In rape trials the criminal intent principle has been distorted to mean that courts must uphold

In rape trials, the criminal intent principle has been distorted to mean that courts must uphold, and impose on survivors and juries, the perspective of a rapist. The Youth Justice & Criminal Evidence Act was supposed to protect women from being cross-examined about their sexual history. But while sexual history evidence was restricted if the man’s defence was that the woman consented, these restrictions were removed if the defence was that he believed she consented. Women’s concerns were raised in Parliament that this would inevitably increase the use of the belief defence.

But they were overruled by Paul Boateng, the Home Office minister.Rape victims were again betrayed when the Act took away a defendant’s right to cross-examine the victim, but left intact the defence barrister’s power to trash her, and then misrepresented this as the end of sexual history cross-examination.The Command Paper is less than satisfactory on other grounds. Some measures presented as completely new, such as criminalising sex with someone with learning disabilities, are mere rewrites of crimes established since 1956. Though ditching the offensive words “mental defective”, they keep people with disabilities in a separate category with considerations that invite discrimination. In the context of rape, discrimination means not to pursue prosecutions at all. As long as the Morgan principle exists, what remains central in court is whether the man thought she consented and whether she gave her consent ceases to matter.Lisa Longstaff is a spokesperson for WAR (Women Against Rape), Crossroads Women’s Centre, 230a Kentish Town Road, London NW5 2AB (tel: 020-7482 2496; fax: 020-7209 4761; e-mail: war womenagainstrape ). The law lords’ ruling affects 225 life-sentence prisoners who have had their minimum terms set by Home Secretaries, including 70 who have already served longer than judges recommended.

Among those eligible are the most notorious killers in England and Wales, including 22 prisoners on a list of inmates never to be released.But it would be wrong to see the judiciary as a soft touch. Although some senior judges have misgivings over the principle of a “natural-life” tariff, they are not opposed to the idea that a prisoner should die in jail because their crimes are so serious. It is possible that “whole-life” prisoners may instead face very long fixed tariffs that almost guarantee they will never be released.There are 3,900 prisoners life-sentence prisoners in England and Wales and their average tariff is 14 years. In 87 per cent of cases, the Home Secretary concurs with the tariff set by the Lord Chief Justice.