The State - News from Jan. 3, 1986

The state Supreme Court has let stand a ruling that a woman who consents to sex, changes her mind in the midst of the act but is violently forced to continue, cannot charge she was raped. The court, by a 4-3 vote, refused to reinstate the 1982 forcible rape conviction of David H. Vela in a Bakersfield case involving a 14-year-old girl. The one-line decision was without comment. The ruling to let stand the state Court of Appeal decision for the first time defines the legal limit of forcible rape to exclude instances when a woman agrees to sex but objects in the midst of the act and is physically forced to continue. Deputy state Atty. Gen. Joel Carey said “this little girl was beaten to a pulp. It was forcible rape as far as I’m concerned, but I guess not in this state.”