as well. Traditionally, juveniles have their names protected, whether they are victims or attackers. However, in a CNN article, the reporters write, “Although the teenagers are juveniles, CNN is identifying them because they have been publicly named by a juvenile court judge, by defense attorneys and in media accounts. CNN is not identifying the girl, who also is a juvenile, in accordance with its policy not to release the names of alleged rape victims.” This story has been chewed over by bloggers and Twitter users who published the names of the alleged attackers, thus putting them on the public record and leading CNN to follow suit.
Furthermore, in this same case a sect of the hacker group Anonymous, Knight Sec, acquired and publicized video which was being kept private by law enforcement. The video shows football teammates and friends of the attacker making lewd jokes and references about rape and the victim.
As made evident by these situations, the landscape is changing. Does the law and the media need to adapt? Or is the horse out of the barn on this? How would courts and law enforcement even begin to keep such information private? And how could the publishing of names and information impact both the victims and the attackers, both after a trial and during one?
Guest:
Gregg Leslie, Legal Defense Director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press
Dan Filler, Associate Dean of Drexel University School of Law
When should judges be put out to pasture?
Several Pennsylvania judges are suing the state over mandatory retirement. The judges argue forcing them to retire at age 70 is unconstitutional. Last week, the case moved up to federal court.
That's not the only state weighing the wisdom of losing seasoned judges too early. New York is considering legislation allowing judges to stay on until age 80. While dozens of states push judges out around age 70, California has no such rule, neither do federal courts.
The court bench isn't the only profession with mandatory retirement. Airline pilots, FBI agents, firefighters, air traffic controllers and more are shown the door before their age can have negative effects on the job.
With an ever aging population, how can we guarantee the mental and physical fitness of workers in these important roles? Which mental and intellectual skills decline, or improve, into old age? What are other costs and benefits associated with mandatory retirement?
Guests:
Dr. Gary Small, co-author of the Alzheimer’s Prevention Program and Professor of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Science, Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior at UCLA
David DeLong, president, David DeLong & Associates, a workforce consulting firm, research fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s AgeLab and author of Lost Knowledge: Confronting the Threat of an Aging Workforce (Oxford University Press)
FilmWeek: Allegiance, Only The Young, Texas Chainsaw 3D and more
Larry is joined by KPCC film critics Tim Cogshell from Box Office Magazine and Henry Sheehan from dearhenrysheehan.com to review the week’s new film releases including Allegiance, Only The Young, Texas Chainsaw 3D and more. TGI-FilmWeek!
Texas Chainsaw 3D
Allegience
Only the Young
All Superheroes Must Die
Guests:
Tim Cogshell, film critic for KPCC and Box Office Magazine
Henry Sheehan
, film critic for KPCC and dearhenrysheehan.comAfrican-Americans’ response to 'Django Unchained'
Quentin Tarantino’s newest film “Django Unchained” has many of the elements fans and critics expect from Tarantino: a revenge plot Western heavy with bloodshed and a killer soundtrack. The twist in this film, set just before the Civil War, is that the hero Django is a freed black man who takes his revenge against the entire institution of slavery.
For some audiences, the brutality of slavery, and its echoes in racial discrimination through the present, makes Django unwatchable. Director Spike Lee has refused to see it. Some black critics—even among those who enjoyed elements of the film—were troubled by it. Whether it was Tarantino as a white director making a movie that deployed the “n” word over 100 times, images of torturous violence perpetrated against enslaved characters or the gleeful revenge enacted upon white villains and bystanders alike, viewers might be disturbed by many moments in the film. Still others see nothing wrong, noting that plenty of directors have made films about slavery that dodge its gruesome reality.
If you’ve seen “Django Unchained,” were you offended by the violence? Or did it seem like an artistic treatment of a brutal time? Are you or any one you know boycotting the film?
Guests:
Joe Hicks, Vice President of Community Advocates, Inc.; former Executive Director of the L.A. City Human Relations Commission
Tim Cogshell, film critic for KPCC and Box Office Magazine
Henry Sheehan
, film critic for KPCC and dearhenrysheehan.com