Loose Cannon
Junior
- Joined
- Jul 25, 2017
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This is why people hate lawyers. This bum negged me and then wrote his senior thesis explaining why I was correct.You should have read the second paragraph of the website you pulled this from a bit more carefully. The age of consent in Texas is 17, which is reinforced in several statutes. But that's where the first half of the article loses its veracity.
Under Texas Penal Code 22.011(e)(2), it is an affirmative defense to a claim of sexual assault if the actor was "not more than three years older than the victim" and the victim "was a child of 14 years or older." So, under the Texas Penal Code, it is statutory rape to have *** with somebody under seventeen — unless you are within three years of age of the younger person and the younger person is at least fourteen. Thus, and contrary to the quoted passage, Texas does have some protections in place for proximity in age. But, because it is an affirmative defense (which must be raised by the defendant in response to a charge), a Texas prosecutor with an ax to grind or just having a rough week or who hates l$u football could still bring charges against someone within the 3 year window provided by the statute (but that person would likely be acquitted eventually upon proof that he and the alleged victim were within 3 years in age).
But all of the above deals with "ordinary" sexual assault. The article says Ed was charged with two counts of "aggravated sexual assault of a minor." Pursuant to Texas Penal Code 22.021, the factors that change a sexual assault from "ordinary" to "aggravated" under Texas law are:
So, the State of Texas is not just alleging that Ed had *** with a minor; they are alleging he also either: (1) physically hurt her or tried to kill her; (2) placed her in fear of injury, murder, kidnapping, or trafficking; (3) threatened to seriously hurt her, kill her, kidnap her, or traffic her; (4) used a deadly weapon; (5) involved another individual in the assault (a second perpetrator); (6) drugged her or otherwise impaired her judgment; or (7) the girl was under the age of 14.
- Causes serious bodily injury or attempting to cause the death of the victim or someone else in the course of the crime;
- Places the victim in fear that they or another person will be seriously physically hurt, killed, kidnapped, or trafficked;
- Threatens to seriously physically harm, kill, kidnap, or traffic another person;
- Uses or exhibit a deadly weapon during the crime;
- Acts in concert with another person who also sexual assaults the victim during the same course of criminal conduct; or
- Administers a substance that impairs the victim’s ability to judge the nature of your conduct or resist; or
- Assaults a child under the age of 14 years, regardless of whether you knew the child’s age at the time of the sexual conduct.
This post is not intended as legal advice. Please consult an attorney licensed in Texas for any questions you may have about Texas's statutory rape laws (especially if your name is Ed Ingram).
We know what he was charged with. Any implications were based on the charges. We don’t need the Texas penal code explained in that much detail, when 95% of it ignores the charges.
