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Re: Middle School Girl Expelled, Forced to Apologize to Boy Who Raped Her - August 18th 2011, 12:59 PM

Quote:
EDIT2: And here I was thinking it was the school board filing a law suit AGAINST the girl. The following is written as such, and I don't really want my work to go to waste. For future reference, remind me not read anything that's confusing.

If this is true, I'll deeply regret what I'm about to say and my heart will definitely go out to this girl.

Let's just clarify this: I see no evidence to the contrary that she was raped the second time, and some evidence support it, though we all have an idea on how credible these tabloids can be, which causes me to doubt the credibility of that evidence (or if it even exists).

The problem is, the school board filed that suit on the basis that she may have humiliated the boy and defamed the school, which is a credible and (albeit ridiculous) valid claim. Whilst the boy may have "pleaded guilty" to an unspecified charge, no one seems to know what that charge is - and if he is found guilty of rape, then the school board will ultimately not be able to sue for damages, but she will be able to counter-claim under the tort of negligence. However, if he is found not guilty of rape (which seems to be why the school board filed the suit in the first place - she was making seemingly ridiculous allegations against the boy, which indirectly affected the school's reputation), then both he and the school board will most likely be successful (for nominal damages, no doubt), though their behaviour in the matter would probably also give rise to a counter-claim on her part (under the intentional tort of intentionally causing emotional distress.

HOWEVER, the school board could also lose this similar to the way O.J. Simpson got sued under the tort of wrongful death. If the boy is found not guilty for rape under criminal jurisdiction (because the burden of proof is beyond reasonable doubt in criminal cases), he may still be found guilty of rape on the balance of probabilities, as the evidence may suggest to the jurors/judge(s) that he did rape her, and it was more likely he did than not.

But again, there's no way to see if what the defence has written in the law suit is anything more than a cock-up, nor do I know whether or not the Child Advocacy Centre is a credible examination centre (I mean, even if there's one foot out of place in the person who took the exam; they "just wanted to help the mentally disabled girl," rather than actually having conclusive evidence that she was raped) - it seems to me that they somehow magically managed to get ahold of the boy's DNA without following necessary procedures. I would imagine that, for the evidence of rape to hold up (or furthermore, 'sound'), it would have to be done by police - in which case, if the evidence was conclusive against the boy, he would be charged with rape (providing he's over the age of 14 and is not mentally disabled as well).

If he is under the age of 14 and is mentally disabled, the police CANNOT charge him (at least, that is the case in Victoria, Australia), though he can still be found liable for the damage he caused the girl if the evidence suggests it - and even then, it would be his parents being sued and not him. Furthermore, she could then sue the school board under the aforementioned tort.

This seems to be a big problem with civil claim: you can't squeeze blood from a stone. I suppose that's why a contract made with a person who is bankrupt is considered illegal and thus void, simply because that person cannot possibly be awarded damages against them when they have no money.

EDIT: I like waffles; so much so that when I went to reread this post, I said to myself "tl;dr," and that was the end of it.




EDIT3:
Let's redo this. Simply because I like this case already.
She has a very strong case, regardless of what I said earlier - I mean, she filed the suit, not the school board. She has a strong case under the tort of negligence - if the boy is found guilty (on the balance). The school board has a strong case for counter-claim should he be found not guilty (in a civil proceding, not a criminal one).

Also, I do think a formal criminal proceding needs to take place if anything is going to go forward with this case. If the boy is found guilty of rape in a criminal court, his parents will be liable and so will the school. I think the lawyers in this case might have jumped the gun too fast.

Last edited by Age of Ignorance; August 18th 2011 at 01:12 PM.