Man squeezes woman's boobs too hard - it ends up in court - should it have?

Fr_Dougal

midlandsmissus wrote: »

Perfect! That thread points out the lie.

I said Abuse. I knew I said abuse seeing as I wrote the thread.

Why don't you use the dictionary to look under the two different words:
1. Abuse.
2.Assault.

I think you'll find they mean two different things.

Don't twist my words again. Evidence always points to the truth.

How about someone not being able to remember something so the *feel* they must have been abused? 🤔

Vela

He was inflicting pain on the woman, she made him aware of this and asked him to stop. He didn't. That's assault. The reason so many people are on the fence is that most people have been in an uncomfortable sexual situation, and the majority of the time they're just uncomfortable situations. Sometimes the person might do something you don't like, but you suck it up because you're not that bothered about it. Sometimes they cross the line, so you tell them and they stop and it's no big deal. The key part of this case is that she told him, she was visibly distressed about it, and he didn't stop.

Yes, she should have asked him to leave. But it's very normal for victims to try to "normalize" these situations in their heads because they're in shock or just can't process it. The same applies to her asking him to stay and talk about it; if he came out with an explanation for it then she wouldn't have to deal with the reality of it. It's similar to people who stay in abusive relationships for years - they normalize the behavior and stick around because it's easier than acknowledging that they're being/have been abused.

Is the sentence just? I think it is, considering his profession. He's in a position of trust as a doctor that he clearly shouldn't be in. The "he said/she said" element does come into it, yes, but that's what the hearing was for.

222233

I thought no but then I seen his picture and changed my mind. I know, unfair, but life's unfair.

Vela wrote: »

Is the sentence just? I think it is, considering his profession. He's in a position of trust as a doctor that he clearly shouldn't be in. The "he said/she said" element does come into it, yes, but that's what the hearing was for.

Is he really a genuine *danger* to the public based on this crime and the context/nature of this crime? Would someone with a conviction of physical assault eg. Punching someone in a nightclub also be unfit to work in a position of trust, should they also be on a register ? I'm unsure about this one, I empathise with the victim of course but given the context I'm not sure where I stand

Fr_Dougal wrote: »

How about someone not being able to remember something so the *feel* they must have been abused? 🀔

You know there is actually a phenomena that does happen even in people who didn't black out, where people have false memories and can't differentiate from reality vs created events. Similar to what your mentioning

One eyed Jack

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Nobody is saying that he should have the right to keep doing what he wants despite her protestations. Of course he should have stopped. He's a dickhead for not doing so but what has that got to do with the question posed in the OP of this thread? I don't see anyone saying he should be able to do to her what he wanted to.

The question posed is whether or not this should have ended up in court. Surely this woman has to take some responsibility for the consequences of continuing to have sex with someone who was clearly turned on by squeezing her boobs harder than she liked. Tell him to leave. Don't have sex with him again.

Pete I honestly don't understand what you mean by this? It should end up in court if it's determined by the authorities that the victim has a legitimate complaint. They're not the person on trial, so they don't have to justify their actions either before, during or after what happened.

I read a case earlier on today and the line of questioning you're proposing would be similar - why didn't they do this? why didn't they do that? why didn't they do the other?

'Hard to find words to describe each new outrage inflicted' - retired soldier jailed for abuse of his daughters

The sisters reported the abuse to the Southern Health Board in 1999 after attending the Rape Crisis Centre in Cork. As a result O'Keeffe agreed to leave the family home and no further action was taken against him.

Melissa O'Keeffe said she went to gardaí in 1999 but withdrew the allegations after her parents confronted her. Both victims reported the matter to gardaí again in October 2014.

A victim impact statement on behalf of Ms O'Keeffe was read out to the court and described how she resisted calling out for her mother in case she got into trouble.

“I went to gardaí to make a complaint in 1999 but my parents confronted me so I had to lie and say I made it all up,” she said.

The point being, that the victim is not the person on trial. What they did or didn't do is not in question. In this case, the woman asked him not to do something, he continued to do it. That's why it ended up in Court. He could have avoided it ending up in court if he had just done as she requested -

'The woman's evidence was that during intercourse he grabbed her breasts very forcibly.

