www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2003/01/06/state1919EST0124.DTL
The 7-0 decision clarifies almost 18 years of conflicting California precedent. In 1985, a state appeals court ruled that such circumstances were not rape, which carries a maximum eight-year prison term for each count. The case attracted widespread attention from anti-crime and women's groups. They feared a contrary ruling would upset a woman's autonomy over her body. During the past two decades, rape rules across the country and California have been slowly softening the burden on women. In California, for example, the Legislature and the state's courts have been revising the definition of rape. Among other changes, women sometimes were required to physically resist to be a rape victim, or their allegations had to be corroborated. Courts had also required some rape victims to undergo mandatory psychological evaluations. It appears the California Supreme Court has clearly rejected an opportunity to revisit past barriers to rape convictions," said Douglas Beloof, an attorney with the National Crime Victim Law Institute. The case involved two El Dorado County 17-year-olds, John Z. They were having consensual sex in a bedroom during a party where alcohol was available. Because they were minors at the time of the 2000 rape, their full names are shielded by law. The boy testified that the sex was consensual and that he stopped when the girl demanded. She disputed that, testifying the boy kept having sex with her for about a "minute and a half" after she said she called it off. Because he was a minor, the boy served about six months in a juvenile facility after being convicted of rape. Justice Janice Rogers Brown, while agreeing with the majority on what constitutes rape, dissented on whether the boy was guilty of it. She said that the boy may have had an honest and reasonable belief that the girl did not waive consent during sex, a defense to rape that California's courts have recognized since 1992. But it does not tell us how soon would have been soon enough," Brown wrote.
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