a public defender

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When the alleged victim is a hooker, according to a magistrate judge in Philly. Initially charged with sexual assault, the judge dismissed those charges, but left standing “theft of service” charges against the defendant.

“She consented and she didn’t get paid . . . I thought it was a robbery.”

Now this is particularly curious, given that she ended up having sex with four men [one of whom paid] (a fifth noticed her crying and helped her leave), reportedly at gunpoint.

The judge, it seems, exhibited some contempt for prostitution:

“Did she tell you she had another client before she went to report it?” Deni asked [the writer of the news story] yesterday when [they] met at a coffee shop.

“I thought rape was a terrible trauma.”

A case like this, she said - to [the writer's] astonishment - “minimizes true rape cases and demeans women who are really raped.”

This is the sort of argument that, when proposed in a “brainstorming” session, results in raised eyebrows and a few uncomfortable laughs and perhaps a “nice try, old chum” or two.

Whatever her stance on prostitution, I think the judge might have picked the wrong case to state it.

More here.