'She was in pain. At first she said nothing but moved position to avoid her breasts being touched. Again he grabbed her breasts.

'She wanted to continue sexual intercourse but was in pain and did not want her breasts to be touched again.

'She was crying and told him that he had been rough. She told him not to grab her breasts.

'He apologised and agreed, after which they recommenced sexual intercourse.

'However he grabbed her breasts again twice more in the same manner as before, causing her severe pain.'

She said the victim was very shaken and went to the bathroom where she noticed red marks on her breasts which had developed into significant bruising.

Queree told the court he agreed that the encounter took place but insisted that all acts were consensual.

In his defence, Queree claimed that at no time did she tell him not to touch her breasts although he said she did at one stage ask him, in non specific terms, to be more gentle and he complied.

The court was told: 'She had given consent to sexual intercourse and therefore had implicitly given consent to her breasts being touched in a sexual manner.

'By her account she later specifically withdrew consent for her breasts being touched even though she continued otherwise to consent to sexual intercourse.

'She said that he had continued to grab her breasts despite the withdrawal of consent and in the knowledge that consent had been withdrawn.'

'After she showed him the bruise he responded that he had had rougher sex than that.

'She did not want him to leave and did not want to believe what had happened.

'She wanted him to stay and discuss it. His demeanour then changed. He had tears in his eyes and said he needed to go and think about what he had done to her.

'He then stormed out the door. She was in complete and utter shock and texted him, imploring him to return.

'She wanted him to come back and give an explanation and just could not equate his behaviour in the bedroom with his previous charming behaviour.

In police interview Queree agreed that he had touched her breasts during sexual intercourse but felt that that was reasonable behaviour.

Queree said the intercourse was 'pretty passionate as befits two people engaging in their first sexual encounter.'

But Mrs Shaw rejected his version of events and found him guilty of indecent assault.

In conclusion, she said: 'I am sure that she withdrew her consent for him to grab her breasts; but he knew this and continued to do so forcefully, causing her severe pain.

'This was an assault. He touched a sexual and intimate part of her body in a sexual manner without her consent.

'Irrespective of her consent to other sexual conduct, I am sure that the touching was in circumstances of indecency and thus he is guilty of indecent assault.

'I find it credible that she wanted to continue sexual intercourse but that she tried to put a limit on his conduct and asked him not to grab her painful breasts again.

In deciding to put Queree on the Sex Offenders Register, she said: 'I am concerned that you pose a risk of sexual harm to others.'

It's not unusual that someone would want to continue having sex with someone after requesting that they desist from a particular act. What is unusual is when that person after being asked to desist from that particular act, continues to do so. Then the person they're doing it to has every right to make a complaint, and has every right to see that justice is done. If she hadn't made a complaint, then he would have gotten away with what he did.

Outlaw Pete

One eyed Jack wrote: »

Pete I honestly don't understand what you mean by this? It should end up in court if it's determined by the authorities that the victim has a legitimate complaint. They're not the person on trial, so they don't have to justify their actions either before, during or after what happened.

Well......

'Man squeezes woman's boobs too hard - it ends up it in court - should the authorities have determined that the victim had a legitimate complaint?'

.....wouldn't fit into the title, would it

Come on, Jack, ffs, you know well what the question posed is ultimately asking.

One eyed Jack

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Well...... .....wouldn't fit into the title, would it

Come on, Jack, ffs, you know well what the question posed is ultimately asking.

Was it serious enough to end up in court?

I think so anyway. I mean, if we're going to tell people that they should make a complaint to the proper authorities, as it's the only way justice is done, instead of posting vague accusations on social media when they feel they have been the victim of a crime, then have we any right to say they were wrong when they do make a complaint and justice is done?

Otherwise we end up where we are now with a deluge of allegations on social media because people felt at the time their complaint wouldn't be taken seriously. A case like this shows people that their complaints are taken seriously, and that the legal route does result in justice being done.

Outlaw Pete

Oh I agree with pretty much all you said with regards to social media..... only place we differ is that I don't believe this was something she should have went to the authorities with. No more than I would feel a man with a bruise on his penis should where he to have met a woman off Tinder who liked to squeeze his penis harder than he'd wanted her to.

