The increasing reach and the "unintended" consequences of rape shield laws have had more than a few Constitutional problems mainly those where a defendant has a right to a fair trial. These laws, enforced to make sure accusers are not "smeared" in court, have more than a few times kept juries from seeing or hearing evidence that is extremely relevant to the persons accused and may been responsible for sending an innocent man or boy to jail for something they did not do and given how frequent false rape accusations are rape shield laws are even more deadly to basic constitutional. These laws also shield the accusers' identity from the media and despite the amount of damage a false rape accusation can bring the person accused does not have his identity shielded.
On November I, a Manhattan courtwithdrew all charges against Oliver Jovanovic,who was a Columbia University student.Oliver was at the center of a "cybersex" casewhere he was accused ofkidnapping, sexual assault andsexual torture.
In 1998,Oliver was convicted of attacking Jamie Rzucek who was a student at Barnard Collegeand wasgivena minimum sentenceof 15 years behind bars.Jamiesaid thatOliverkept her in his apartment against her will for over20 hours andthat he sexually abused her. The defense argued that no torture had ever occurred and Jamie's claim that she wassodomized against her will by Oliver was disputed by themedical evidence,the jury eventually concluded that no torture ever happened and everything that did happen was consensual.
Thisof course,was crippled by William Wetzel's (the judged)decision to excludesomeof the e-mailmessages betweenOliver and Jamiewhere shetalked abouther "adventures" in sadomasochism, including herthen relationship in itwith a man. These emails,Wetzel concluded, werenot admissiblethanks toNew York State's rape shield laws because theydealtwith the accuser's sexual conduct which was (under the "law") not allowed.
Thankfully, the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court, setdismissed the convictionbecause they claimedthatthejudgehadapplied the rape shield law improperlywhich lefta "distorted view of the evidence." The case wasnow setfor a much neededretrial, butJamie proveddid not wantto testify a second time, and prosecutorseventuallydismissed the case.Oliver's innocencecame at a veryhigh price:about $500,000 in legal fees, as well as 20 months in prison.
Even before theOliver trial, thebest known case to raisethe "rape shield law"issues was that of Marv Albert (a sportscaster), who was accused by his "friend" and sexual partner Vanessa Perhach of assault and oral sodomy. At the trial, Albert's attorneys tried to bring upVanessa's sexual conduct with other males, especially those wholeft her (asAlbert was about to). She reportedly was very unstable and went on toharass and threaten a former boyfriend's family, andeven madefalse accusations of crimes against one of themas a form of revenge (according to a Eugene kanin study the most common reasons for a false rape accusation by a woman was "spite or revenge),a former boyfriend ofVenessa's was also evenwilling to testify.
Thanks torape shield laws ALL of this evidence was not allowed byJudge Benjaimin Kendrick. Ofcourse the rape shield laws only protect thewoman ina case like this and the judge allowed a women to testify against Marv, in which sheclaimed thatMarv had sexually assaulted her a few years earlier.With the defense unable to do anything because of the rape shield law,Marv was forced toplead guilty tomisdemeanor assault. The outcome was ashock to many people observing the case and even those, like Geraldo Rivera who generally had a lot of sympathy to a victims' (accusers) rights concluded that case was "shockingly unfair".
In 1993, 18-year-old Charles Steadman was accused andconvicted ofsexually assaultinghis foster sister Jessica who was 22in a he said/she said case where therewas NO physical evidence of force and a defendant that claimedthatthe sex was consensual.The jury was inthe darkabout all of the facts of the case because they did not know (thanks to therape shield law) that when Jessica accused Charles of sexual assault, she was actually alreadyfacing criminal charges of having sex with minors. (She eventually received probation for her crime.) This definetely gave her a reason to lieespecially consideringshe had sex with Charles whenhe was not of legal age.This mighthave lead her to believe that if she claimed to be a victim that would improvethe legal situation she was inor she might have worried that if her encounter withCharles were ever known, she probably would become in even more trouble with the law. Of coursenone of this could be introducedbecause rape shield laws made hersexual activities not admissible.
