Women's groups outraged by rape ruling

["Macdonald Stainsby" <mstainsby@xxxxxx>]

AP. 13 December 2001. Women's groups outraged by rape ruling.

MADRID -- Women's groups condemned Spain's justice system Wednesday
after the Supreme Court reduced the sentence of a rapist because he was
drunk, the latest in a string of rulings in which the aggressor's
drinking and the victim's past were seen as mitigating factors.

"What is happening in our country is a monstrosity," said Tina Alarcon
of the Federation of Aid Associations for Sexually Abused Women. "Some
of these judges exhibit a male chauvinism that is right out of the
Middle Ages."

On Monday, the high court quashed the sentence in the conviction of
18-year-old Marcos Gonzalez Rodriguez for raping a mentally retarded
girl while two friends pinned her down.

The five male justices cut Rodriguez's sentence from 13 1/2 to eight
years and those of co-defendants Manuel Rodriguez Bidault and Rafael
Rodriguez Racca from 12 and six years to two years each because the
lower court failed to take account what the court called "very valid"
mitigating circumstances.

"Having ingested alcoholic beverages throughout the night, the three
accused manifested an intellectual capacity that was slightly below
average," the Supreme Court ruling said. "Taken together, these may be
considered to have keenly affected their volitional faculties."

The assault took place three years ago as the defendants left a  pub at
4 a.m. and offered to give the girl a lift home in the northwestern town
of Ourense. After she saw she was not being driven toward home, she
tried to escape by jumping from the car three times, the ruling said.

The age of the victim was not immediately available.

Last spring, a Barcelona court sparked an outcry when it handed down a
minimum six-year sentence to a policeman who forced a 13-year-old girl
to perform oral sex at gunpoint. The court said it considered the
victim's previous sexual experience as a mitigating factor.

According to Micaela Navarro of the opposition Socialist party, a study
over a six-month period last year found 56 court cases in which
sentences were reduced against men who sexually assaulted or violently
abused women.

"There is a collection of many cases in which courts are taking as
mitigating factors conditions which should be aggravating factors," said
Marisa Soleto of the Women's Foundation.

Women's rights and rape victims' organizations have helped the Socialist
party draft a proposed "Law against Gender Violence," which would expand
legal protections for victimized women and provide stricter standards
for mitigating factors.

A debate on the legislation is expected this month.



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Macdonald Stainsby
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