You say that it would show that the courts take such complaints seriously, but Jack, there are barristers in the UK complaining about some of the nonsense that is ending up in the courts and are blaming feminist lobby groups for it. There is no issue regarding women not being believed by the authorities. Quite the opposite.

Laura Perrins: Feminism turns British justice against men

The Crown Prosecution Service is meant to be one of the guardians of the British public. Its duty is to tackle criminality without bias, regardless of the background of either perpetrator or victim.

But, as a barrister myself, I fear the service is sliding towards the status of a noisy pressure group in the grip of feminist dogma.

No longer the stern, impartial bulwark of our legal system, it now appears to be increasingly driven by fashionable politics and ideological fads.

‘Domestic abuse, rape and sexual offences now account for nearly 19 per cent of our workload, an increase over the past six years from just under nine per cent,’ declares another.

Much of this focus on offences against women has been driven by the Director of Public Prosecutions, Alison Saunders.

In Ms Saunders’ brave new world, a rape suspect may have to show the steps he took to establish that consent was ‘fully and freely given’, which rather inverts that age-old British tradition: innocent until proven guilty.

Hardline feminists may be glorying in Ms Saunders’s tenure. The rest of us should surely be concerned that the organisation is in danger of losing its sense of purpose and proportion.

I am not, of course, arguing that crimes against women should not be prosecuted with the full rigour of the law. In the name of genuine justice, such an approach is essential, and it is true that in the past, prosecutors often ignored offences such as rape within marriage and domestic violence but what profoundly concerns me is the CPS’s lack of balance.

In practice, the CPS — and much of the rest of the political establishment — now gives the impression that offences against women are treated with more robustness than those against men.

We see that in the rash of new legislation designed to meet the demands of the feminist creed.

The feminist lobby is endlessly demanding new laws to signal their virtue and campaigning zeal, and the CPS, under Alison Saunders, is only too happy to accommodate them.

When referring to offences against women, Alison Saunders and her underlings peddle political jargon about the problem of so-called ‘victim-blaming’ — where a woman is blamed for a sexual assault against her — as if the only reason more prosecutions are not secured is because the criminal justice system is insufficiently feminist. Such an insidious approach ignores the age-old notion of establishing the burden of proof.

A rape suspect sometimes walks free, not because of ‘victim-blaming’ by the defence, but because he’s genuinely innocent.

But perhaps the biggest disservice of all is done to women themselves. The CPS appears determined to create a mood of infantilised hysteria, where threats lurk for women around every corner, where masculinity is nothing but a reservoir of violent anger.

With this relentless message, the CPS seems to want to trap women in victimhood, whipping up fears and exaggerating dangers. There is something offensive about its urge to sweep all kinds of crime, from brutal rape to nasty texts, into one vast category of female misery.

The shallowness at the heart of this outlook was highlighted recently by a CPS campaign against rape which compared sexual consent to having a cup of tea. ‘You wouldn’t force or pressure someone into having a cup of tea, and you can tell when someone wants a cup of tea or not,’ said Ms Saunders in pushing the initiative.

That’s the naive quality of argument and poor leadership we have to endure in our legislation.

RDM_83 again

Honestly I see this case being taken to appeal successfully if the guilty party has the resources and inclination to do so.

One eyed Jack

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Oh I agree with pretty much all you said with regards to social media..... only place we differ is that I don't believe this was something she should have went to the authorities with. No more than I would feel a man with a bruise on his penis should where he to have met a woman off Tinder who liked to squeeze his penis harder than he'd wanted her to.

I do know where you're coming from, I'd be the same myself, but those would be our standards we set for ourselves, and just because we wouldn't make a complaint about it to the authorities, that doesn't mean that anyone else shouldn't either. We wouldn't be complaining about it though, but if someone were to complain about it, I'd suggest to them that complaining to me will do fcukall. If they feel that strongly about it, the people to complain to are the people who are in a position to actually do something about it.

