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UK has several different legal systems | 211 comments | Create New Account
Comments belong to whoever posts them. Please notify us of inappropriate comments.
UK has several different legal systems
Authored by: Anonymous on Thursday, July 19 2012 @ 10:47 AM EDT
It's a legal loophole, in that you are considered an adult in Scotland at 16 for
most things, but the newer UK peadophile laws use "18 years old"
instead of "adult". So 17-year-olds are both adults, and children, at
the same time. So *both* people involved can be prosecuted for being an adult
sleeping with a child.

I believe the term for the case that is going through is: "test case".
ie. it's to sort out the mess that Westminster created.


And you thought your laws were inconsistant!

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

UK has several different legal systems
Authored by: Wol on Thursday, July 19 2012 @ 10:51 AM EDT
I strongly suspect it's something about "the age of consent is 16" (so
it was all legal in that sense) plus something about "the minor must be
over 18" under certain circumstances. If neither of them met those
circumstances, they would BOTH be treated as being old enough themselves, but
sleeping with an under-age partner.

Which promptly lands you in paedophile territory.

It can get worse - there were headlines (in the Sun, probably, of course)
demanding that a man be prosecuted for sleeping with his wife! UK law recognises
any legitimate foreign marriage, and this couple came to the UK. As far as I can
make out, she was very happily married - but she was only 12.

(Mind you, the rest of Europe had trouble with us doling out full driving
licences to 17-year-olds :-)

Cheers,
Wol

[ Reply to This | Parent | # ]

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