UNLAWFUL CARNAL KNOWLEDGE

Sex between adults and children is in the news again today for several reasons. Former world champion boxer Lionel Rose has been accused of sexually abusing an eleven-year-old girl.

According to a front-page splash in the Melbourne Herald Sun today Rose forced the young girl to perform sexual acts on him when she was eleven. She is now fourteen. Rose has not been charged but according to reports the girl’s family is now seeking an AVO to prevent Rose and his relatives from harassing the alleged victim and her mother.

Police did interview the child twice and did interview Rose. The alleged victim gave the newspaper a statutory declaration. Her parents told the newspaper they were frustrated and angry that the word of an eleven-year-old was not enough for Rose to be charged with sexual assault charges.

When Rose was approached by a newspaper reporter he denied even knowing the girl. He is quoted as saying: “Don’t know who you are talking about, mate. I can’t comment about anything mate, sorry”.

And yet, allegedly, Rose and his sister, have visited the family this week, forced them to flee their house and seek emergency police accommodation and seek an AVO.

There is a lot more to this story. The alleged victim says: “Why would I make something like that up. He made me feel disgusted. I hate him. I wish he was dead”.

She claims she eventually got away from the former world champion, locked herself in her bedroom and cried herself to sleep.

On another issue about under-age sex there is threat of legal action involving a well-known sportsman and a teenage girl. And this has got me researching the laws of unlawful carnal knowledge in the state of Victoria.

My belief has always been that the laws about sex are two-fold. If the girl is sixteen and willing then intercourse is legal if the male is under 18. But she must be 18 years old if he is older than 21.

That discrepancy, presumably, was to prevent impressionable teenagers being seduced by worldly, older men. And it makes sense.

But the Crimes Act of 1958 -- Section 49 – seems to contain a dangerous anomaly.

It says that you can be jailed for two years if you penetrate a girl who is over sixteen but under 18. But then gives you an out if you believe “ on reasonable grounds” that the person was 18 or over the age of 18.

But the most perturbing defence is a sub-section that says you can launch a defence against a charge of under-age sex if “the person had previously willingly taken part in an act of sexual penetration with a person other than the accused”.

Think about it. This is the “so what she wasn’t a virgin” defence. And that is manifestly wrong.

Does this mean that if a 16-year-old schoolgirl has sex with her 16-year-old boyfriend and then later is seduced by a 50-year-old teacher he is not guilty of a carnal knowledge crime?

It also means than in any criminal action that schoolgirl’s sexual history must be brought out.

Is that what our lawmakers intended?

If this is a true interpretation then the law is wrong. It must be amended. Who’s looking after the children?

Wednesday, October 27, 2004

©Copyright Derryn Hinch 2004