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

You say that it would show that the courts take such complaints seriously, but Jack, there are barristers in the UK complaining about some of the nonsense that is ending up in the courts and are blaming feminist lobby groups for it. There is no issue regarding women not being believed by the authorities. Quite the opposite.

Given that there are over 50,000 barristers in the UK alone, I'd be surprised if they weren't a diverse bunch with a diverse range of opinions. On that basis, I wouldn't be surprised if there were thousands of barristers were feminists themselves, and thousands more were anti-feminists, each blaming the other for the problems they see within the judicial system. If they regard having to do their jobs as entertaining nonsense, then they should consider a career change, because I don't see why people should be discouraged from coming forward with complaints.

I think there is an issue with both men and women believing that they won't be believed if they make a complaint to the authorities, and part of that is due to the idea that they themselves also believe that when it happens to someone else, they shouldn't be taken seriously. It's the perception that they wouldn't believe it themselves is why they believe nobody else would believe them, so they don't come forward. As you point out though, that perception isn't really representative of the reality that they will more than likely be believed and will be taken seriously, and that applies to both men and women.

There will be outlier cases that they read about in the media, but that's because the media only reports on extreme cases, rather than the huge numbers of cases that are more run-of-the-mill type cases that are heard in court every day.

kylith

One eyed Jack wrote: »

Was it serious enough to end up in court?

I think so anyway. I mean, if we're going to tell people that they should make a complaint to the proper authorities, as it's the only way justice is done, instead of posting vague accusations on social media when they feel they have been the victim of a crime, then have we any right to say they were wrong when they do make a complaint and justice is done?

Otherwise we end up where we are now with a deluge of allegations on social media because people felt at the time their complaint wouldn't be taken seriously. A case like this shows people that their complaints are taken seriously, and that the legal route does result in justice being done.

Agreed. The backlash against #metoo was that if people think they have been assaulted they should go to the authorities, not post on social media. But now we have someone who feels that she was assaulted (and a judge agrees), who did make a complaint to the authorities and people are saying that, idk, she wasn't assaulted enough(?), or that they personally wouldn't have considered it assault so she shouldn't either?

What do people want? Should people who feel they have been sexually assaulted post on Twitter with a special hashtag so people can vote on whether they have been, before they can go to the authorities?

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

Shurimgreat

This sounds to me more a case of common assault than sexual assault. That he is put on a sex offenders register is frankly ridiculous.

Outlaw Pete

kylith wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

You say that as if there's a contradiction with thinking both things, there's not.

Just because someone is of the belief that #metoo'ing about sexual assault is pointless, doesn't mean they must therefore think it's okay to go to the Police with a bruised tit. Merely suggesting there's a contradiction doesn't automatically mean there is one.

What do people want? Should people who feel they have been sexually assaulted post on Twitter with a special hashtag so people can vote on whether they have been, before they can go to the authorities?

Oh give over. If a man had gone to the Police with a bruised arse after some woman he met on Tinder wouldn't give over squeezing it harder that he wished her too, you'd not have been taking this tone. This wasn't sexual assault, or anything like one.

Permabear wrote: »

Imagine that you are walking home one night, and you hear sounds coming from an alleyway. You peer in, and you see a woman up against a wall, with a man pulling her hair and squeezing her breast so hard that she is crying in pain. She is saying "Stop ... please, stop, you're hurting me" and he is ignoring her. Taking a closer look, you see that her chest is covered in red marks where he has been grabbing her.

What do you do? Do you walk on, thinking that everything is fine? Or do you intervene and/or call the police, believing that you are witnessing an assault?

Yeah, I would call the police most likely........... and then an hour or so later, after seeing the police come, chat with them, and leave, if I then saw them at it again as I walked past, her moaning about him squeezing her boobs too hard... I'd say "Lovely night for it" and go on about my business. The thing is though, there are lots of consensual sexual acts that of witnessed up an alleyway at night would have them reaching for their phone to contact the authorities, but that doesn't mean that what they're witnessing is actually a sexual assault.

kylith

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

You say that as if there's a contradiction with thinking both things, there's not.

Just because someone is of the belief that #metoo'ing about sexual assault is pointless, doesn't mean they must therefore think it's okay to go to the Police with a bruised tit. Merely suggesting there's a contradiction doesn't automatically mean there is one.

