>Do you have any concern over whether these boys of eleven actually
>committed a rape? Or just over the presence of the crayons? Yes,
>it is a tragedy that boys as young as 11 can sexually assault
>someone. But so far you have told us nothing of the "evidence", just
>that you're disconcerted by the colouring books in the courtroom.
>
You misunderstand the law. To commit the offence of rape, as indeed to commit any offence, the accused must be responsible for their actions. The assumption in English law, until it was recently overturned, was that children under the age of 14 were 'doli incapax', or incapable of harm. Not meaning that they were incapable of injuring someone, or, in this case, committing the physical act of forcible penetration, but that they were not capable of understanding the full moral force of their actions. The law makes that specific point that to do harm is intentional, as opposed to causing an injury without fully understanding what you are doing.
Any civilised society distinguishes between the actions of children and those of adults. But in Britain, the pressure to up the convictions for rape, beyond what juries were prepared to find on the evidence, led the Home Office here to pursue cases that would previously have been considered wrong. This was a case in point. Pressing rape charges against children is indeed depraved.
Jane's comments
>
>No, the big problem is that you clearly know very little about this
>issue, but you still feel qualified to make absurd and universal
>assertions about it. Check yourself before you shame yourself even
>further in public.
apply to herself -- Jim heartfield