‘Grim’ New Jersey Law Allows Death With No Evidence of Rape or Sexual Assault
By Amy Gershman, Associated PressA new bill introduced by New Jersey lawmakers would allow people accused of raping a woman to die with no evidence of rape or sexual assault.
A bill sponsored by Assemblywoman Patricia Brennan, R-New Brunswick, would make the death penalty a form of punishment in cases involving rape and sexual assault, but not a final judgment, according to a report in The Associated Press.
In the bill, victims would be required to give “substantial and credible evidence” that they were raped, the AP said.
The bill would make death penalty hearings mandatory for victims.
It’s the latest effort to ease the death sentence for rape and other sexual assaults.
In December, a bipartisan group of lawmakers introduced a bill to allow people convicted of rape and indecent assault to be executed without a jury trial.
A few weeks earlier, lawmakers introduced the “Ninth Amendment” proposal to make the decision on whether to impose the death or life sentence for the crime more transparent.
The bill’s author, Assemblywoman Brennan, said in a statement Thursday that the bill would help victims of rape by allowing them to be able to speak out.
The victim would also be able “to have a jury decide on the validity of their accusation,” Brennan said.
The new bill is a response to a new report in the New Jersey General Assembly, which found that some women who are raped may not want to testify against the attacker.
The report found that nearly one in five rapes reported in the state involve the accused rapist.
The report said the number of rape-related deaths rose by more than 300 percent between 1999 and 2014.
It was one of several reports released Thursday that showed that rape remains a significant and deadly problem in New Jersey.
A spokeswoman for the state Department of Public Safety said in an email that while it was the first time in the State’s history that a bill allowing the death of a convicted rapist was introduced in the legislature, the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene “has been in the process of evaluating a number of potential revisions to our death penalty law to make it more effective and effective in protecting the public.”
We remain committed to providing the best possible care for all our victims, and we look forward to continuing to work with the New York legislature to address this critical issue,” the department said.
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