There is a contradiction if the issue is that those who think #metoo was overreaction and that if someone believes that they have been assaulted they should let the law decide. This woman felt that she had been assaulted and she let the law decide. The law agreed with her.

It wasn't a 'bruised tit' it was a painful experience that he continued doing even though she repeatedly told him to stop. You have to be very rough to bruise breasts; this was not run-of-the-mill boob-squeezing, this was him really digging his fingers in. Bruising has been used in other assault cases because, in most instances, people are relatively difficult to significantly bruise.

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Oh give over. If a man had gone to the Police with a bruised arse after some woman he met on Twitter wouldn't give over squeezing it harder that he wished her too, you'd not have been taking this tone. This wasn't sexual assault, or anything like one.

I have never denigrated men's experiences of sexual assault.

If a man felt that his partner had been too rough and continued to do so after being told to stop then he absolutely has the right to make a legal complaint, especially if he is in pain and has significant bruising.

Tigger

Permabear wrote: »

This post had been deleted.

he says he was never asked to stop touching her brests
also the sex alwas consntual not someone getting attacked in an alley
very strange comparison

Permabear

This post has been deleted.

sbsquarepants

No it shouldn't, are you mad!

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

Oh give over. If a man had gone to the Police with a bruised arse after some woman he met on Tinder wouldn't give over squeezing it harder that he wished her too, you'd not have been taking this tone. This wasn't sexual assault, or anything like one.

I have to say I'm completely baffled by your point of view.

Do you consider it an assault at all?

If you do, does the location of the injuries by definition not mean it was a sexual assault?

If you don't consider it an assault - well then I just don't know what to say to you.
If you for some bizarre reason think it's acceptable to ignore a womans repeated requests to stop hurting her and leave her crying and covered in bruises just so you can get your end away, nothing I say or anyone else says is going to change your mind.

If that is actually your argument (I honestly can't see how anyone could stand over that, so I'm hoping it's not) but if it is, maybe you need to think about the sort of person that makes you.

sbsquarepants

No it shouldn't, are you mad!

Tigger wrote: »

also the sex alwas consntual not someone getting attacked in an alley
very strange comparison

The part she repeatedly told him she did not consent to wasn't!

That's the bit he got in trouble for.

neonsofa

sbsquarepants wrote: »

I have to say I'm completely baffled by your point of view.

Do you consider it an assault at all?

If you do, does the location of the injuries by definition not mean it was a sexual assault?

If you don't consider it an assault - well then I just don't know what to say to you.
If you for some bizarre reason think it's acceptable to ignore a womans repeated requests to stop hurting her and leave her crying and covered in bruises just so you can get your end away, nothing I say or anyone else says is going to change your mind.

If that is actually your argument (I honestly can't see how anyone could stand over that, so I'm hoping it's not) but if it is, maybe you need to think about the sort of person that makes you.

If she had been fully clothed and just going about her business and someone touched her breasts and hurt her that way it would be sexual assault. The fact that she gave consent to sex first seems to be confusing people. But its actually fairly simple, she explicitly denied him consent to touch her so aggressively on her breasts. Therefore it was sexual assault. Whether she was clothed or not doesnt really change it as far as i can see. If it had been two people engaging in rough play and a woman said her safe word and he ignored it, again, it would be sexual assault. The person touching/harming the other person is doing so in a sexual way ignoring the wishes of the other person for them to stop.

sbsquarepants

No it shouldn't, are you mad!

It's a fairly simple concept if you ask me - what she did consent to has no bearing whatsoever on what she didn't consent to.

I can even see where there might be some grey area, one persons normal is another persons downright weird after all. So it is quite understandable / forgivable to overstep the mark accidentally. You do whatever, she doesn't like it and tell you to stop - so you stop!

But when you are told to stop and just refuse - where's the confusion there? What exact part of "stop, don't do that" have you taken to mean "carry on, feel free to do that"

That's not understandable or confusion - That's just a fúcking scumbag.

Sexual assault is the only name for that sort of behaviour. This prick got no more than he deserved.

