Maouloud Baby v. State

Last updated
State v. Baby
Court Maryland Court of Appeals
Full case nameState of Maryland v. Maouloud Baby.
DecidedApril 16, 2008 (2008-04-16)
Citation(s) 946 A.2d 463 ; 404 Md. 220
Court membership
Judges sitting Robert M. Bell, Irma S. Raker, Glenn T. Harrell Jr., Lynne A. Battaglia, Clayton Greene Jr., Alan M. Wilner, Dale R. Cathell [lower-alpha 1]
Case opinions
Decision byBattaglia
ConcurrenceGreene, Cathell
Concur/dissentBell, Raker, Harrell, Wilner
Keywords

Maouloud Baby v. State of Maryland [1] (aka Maryland v. Baby) is a Maryland state court case relating to the ability to withdraw sexual consent. [2]

Contents

Initially, the two men involved were charged as adults with first-degree rape. First defendant, Michael Wilson, pleaded guilty to second-degree rape and was sentenced to 18 months. Maouloud Baby's first trial ended in a mistrial. In his second trial, he was convicted of the state crimes of first-degree rape, first-degree sexual offense and third-degree sexual offense. Baby appealed on the grounds that the trial judge had refused to answer questions from the jury on whether rape includes consensual intercourse that becomes non-consensual. In 2006 the Maryland Court of Special Appeals held that the judge should have answered in the negative, reversed Baby's convictions, and remanded the case for re-trial. The prosecution cross-appealed to the state Court of Appeals. That court held in 2007 that the judge should have answered in the positive: "Post-penetration withdrawal of consent negates initial consent for the purposes of sexual offense crimes and, when coupled with the other elements, may constitute the crime of rape" - but affirmed the reversal of conviction and remand due to court error. [1]

J.L's testimony

As detailed in court testimony quoted in the Court of Appeals opinion, [1] on December 13, 2003, Maouloud Baby (1988- ), age 15, and a classmate, Michael Wilson, were students at Watkins Mill High School in Montgomery Village, Maryland. They drove to a residential area with an 18-year-old woman who attended Montgomery College. Baby and Wilson knew the woman socially. After the woman parked the car, Baby and Wilson asked her to sit between them in the back seat of the car. After she did they began touching her sexually. They told her that she would not be able to leave until "they finished whatever they told [her] to do". Baby got out of the car and Wilson had sexual intercourse with her. Then Baby got back in and had a brief conversation with the woman. When asked if she felt like she had a choice whether or not to have intercourse with him, she said "Not really. I don't know. Something just clicked off and I just did whatever they said." Baby then said "So are you going to let me hit it?" She replied "As long as [you] stop when I tell [you] to." She said the intercourse was becoming painful and she asked him to stop and he stopped about 5 seconds later and did not ejaculate. All three returned to the McDonald's restaurant in Montgomery Village where they had been earlier that day. Before leaving, the woman and Wilson hugged, and she gave Baby her telephone number. Hours later she told a friend's mother what had happened and the police were called.

Baby and Wilson's testimony

Baby and Wilson differed in large parts with the above testimony. They stated that at no time were they together in the back seat of the car, nor did they say she wouldn't be allowed to leave the car at any time. Baby and Wilson maintained that she was in the front passenger seat for the entire duration of the incident, and could have "easily left the car if she wanted to". After Wilson had had sexual intercourse with J.L, Baby returned to the car and took his place in the drivers seat. At which point he asked J.L "So are you going to let me hit it?" She replied "As long as [you] stop when I tell [you] to." He stated that once he had put the condom on, he couldn't get his penis into her vagina: "...it wouldn't go in, and I tried a couple more times and it wouldn't go in. I didn't feel nothing there". "And then she sat up. She was like, "It's not going to go in," and that's when, after she sat up and said "It's not going to go in," that's when I took off the condom and I put it in my pocket and then knocked on the window for Michael to come in." He further testified that he had never had sexual intercourse before the incident. He was aged 15 when the incident took place. [1]

Courts

The jury in the trial court convicted Baby of first degree rape and related charges, but the Court of Special Appeals, based upon a 1980 precedent that held that a rape could not legally occur if a woman withdrew consent after penetration, [3] reversed the conviction. [4] That precedent interpreted the English common law such that the withdrawal of consent following initial penetration did not make the act a rape. The court noted other states had noted that the act of intercourse is not completed at the initial penetration, and so consent could be withdrawn at any point during intercourse. For rape, the court noted that force or threat of force was a necessary element of the crime. Due to issues involving the instructions to the jury regarding rape and consent, the case was remanded for a new trial.

In 2008, the Court of Appeals affirmed the Court of Special Appeals' reversal of the convictions and remand for re-trial, due to the trial court's error in failing to answer the jury's questions about whether a sex act continued after the withdrawal of consent could constitute rape if penetration had already occurred. [1] However, the court ruled that consent could be withdrawn at any time, even if the victim had initially consented. [5]

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Both Wilner and Cathell were retired justices assigned to the court.

Related Research Articles

<i>R v Park</i> Supreme Court of Canada case

R v Park [1995] 2 S.C.R. 836, is a Supreme Court of Canada case dealing with the mistaken belief defence – i.e. that the accused had an honest but mistaken belief that he had consent to engage in sexual relations with the complainant – and the role of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms in relation to sexual assault.

In criminal law, consent may be used as an excuse and prevent the defendant from incurring liability for what was done.

James Alan Gell is an American who was wrongfully convicted of first-degree murder in 1998 and sentenced to death in Bertie County, North Carolina, at the age of 22. He served nine years as an inmate on death row before being acquitted in a second trial in 2004; he was freed from prison and exonerated that year. He was the 113th person to be freed from death row in the United States.

