Court Opinion

ID: 9868623
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-26 18:45:02.68274+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:45:52.167380
License: Public Domain

On Petition to Reheae.
Plaintiff in error has petitioned the Court for a rehearing of his appeal, complaining that the opinion is erroneous in many particulars. It is contended that it' “overturns the long established rule that actual consent of the female is necessary proof in ‘Violation of Age of Consent Prosecutions ’, also that the element of consent must be corroborated; and furthermore that the opinion abolishes the distinction between the offense of ‘Violating the Age of Consent’ (Code, section 1086) and ‘Rape’ (Code, section 10780).” The petition and brief is largely a reargument of the case.
*229We find nothing in Code, section 10786 providing that consent of the female to an act of intercourse is an essential element of the crime. “The substance of the crime legislated against ... is the having unlawful carnal knowledge of a female between stated ages. It is assumed that such act is with the actual consent of the female, bid the law deprives her of the power.of giving,so to speak, a lawful consent; that is, a consent effective to exonerate the defendant from legal wrong.” (Italics ours.) McEwing v. State, 134 Tenn. 649, 653, 185 S. W. 688, 689. In this opinion Mr. Chief Justice Neil (not the writer of this opinion) made the following observation, 134 Tenn. page 657, 185 S. W. page 690: “ Females between the ages of 12 and 21 years are incapable of giving a lawful consent to their own defilement, but the law recognizes the defilement of such females, if accomplished without force, or with their actual though not legal consent, as an offense distinct from rape, and punishable by a penalty far less severe; such offense being punishable by confinement in the state penitentiary for a term of from 3 to 10 years, while the penalty for the crime of rape is death (Shan. Code, sec. 6452), subject to communtation by the jury trying the case to confinement in the penitentiary for a period of not less than 10 years.” (Italics ours.)
The essential element of the crime of rape is want of consent, that is, that the act was done forcibly and against the will of the female. Under an early English statute, females under twelve years of age were considered incapable of consent. The statute was enacted to change the rule of the common law under which “It was not rape to have sexual intercourse with a female child, however young, if she consented.” 52 C. J., p. 1020. The effect of our own statute on this subject is to modify *230the rule of law under which the violated female could not legally consent. The theory upon which the English statute rests is found in a statement by Sir William Blackstone, referred to in State ex rel. Hull v. Rimmer, 129 Tenn. 383, 387, 164 S. W. 1148, 1149, as follows: “The consent or nonconsent is immaterial, as by reason of her tender years she is incapable of judgment and discretion. ’ ’ This statement was not made with reference to the crime of rape but to the Age of Consent Statute.
The plaintiff in error is here insisting that the State carry a burden which would in effect nullify the Age of Consent Statute, because it would be a rare case where it would be .possible to corroborate the fact that the violated female consented to the act. Moreover, if under the Age of Consent Statute consent to the act is “assumed”, as'held in McEwing v. State, supra, it follows that it need not be shown in order to make out the offense.
Counsel for petitioner is mistaken in the view that the Court discredited Pauline Gentry, who was the chief prosecuting witness. It is true we suggested that there was some evidence indicating that she was not an unwilling participant in the act. But the opinion points out strong, if not conclusive, evidence corroborating her as to the act of intercourse. Conceding that we were in error in saying that she may have consented, although she testified that it was the result of force, the fact remains that she was the victim of plaintiff in error’s lecherous and lustful desires. He has violated the law enacted to protect virtuous young womanhood, and is in no position to claim that he should have been indicted and tried for the more heinous crime of rape. Reagan v. State, 155 Tenn. 397, 293 S. W. 755.
In Wright v. State, 76 Tenn. 563, 568, the following statement, taken from Bishop on Criminal Law, is ap*231proved: “ ‘If the evidence show him to he guilty of a higher offense than he stands indicted for, or of á lower, or of one differing in nature, whether under a statute or at common law, he cannot he heard to complain; the question being, whether it shows him to he guilty of the one charged: ’ 1 Bish. Crim. Law, sec. 791. ’ ’ (Italics ours.)
The petition is denied.