Jury limited to only two options creates injustice.

[Joe blogs]

Hi, sometime ago I was a member of a jury and the case was one of rape. The problem was that members of the jury felt that due to the unique facts of the case, the sentence the accused was likely to get was unjust. But due to the black and white definition of rape, this guy got four years due to government guidelines on sentencing.

Whereas the jury members felt he should have been given a lighter sentence, but didn't have a third option.

Should rape charges be reclassified to, for example, Rape one, Rape two, Rape three, to indicate the severity of the case?

[Snoopyseed]

put bluntly no, rape 1 rape 2 or rape 3 doesnt matter, because at the end of the day a victim of any crime can suffer emotional or mental health problems for a lifetime, sometimes a person can be so traumatised just from having their bag snatched where others can handle it, but the point here is it doesnt make it right!
it doesnt matter about how severe or not a crime is, the point is no one has a right to rape anyone, juts because the rape didnt seem too severe to you or other members of the jury, it may not be the case for the survivor of the crime, during a rape or even an assault you can feel like you are going to die, you are in a position whereby you do not know what the other person is going to do to you, and just that alone can cause people to commit suicide later, a small grope may not sound severe, but it has been known for people to take an overdose because of the grope, because even though all that happned was a grope, the person felt that it could of led to something else and it is that fear of what could have happened that have led peoplke to become agrophobic, and develop PTSD. Rape is rape, no one has the right to be touching another person in any way shape or form without express permission, if penetration took place how can you say that it wasnt severe, if you are not the person experiencing being penetrated against your will?
Just think about how you would feel if someone had raped a close female to you, and you saw her try and kill herself? could you say it wasnt severe then? how would you feel, if the perpertrator got off with rape 1? when the effect of the assault had the impact on the survivor of a rape 3?
Snoopy