Rape is a type of sexual assault initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, under threat or manipulation, by impersonation, or with a person who is incapable of giving valid consent.

The concept of rape, both as an abduction and in the sexual sense, makes its appearance in early religious texts.

In common law jurisdictions, statutory rape is nonforcible sexual activity in which one of the individuals is below the age of consent. Although it usually refers to adults engaging in sexual contact with minors under the age of consent, it is a generic term, and very few jurisdictions use the actual term statutory rape in the language of statutes.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ages of consent in the United States</span> U.S. law on age of consent to sexual activity

In the United States, each state and territory sets the age of consent either by statute or the common law applies, and there are several federal statutes related to protecting minors from sexual predators. Depending on the jurisdiction, the legal age of consent is between 16 and 18. In some places, civil and criminal laws within the same state conflict with each other.

Rape is a statutory offence in England and Wales. The offence is created by section 1 of the Sexual Offences Act 2003:

(1) A person (A) commits an offence if—

(2) Whether a belief is reasonable is to be determined having regard to all the circumstances, including any steps A has taken to ascertain whether B consents.
(3) Sections 75 and 76 apply to an offence under this section.

(4) A person guilty of an offence under this section is liable, on conviction on indictment, to imprisonment for life.

Rape by deception is a situation in which the perpetrator deceives the victim into participating in a sexual act that they would otherwise not consent to. Deception can occur in many forms, such as false statements or actions.

<i>DPP v Morgan</i>

DPP v Morgan[1975] UKHL 3 was a decision of the House of Lords which decided that an honest belief by a man that a woman with whom he was engaged with sexual intercourse was consenting was a defence to rape, irrespective of whether that belief was based on reasonable grounds. This case was superseded by the Sexual Offences Act 2003 which came into force on 1 May 2004.

<i>R v Evans and McDonald</i>

R v Evans and McDonald was the prosecution of two footballers, Ched Evans and Clayton McDonald, who were accused of the rape of a woman. On 20 April 2012, Evans was convicted and sentenced to five years imprisonment. McDonald was acquitted. Several people were later fined after naming the woman on Twitter and other social media websites.

Rape is the fourth most common crime against women in India. According to the 2021 annual report of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB), 31,677 rape cases were registered across the country, or an average of 86 cases daily, a rise from 2020 with 28,046 cases, while in 2019, 32,033 cases were registered. Of the total 31,677 rape cases, 28,147(nearly 89%) of the rapes were committed by persons known to the victim. The share of victims who were minors or below 18 - the legal age of consent - stood at 10%.

S v Masiya is an important case in South African criminal law, decided by the Constitutional Court.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alex Hepburn (cricketer)</span> Australian cricketer

Alex Hepburn is a former cricketer from Australia and convicted sex offender, who last played for Worcestershire County Cricket Club in England. In April 2019, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment for the rape of a sleeping woman as part of a WhatsApp-based "sexual conquest game". He was imprisoned at HM Prison Littlehey. Hepburn was released from prison on October 26, 2021.

Non-consensual condom removal, or "stealthing", is the practice of a person removing a condom during sexual intercourse without consent, when their sex partner has only consented to condom-protected sex. Victims are exposed to potential sexually transmitted diseasess (STDs) such as HIV/AIDS, or unwanted pregnancies. Such behaviour may be therefore regarded as sexual assault or rape, and sometimes as a form of reproductive coercion. As of 2020, stealthing is punishable as a form of sexual violence in some countries, such as Germany and the United Kingdom.

In Islam, human sexuality is governed by Islamic law (Sharia). Accordingly, sexual violation is regarded as a violation of moral and divine law. Islam divides claims of sexual violation into 'divine rights' and 'interpersonal rights' : the former requiring divine punishment and the latter belonging to the more flexible human realm.

Rape in Alabama is currently defined across three sections of its Criminal Code: Definitions, Rape in the First Degree, and Rape in the Second Degree. Each section addresses components of the crime such as age, sentencing, the genders of the individuals involved, and the acts involved.

Rape laws vary across the United States jurisdictions. However, rape is federally defined for statistical purposes as:

Penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.

Sexual consent plays an important role in laws regarding rape, sexual assault and other forms of sexual violence. In a court of law, whether or not the alleged victim had freely given consent, and whether or not they were deemed to be capable of giving consent, can determine whether the alleged perpetrator is guilty of rape, sexual assault or some other form of sexual misconduct.

<i>McNally v R</i> 2013 English criminal case

McNally v R [Crim 1051 (2013)], is a 2013 court decision in which the English and Wales Court of Appeals (EWCA) ruled that Scottish student Justine McNally's prior conviction of six counts of sexual assault by penetration would be upheld. McNally's sentence, however, was reduced. The convictions were made under the Sexual Offences Act 2003. Various other cases were explored to maintain the conviction, expanding the previously slim "rape by deception" laws. McNally v R was one of the first cases to display gender fraud or gender deception arguments.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Maryland v. Baby, 946A.2d463 (Md.2007).
  2. ↑ Londoño, Ernesto (November 2, 2006). "Court Says Consensual Sex Can't Become Rape". Washington Post . Retrieved 2007-02-14.
  3. ↑ Battle v. Maryland,414A.2d1266, 1270(Md.1980).
  4. ↑ Baby v. Maryland, 916A.2d410 (Md.2007).
  5. ↑ Wyatt, Kristen (April 16, 2008). "Md. Court Rules Women Can Withdraw Sexual Consent". Washington Post.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.