It is most often the case if one was to start a discussion about sexual predators that the focus would be on men. However, it is not a case that only men are sexual predators but women prey on children sexually as well. The question is do we hold women to a different standard when it comes to sex crimes involving minors than the standard we hold men?A story out of Pennsylvania in the US has shocked a suburban community where the alleged offences occurred. Two single mothers, on of who has two children of her own, have been charged with offences including statutory sexual assault, unlawful contact with a minor, corruption of minors, and the endangerment of a child, among other offences.
The story goes that one of the women, Lynne Long, was holding a slumber party at her home where the invitees were boys between the ages of 14 and 16. The other woman, Angela Honeycutt, is alleged to have had sex with a 14-year old and performed sex acts on a 15-year old. It is also alleged that Honeycutt showed her breasts, did some French kissing, talked dirty to the boys, and showered with another. The allegations against Long are that she listened in on the assaults and she watched the assaults occur. It is further alleged that Long told the boys not to say anything. In the above photo, Honeycutt is on the left and Long is on the right.
The crimes came to light when one of the boys told his parents the lurid details of the evening's activities.
Both women are now back in the community after having been released on bail.
The question is this, if these allegations were against two men having perpetrated these crimes against girls of the same age would they have been granted bail?
The other question is this, if we are serious about protecting our children from harm and sexual predators, then should people alleged to have committed such sexually predatory crimes be granted bail?
4 comments:
Hi Rob, I would assume as a lawyer you would like to think the law is applied equally regardless of gender, but sadly no. Another example is granting of custody of children, I think I recall figures of 97% to the mother. The other 3% must be real pillars of society!!! Sure dads aint that bad.
My opinion only
I have not seen or researched teh most recent figures on family law in Australia.
I did family law in law school as one of my compulsory subjects. I did really well in it too. Yet, it was sometimes a little bit depressing and it is not an area of law that I would choose to get into.
I did have to write a paper though on "male rights" and the myriad of groups that sprung up to address the perceived biases of the Family Court. The research was interesting.
It is good to have opinions :D
A little like our discussion re religious segregation, treating the sexes differently sounds a good idea, but isnt so hot when you look at the big picture.
If the law can discriminate on the sex of the accused, then I can discriminate on pay rates, promotion.....
PB...
I guess that is my point! If we make the distinctions then we will have to live with the consequences of those distinctions.
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