A 14-year-old Houston teenager may be a registered sex offender for the rest of his life after he was charged with having sex with his 12-year-old girlfriend.
The seventh grader, whose name has not been revealed, has been charged with aggravated sexual assault of a child. His girlfriend is in the sixth grade, the Houston Chronicle said.
“He had consensual sex with his little girlfriend and he loved her. They were boyfriend-girlfriend,” the teen’s mother said.
Texas law has the “Romeo and Juliet” exception, which means that having sex with a juvenile under the age of consent is not illegal, if you’re less than three years older than the person who is under the age of consent.
But that law only applies if both sexual partners are at least 14. If you’re 13 or younger, the Romeo and Juliet exception isn’t valid.
Buried inside this story is a link to an awfully beneficial study….in my estimation. It is a little old being published in 2000, but it written by US Department of Justice…so it should carry some weight.
Oddly, this does not seem to have made it at all to the Supreme Court for the Smith v. Doe case that has harmed us so badly for the past 15 years.
In any case, for others to study or use:
https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/saycrle.pdf
Best Wishes, James
“The age with the highest number of people arrested for a sex offense is 14”. Now think about this. This is a major weakness of the entire sex-offender infrastructure. This kid is no monster. There is no victim. These were children driven by hormones, doing what is natural around the entire world for the past several thousands of years. What country does this? We live in a world dominated by pseudo-christian, malicious, sadistic, shame-filled assholes who take great pleasure whenever they can label someone and destroy a life.
Sex offender laws are written for both men and women, boy and girl. If he is being charged for having sex with an underage girl, then she should also be charged with having consensual sex with an underage boy.
Honestly I think the whole thing is stupid. But, if you’re going to apply the law to ruin a life, why not apply it to everyone?
They raped each other.
Young people have sex, and have done so since the dawn of man. Kids explore as a natural part of human development, as any psychologist will tell you. Of course, it can be argued they shouldn’t be engaging in sexual activity from a moral and rational standpoint, but I will never understand the criminalization of such behavior and involving the justice system. But I guess these are situations when, if the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail, at least in the hysteric American mindset.
I cannot wrap my head around placing kids on a registry, for doing what kids naturally do, right alongside adults, holding them to the same standards despite large differences in brain development, impulse control, and decision-making ability (essentially the rationale behind age of consent laws in the first place). Putting kids on the very registry that was originally intended to protect them defies logic and is an absolute travesty. Their lives are ruined before they’ve even begun to live their lives, and for what? For what they did as middle schoolers in the throes of adolescent development? Think about that for a minute. Let it sink in.
Stories like this make my f-ing blood boil. If I had a kid who was being forced to register, I would have a nice chat with the prosecutor and kindly inform him, on the record if need be, that it would happen over my dead body.