Arizona statutory rape victim forced to pay child support

[jimmy olsen]

What say you Languish? Should victims of statuary rape have to pay child support?

http://www.azcentral.com/story/news/arizona/politics/2014/09/02/arizona-statutory-rape-victim-forced-pay-child-support/14951737/

Nick Olivas became a father at 14, a fact he wouldn't learn for eight years.

While in high school, Olivas had sex with a 20-year-old woman. As he sees it now, she took advantage of a lonely kid going through a rough patch at home.

State law says a child younger than 15 cannot consent with an adult under any circumstance, making Olivas a rape victim. But Olivas didn't press charges and says he didn't realize at the time that it was even something to consider.

The two went their separate ways. Olivas graduated from high school, went to college and became a medical assistant.

Then two years ago, the state served him with papers demanding child support. That's how he found out he had a then-6-year-old daughter.

"It was a shock," he said. "I was living my life and enjoying being young. To find out you have a 6-year-old? It's unexplainable. It freaked me out."

He said he panicked, ignored the legal documents and never got the required paternity test. The state eventually tracked him down.

Olivas, a 24-year-old Phoenix resident, said he now owes about $15,000 in back child support and medical bills going back to the child's birth, plus 10 percent interest. The state seized money from his bank account and is now garnisheeing his wages at $380 a month.

He has become one of the state's 153,000 active child-support cases, according to the Arizona Department of Economic Security division of Child Support Services.

In May alone, payments were not made in 49 percent of those cases, according to the agency.

Olivas' fear has turned to frustration.

He wants to be in his daughter's life and is willing to pay child support going forward. But he doesn't think it's right for the state to charge him for fees incurred when he was still a child himself or for the years he didn't know the girl existed.

"Anything I do as an adult, I should be responsible for," he said. "But as a teenager? I don't think so."

Situations such as Olivas' are rare, according to fathers-rights advocates. But cases in several states have garnered attention. And while there has been some public outcry over charging a crime victim with child support, the courts have consistently said states have every right to do so.

The most well-known case was of a Kansas boy who, at age 13, impregnated his 17-year-old baby-sitter. Under Kansas law, a child under the age of 15 is legally unable to consent to sex. The Kansas Supreme Court in 1993 ruled that he was liable for child support.

California issued a similar state court ruling a few years later in the case of a 15-year-old boy who had sex with a 34-year-old neighbor. In that case, the woman had been convicted of statutory rape.

In both cases, it was the state social-services agency that pursued the case after the mother sought public assistance.

"The Kansas court determined that the rape was irrelevant and that the child support was not owed to the rapist but rather to the child," said Mel Feit, director of the New York-based advocacy group the National Center for Men.

In Arizona, the Department of Economic Security oversees child--support enforcement. Its written policy is not to exempt situations like Olivas' from child-support responsibilities, unless the parent seeking child support has been found guilty of sexual assault with a minor or sexual assault.

"We don't see those cases very often, and we're really glad for that," said attorney Janet Sell, chief counsel with the Attorney General's Office's Child and Family Protection Division.

But DES officials said the intent of the rule is to ensure that the child, who had no control over the situation, is cared for.

Feit said if the roles were reversed and the woman was the victim, the scenario would be unthinkable.

"The idea that a woman would have to send money to a man who raped her is absolutely off-the-charts ridiculous," he said. "It wouldn't be tolerated, and it shouldn't be tolerated."

Feit said the basic legal premise of a rape is that the victim can't be held responsible. And with statutory rape, even if the victim participates, he or she can't be held responsible.

"We're not going to hold him responsible for the sex act, so to then turn around and say we're going to hold him responsible for the child that resulted from that act is off-the-charts ridiculous," he said. "It makes no sense."

Arizona also has no exemption for children born to children, although the state cannot get a court order for child support against the non-custodial parent until that parent becomes an adult.

It also doesn't matter to the state whether the non-custodial parent knows about the child or not. Child support is a separate legal issue from custody.

The state requires parents seeking public assistance under the state's welfare programs to first pursue child support. The child-support payments then are used to help reimburse the state for assistance payments.

