This episode suffered from misconceptions about this crime and made the concept murkier, instead of creating enlightenment. But it was wonderful that the writers focused light on this issue. Let me start by confessing that I'm the author of two books about rape by fraud, so my opinion is extremely biased!
Whenever people have sex in NY State, they must both consent to the action and the actor. Society, unfortunately misconstrues the meaning of the word "consent" and confuses it with "agreement." Consent is a special form of agreement.... it's "knowledgeable and informed agreement." Therefore, when a person has sex with you by clouding your judgment so that you are not knowledgeable and informed, either by force, intoxication, drugs, coercion or deception, they are undermining your consent. While you can agree on the face of it, that action is known as "assent." But you cannot "consent" when your judgment is clouded. Saying that a person you lie to "consents" is an oxymoron.
In rape by fraud, as in all types of fraud, the victim does not know they are being defrauded at the time the crime takes place. They are treacherously tricked into thinking that their "assent" is "consent" when it is not. And the offender knows full-well that it is not, even though the victim does not know.
Here's where the plot of this episode goes wrong, (and if you didn't see the "Spoiler Alert" previously, let me caution you again to stop reading right now.) The victim does not behave as a "reasonable" person would be expected to behave by a jury of their peers. In order to try this type of case, the victim would have to be behaving in a "reasonable manner," and have a "reasonable basis of belief" of the lies they are told. There must also be significant proof that a lie indeed took place. So while the victim did, in fact, suffer a crime, it would have been unlikely to lead to an arrest.
The same holds true when victims rush to have sex with someone they just met, regardless that their beliefs were false. If the victim fails to conduct a "reasonable" amount of due diligence, or have a "reasonable" basis of believing the lie(s), it is unlikely that the prosecutor would seek an indictment.
Yes, in "Impostor" the offender lied but not to a "reasonably behaving" victim. Here is a better, and TRUE example of a rape by fraud case that recently happened in New Jersey:
The woman, I'll call her Beth, met Arthur on the dating site, Plenty of Fish. His profile indicated he was divorced with one child. And he had a web presence for his wealth management business that identified him as a successful investment manager. Beth was a physical therapist with 3 children. She'd worked hard and while she wasn't wealthy, she had a reasonable next egg set aside in her 401K.
Their romance blossomed and after several months, Arthur asked Beth to marry him. She was head over heels in love and agreed. He also told her he could get her a better return on her 401k than the current wealth management firm she was using. She wrote a check to his firm for $232,000.00.
I'm sure you've guessed that everything he'd told her was a lie. He wasn't divorced. He was married with four children. And he wasn't a wealth manager either. The IRS came after Beth for another $49K for her failure to roll over her portfolio to a 401K.
Beth attempted to take legal action against Arthur in New Jersey. The police did nothing. She went after him in a civil proceeding. She won her case. It cost her approximately $50K in legal fees. He has defaulted on every payment and has not restored a single dime to her.
If you ask Beth which is the most painful part of what she endured, the monetary loss, or the defilement of her body, she will unequivocally tell you, Arthur's rape of her has caused her the most egregious pain.
I am fighting to enact laws that punish rape by fraud offenders in every state. Today, a limited number of states have clear laws on this crime.... Alabama, Tennessee and Missouri. But in Missouri where Rape by Deception is a 2nd degree rape, the state's SVU Prosecutor is currently failing to press charges against an offender that the Federal Prosecutor says is a "serial rapist." They found evidence that he'd read my blog and knew how harmful his actions would be, but he went ahead anyway. Over 30 women have come forward in this case.
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