I must admit, I have hoped Sergeant Hadnott not guilty of the crimes of which he has been accused. I suppose I have not lost hope that he is still partly innocent--that he is being charged with very serious crimes in order that he may be intimidated into confessing a lesser crime as a part of a plea bargain--a dirty trick but one exasperated prosecutors will employ in order to win a conviction sometimes.
It is a long shot though--and one that unfairly impugns the motives of JAG officers--a really bad initial assumption, generally.
What one wants is not often delivered.
I really wanted the Box on the Euphrates to be something other than a graphite moderated reactor being constructed with technical help from the North Koreans.
I really wanted Olatunbosun Ugbogu to be just a sailor on the run, someone who left his wallet lying about to be picked up by a killer--not the killer himself.
I really wanted the Japanese government not get caught abnegating itself to the permanent members of the UN Security Council, particularly the United States and China, in order to get a pat on the shoulder from the Security Council for sending ships to the Indian Ocean -- in the hopes that the purloined authority of the UN would somehow force the Democratic Party of Japan to back down and vote for the bill extending the Maritime Self Defense Forces refueling mission.
Not because I want others to believe I can make sense of the world. Nice that is but not necessary.
But because I want the world to make sense, period.
I suspect - without knowing the pertinent facts - that Hadnott's case is legally sound (if not perhaps morally so). "rape" actually tends to cover a whole range of behaviours and events, and even more so when one party is a minor. In such a case, it can be rape even if you do not have actual intercourse, and even if it is consensual (a minor is not deemed to be able to give informed consent - if they could then the age of majority is set too high).
ReplyDeleteAnd in many legal systems (all, perhaps?) for serious crimes there does not need to exist a wronged party pressing charges. A prosecutor can - and frequently is obligated to - press charges even if the victim denies anything has happened, should other evidence exist. I'm actually not surprised that it will go to trial; I was more surprised when the case seemed to be dropped on the girls word only.