The state's child-support caseload includes 122,230 cases as of the end of May in which the families are or were receiving cash assistance. From April 2013 through March 2014, the state recouped just over $14 million in previously dispersed cash assistance through child-support payments.

"They have to comply with us," said Scott Lekan, DES child support operations administrator. "We're trying to keep them off the cash assistance, and we're trying to get back some of the cash assistance money. It benefits everybody at the end of the day."

The state has more routes than the courts to acquire money from a parent. It can garnishee wages up to 50 percent of disposable income. It can take a tax refund. It can put a lien on a home or a vehicle. It can suspend driver's licenses or revoke passports. And it can seize money out of bank accounts.

"Our biggest source of income is from income-withholding orders to employers," Lekan said.

Under Arizona's child-support formula, non-custodial parents may keep their first $903 to cover their own living expenses. A child-support payment amount is then set based on the remaining money.

Olivas is trying to fight some of the child-support costs, but says he can't afford a lawyer

He also is trying to see his daughter.

"I lost my mom at a young age. I know what it's like to only have one parent," he said. "I can't leave her out there. She deserves a dad."

[Ideologue]

He kind of slept on his rights.  Dunno about the question raised generally.  It's a thinker.  My gut instinct is to say yes, since I'd like to see them punished out of envy.

[Valmy]

What say you Languish? Should victims of statuary rape have to pay child support?

Of course not what a load of bullshit.  I have no idea why the legal system has such a freaking hard time doing right by rape victims this is ridiculous. 

[Valmy]

He kind of slept on his rights.  Dunno about the question raised generally.  It's a thinker.  My gut instinct is to say yes, since I'd like to see them punished out of envy.

Why is it a thinker?  Rape victims are responsible for their rapists actions?  You think that is a viable point to consider?

[Ideologue]

He kind of slept on his rights.  Dunno about the question raised generally.  It's a thinker.  My gut instinct is to say yes, since I'd like to see them punished out of envy.

Why is it a thinker?  Rape victims are responsible for their rapists actions?  You think that is a viable point to consider?

Well, stat rape isn't rape as is generally understood (or rape-rape, since we all know that's what I'm saying ), for one thing.  It's always been a problem to confuse the two.  Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

For two, there is a huge gendered difference in our laws.  A woman, if impregnated, can choose to terminate the child (or terminate her parental rights via adoption).  A man cannot.  You say that a male rape victim can terminate his parental rights on his demand, and there are great reasons to think this is a good idea; but he can't demand the child be terminated, which means... there's still a child to consider.  This is precisely why we don't let men who have (consensually) impregnated a woman terminate their parental rights unilaterally and get off "scott free."

Now this is obviously tremendously unfair, and I think it needs a lot more discussion than it gets.  It's a real moral dilemma, one overlooked because of the dumbassed ideological framework we've decided to understand abortion in.  ("A woman has a privacy interest in her own body, thus abortion" rather than "a child is a life-changing event that anyone may have good reasons to avoid.")  A personal anecdote: the subject once came up in one of my constitutional law classes, as an equal protection violation (child support laws burden men who never wanted to be fathers and would have chosen abortion if they could, whilst favoring women who can do as they wilt, indeed regardless of the father's preference).  That was a stupid conversation for me to get involved in, in that venue, especially against a bitch professor who kept talking about "forced abortion" when all I was ever saying was that there was no particularly good answer to the conundrum.

[jimmy olsen]

He kind of slept on his rights.  Dunno about the question raised generally.  It's a thinker.  My gut instinct is to say yes, since I'd like to see them punished out of envy.

Why is it a thinker?  Rape victims are responsible for their rapists actions?  You think that is a viable point to consider?

Well, stat rape isn't rape as is generally understood (or rape-rape, since we all know that's what I'm saying ), for one thing.  It's always been a problem to confuse the two.  Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

I think you mean to say very uncomfortable, right?

Otherwise your whole post doesn't make sense.

[Valmy]

Well, stat rape isn't rape as is generally understood (or rape-rape, since we all know that's what I'm saying ), for one thing.  It's always been a problem to confuse the two.  Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

Well yeah but we are talking legally here.  If they want to make it not rape to have sex with minors they need to pass that law first.

