Court Opinion

ID: 9756138
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-28 21:09:35.027429+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:56:12.826970
License: Public Domain

ZAPPALA, Justice,
concurring.
I concur with the majority’s holding that the victim’s testimony and the physical evidence of trauma was suffi*567dent to establish the element of fordble compulsion. I cannot accept, however, the majority’s conclusion that forcible compulsion would have been established in the absence of that evidence.
The majority’s discussion of whether the age of a victim is in itself sufficient to establish forcible compulsion is unnecessary under the factual circumstances presented in this case. I do not join in that portion of the majority opinion and am concerned that the majority’s finding that forcible compulsion may be established by a showing of the respective capacities of the defendant and victim will eradicate the distinction between the criminal offenses of rape, 18 Pa.C.S. § 3121, and statutory rape, 18 Pa. C.S. § 3121.
McDERMOTT, J., joins in this concurring opinion.