Language Supporting a Special Jury Instruction?
by: Ryan • July 19, 2012 • no comments
Today, the OSC issued a couple of noteworthy opinions. The summaries will be posted later today on this website.
I always read opinions with the possibility that there will be language appropriate to a special jury instruction. That's what I thought when I read this quote:
Put differently, a defendant charged with violating ORS 163.375(1)(a) may always raise consent as a defense, either in the sense that the sexual act occurred as a result of consent rather than as a result of forcible compulsion or in the sense that, to the extent that force was involved, the victim consented to it.
The last half of that last sentence would only be relevant in a small percentage of cases involving force, but in those cases, an instruction that explains that consent can occur even when there is also a certain amount of force that exists. It's a good paragraph in that it recognizes an occasional dynamic within the broad spectrum of human sexual relations. Please note that I am not in any way condoning consent that is a product of force, only that in some sexual interactions that are independently consensual, force might be part of the interaction.
