An Iowa woman alleges an officer raped her after arresting her boyfriend.
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We all know the system protects its own but I hope this will be an exception and there will be a fair trial.
I also think there needs to be an official law that in a rape trial, the sex life and other personal lifestyle matters of the victim will be inadmissible in court. The "hey, she's a tramp" defense should have gone away a long time ago. Even if she's a prostitute or the community bike, consent is always required.
And on what planet is having sex with your steady boyfriend considered sexually loose anyway? Nobody actually expects people to remain virgins until their wedding night anymore, do they?
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Quote:An Iowa woman has decided to go public and file civil charges against former Muscatine police officer Tom Tovar for raping her.
Shari Martin told WQAD that she decided not to take advantage of Iowa's Rape Shield Law that would have allowed her to file the lawsuit anonymously because she didn't have anything to be ashamed of.
“I want people to know this happens to regular people and I’m done," she explained. "I don’t want to be a victim anymore. I want to come out and say I have nothing to be ashamed of. I did nothing wrong, and I was not able to consent."
In 2013, then-Officer Tovar had pulled over Martin's boyfriend's car for OWI after the two had been out drinking on Valentines Day. According to court and police records, Tovar had taken Martin back to her hotel room while her boyfriend was being booked into jail.
Martin said that she didn't even remember being in Tovar's patrol car. And when she woke up several hours later, she realized that she had been raped.
“I realized I was naked. I don’t sleep naked. I started having a flashback. I came to and said, ‘Oh my God, there was a police officer laying on me,'” she recalled.
A police investigation later determined that Tovar's DNA matched sperm found on Martin's hotel bedding and inside of her jeans.
Tovar told investigators that he spent 13 minutes of unaccounted time going to the hotel front desk to get a new room key because Martin's was broken. He said that she was so "drunk he had to help her carry in all of her items."
“He admitted that he had lied about the room key, but did so because he thought it would be funny,” a criminal complaint against Tovar later pointed out.
In his defense, the married officer eventually admitted that he did have sex with Martin, but he insisted that it was consensual.
WQAD reported that Tovar's attorney had filed a motion in the criminal case to admit evidence that Martin had sex with her boyfriend that night before she was allegedly attacked and the next morning.
“I expect they are going to do their best to make it look like a female vixen kind of thing,” Martin lamented.
We all know the system protects its own but I hope this will be an exception and there will be a fair trial.
I also think there needs to be an official law that in a rape trial, the sex life and other personal lifestyle matters of the victim will be inadmissible in court. The "hey, she's a tramp" defense should have gone away a long time ago. Even if she's a prostitute or the community bike, consent is always required.
And on what planet is having sex with your steady boyfriend considered sexually loose anyway? Nobody actually expects people to remain virgins until their wedding night anymore, do they?
Atheist Forums Hall of Shame:
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist
"The trinity can be equated to having your cake and eating it too."
... -Lucent, trying to defend the Trinity concept
"(Yahweh's) actions are good because (Yahweh) is the ultimate standard of goodness. That’s not begging the question"
... -Statler Waldorf, Christian apologist