One eyed Jack

Outlaw Pete wrote: »

You say that as if there's a contradiction with thinking both things, there's not.

Just because someone is of the belief that #metoo'ing about sexual assault is pointless, doesn't mean they must therefore think it's okay to go to the Police with a bruised tit. Merely suggesting there's a contradiction doesn't automatically mean there is one.

There is a contradiction if you're going to appoint yourself the arbiter of what is and isn't worthy of going and making a complaint to the authorities about. I mean, if you're saying it's pointless posting about it on social media, and that they should go to the authorities instead; when they do, you're suggesting that they shouldn't have bothered the authorities with their complaint because you wouldn't have bothered the authorities with yours.

How are people supposed to know what is or isn't acceptable by your standards unless they ask you first, and only when they get your approval should they then go to the authorities, or not, if you deem that they aren't taking any responsibility for their actions, as though you're putting them on trial?

Now you're only one person, so how many people do you think they should ask first should they make a complaint so as not to be wasting everyone's time?

Surely you can see how impractical that would be, and that the more expedient course of action is for an individual to decide for themselves whether they should approach the people who actually have the authority to determine whether they have a legitimate complaint or not.

Oh give over. If a man had gone to the Police with a bruised arse after some woman he met on Tinder wouldn't give over squeezing it harder that he wished her too, you'd not have been taking this tone. This wasn't sexual assault, or anything like one.

It was, he was charged and convicted of indecent assault, y'know, what else is there to say like?

That actually happened, and reversing the genders into a hypothetical scenario that may or may not possibly happen, doesn't diminish what happened in this case, just because the victim is a woman, and the perpetrator is a man.

If a man ends up with a bruised arse from a tinder date and wants to make a complaint to the authorities about it, would you suggest he fill you in first so you can determine whether he should make a complaint or not? You've already suggested that you wouldn't, and from what you've written above you wouldn't consider he had a legitimate case either.

Why not let him decide that for himself? Then the authorities at least have a record of his complaint, and if 100, 1,000 more men make a complaint that they had been left with bruises arses, and it happens to have been by the same person, the victims may never be aware of each other, the perpetrator may assume they've gotten away with it and carry on leaving men with bruised arses, until the investigating officers have enough to proceed with a case that could see the perpetrator subject to a number of counts of assault.

OR, the authorities could just nip that behaviour in the bud (no pun intended), and make things easier all round for everyone.

neonsofa

sbsquarepants wrote: »

It's a fairly simple concept if you ask me - what she did consent to has no bearing whatsoever on what she didn't consent to.

I can even see where there might be some grey area, one persons normal is another persons downright weird after all. So it is quite understandable / forgivable to overstep the mark accidentally. You do whatever, she doesn't like it and tell you to stop - so you stop!

But when you are told to stop and just refuse - where's the confusion there? What exact part of "stop, don't do that" have you taken to mean "carry on, feel free to do that"

That's not understandable or confusion - That's just a fúcking scumbag.

Sexual assault is the only name for that sort of behaviour. This prick got no more than he deserved.

I dont know if your post is in response to mine, it was posted directly after mine which was in response to yours (which i agreed with), if it is i think you misunderstood my post.

sbsquarepants

No it shouldn't, are you mad!

No I meant it for you - but I was agreeing with you!

Sorry, it does read a bit like I was questioning you, which is not how I meant it!

neonsofa

sbsquarepants wrote: »

No I meant it for you - but I was agreeing with you!

Sorry, it does read a bit like I was questioning you, which is not how I meant it!

In that case carry on!

Vela

222233 wrote: »

Is he really a genuine *danger* to the public based on this crime and the context/nature of this crime? Would someone with a conviction of physical assault eg. Punching someone in a nightclub also be unfit to work in a position of trust, should they also be on a register ? I'm unsure about this one, I empathise with the victim of course but given the context I'm not sure where I stand

I can understand your uncertainty, but I'd class it as a sexual assault as it was an assault of a sexual nature. Where it lies on the scale of sexual assault is the grey area here. It's obviously not on par with a rape allegation, but I'd consider it a lot more serious than a slap on the arse in an office. I do think the judge erred on the side of caution re: placing him on the register, but I think that caution was warranted given his position as a doctor.

The poster who said it could easily go to appeal is right, I can see how it could. I think that a lot of the #metoo craic has actually had the opposite effect and actually made people more skeptical of these claims. I know that I've rolled my eyes a good few times at descriptions of sexual assault that clearly just weren't actual assaults. And I've no time for the whole modern feminist angle on it either. But it's still very unfortunate that this also means that many very real claims are falling under the same bracket. I have complete respect for the woman for coming forward with it.

222233

I thought no but then I seen his picture and changed my mind. I know, unfair, but life's unfair.

Vela wrote: »

I can understand your uncertainty, but I'd class it as a sexual assault as it was an assault of a sexual nature. Where it lies on the scale of sexual assault is the grey area here. It's obviously not on par with a rape allegation, but I'd consider it a lot more serious than a slap on the arse in an office. I do think the judge erred on the side of caution re: placing him on the register, but I think that caution was warranted given his position as a doctor.

I absolutely agree that it's a grey area. However with respect to an office assault, consent has likely never been granted or implicitly suggested for any sexual activity. The slap has in this scenario occurred in a completely inappropriate environment, being the workplace. In the context of this crime, consent was removed but the initial scenario was consensual sex. To this extent I would argue that an inappropriate touch in an office is actually a more substantial crime, then again however that is a grey area in itself.

I am assuming that this man had no previous convictions, I would consider someone who assaults another adult physically for example during a football game to be on an equal scale of danger to the public.

Vela wrote: »

The poster who said it could easily go to appeal is right, I can see how it could. I think that a lot of the #metoo craic has actually had the opposite effect and actually made people more skeptical of these claims. I know that I've rolled my eyes a good few times at descriptions of sexual assault that clearly just weren't actual assaults. And I've no time for the whole modern feminist angle on it either. But it's still very unfortunate that this also means that many very real claims are falling under the same bracket. I have complete respect for the woman for coming forward with it.

I agree. I think the main issue is determining the severity of these crimes and specifying what actually constitutes assault and how those perceptions can be measured, because currently it appears to be completely open to interpretation.

Vela

222233 wrote: »

I absolutely agree that it's a grey area. However with respect to an office assault, consent has likely never been granted or implicitly suggested for any sexual activity. The slap has in this scenario occurred in a completely inappropriate environment, being the workplace. In the context of this crime, consent was removed but the initial scenario was consensual sex. To this extent I would argue that an inappropriate touch in an office is actually a more substantial crime, then again however that is a grey area in itself. .

That's the thing, though, she consented to sex. She didn't consent to him inflicting pain on her, and she made that very clear, yet he continued to do so. So consent wasn't given and removed, it was never given in the first place.

blanch152

The poll isn't that great on this one.

There is no option for yes, it should have ended up in court, yes, he should have been sent to consent classes but no, he shouldn't have been put on the sex offenders register, especially given that the report said there was a very low possibility of re-offence.

P.S. Someone may have asked this already but is that the Aviva Stadium in Dublin he is pictured outside in the Daily Mail article?

222233

I thought no but then I seen his picture and changed my mind. I know, unfair, but life's unfair.

Vela wrote: »

That's the thing, though, she consented to sex. She didn't consent to him inflicting pain on her, and she made that very clear, yet he continued to do so. So consent wasn't given and removed, it was never given in the first place.

I absolutely agree that she did not consent to him inflicting pain.

But did he need to get verbal consent for touching her breasts in the first place, or is that an act that one may assume appropriate? She made it explicitly clear that she wanted him to stop after it occurred, in which case there was absolutely no consent to repeat the action.

Vela

222233 wrote: »

I absolutely agree that she did not consent to him inflicting pain.

But did he need to get verbal consent for touching her breasts in the first place, or is that an act that one may assume appropriate? She made it explicitly clear that she wanted him to stop after it occurred, in which case there was absolutely no consent to repeat the action.

No, he didn't. But the case isn't about him touching her breasts. It's about him causing visible bruising, pain, and distress. Which she made clear wasn't okay. And he still repeated the action.