[Eddie Teach]

He kind of slept on his rights.  Dunno about the question raised generally.  It's a thinker.  My gut instinct is to say yes, since I'd like to see them punished out of envy.

Why is it a thinker?  Rape victims are responsible for their rapists actions?  You think that is a viable point to consider?

Well, stat rape isn't rape as is generally understood (or rape-rape, since we all know that's what I'm saying ), for one thing.  It's always been a problem to confuse the two.  Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

I think you mean to say very uncomfortable, right?

Otherwise your whole post doesn't make sense.

Sure it does. He's saying that it should be illegal, but is a less serious crime than forcing somebody to have sex with you.

[alfred russel]

Well, stat rape isn't rape as is generally understood (or rape-rape, since we all know that's what I'm saying ), for one thing.  It's always been a problem to confuse the two.  Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

For two, there is a huge gendered difference in our laws.  A woman, if impregnated, can choose to terminate the child (or terminate her parental rights via adoption).  A man cannot.  You say that a male rape victim can terminate his parental rights on his demand, and there are great reasons to think this is a good idea; but he can't demand the child be terminated, which means... there's still a child to consider.  This is precisely why we don't let men who have (consensually) impregnated a woman terminate their parental rights unilaterally and get off "scott free."

Now this is obviously tremendously unfair, and I think it needs a lot more discussion than it gets.  It's a real moral dilemma, one overlooked because of the dumbassed ideological framework we've decided to understand abortion in.  ("A woman has a privacy interest in her own body, thus abortion" rather than "a child is a life-changing event that anyone may have good reasons to avoid.")  A personal anecdote: the subject once came up in one of my constitutional law classes, as an equal protection violation (child support laws burden men who never wanted to be fathers and would have chosen abortion if they could, whilst favoring women who can do as they wilt, indeed regardless of the father's preference).  That was a stupid conversation for me to get involved in, in that venue, especially against a bitch professor who kept talking about "forced abortion" when all I was ever saying was that there was no particularly good answer to the conundrum.

Child support isn't supposed to be a punishment. I think the reasoning is more like: "the kid is here, someone has to pay for it, should it be the father or some random guy with nothing to do with the situation (ie, the taxpayer)"

[Valmy]

Child support isn't supposed to be a punishment. I think the reasoning is more like: "the kid is here, someone has to pay for it, should it be the father or some random guy with nothing to do with the situation (ie, the taxpayer)"

It is not about punishment it is about responsibility.  The reasoning here is that this rape victim is legally responsible for the results of his rape.  'A rapist conceived a kid.  Somebody has to pay for it, let's make the victim.'  I am just amazed this woman had the balls to put this through the court system, she should be damn glad she did not serve time.

[Eddie Teach]

Child support isn't supposed to be a punishment. I think the reasoning is more like: "the kid is here, someone has to pay for it, should it be the father or some random guy with nothing to do with the situation (ie, the taxpayer)"

Indeed, our society and legal system are quite mercenary.

[CountDeMoney]

A woman, if impregnated, can choose to terminate the child

That's not as legal as it used to be.  It's now classified as a "It Depends" right.

[Ideologue]

Child support isn't supposed to be a punishment. I think the reasoning is more like: "the kid is here, someone has to pay for it, should it be the father or some random guy with nothing to do with the situation (ie, the taxpayer)"

It is not about punishment it is about responsibility.  The reasoning here is that this rape victim is legally responsible for the results of his rape.  'A rapist conceived a kid.  Somebody has to pay for it, let's make the victim.'

Dude, I'm pretty sure if you left enough of your cum lying around that a woman could inseminate herself with it, and she did, you'd still be responsible for the child.*  Family courts are essentially weighted entirely toward the well-being of the kid, and have basically zero regard for the parents.  While they are also a little biased toward women in general too (albeit less so now than ever), this is why they appear to be ridiculously biased toward women, because of a survivor bias: any woman who doesn't want a child has an abortion or gives it up for adoption; any man who conceives has no choice at all.  It's a shitty paradigm but there's no solution, since our options are as follows:

1)permit deadbeat dads to walk;
2)require women be forced into an invasive medical procedure at the request of a man;
3)have the state raise all children, indoctrinating them into the Party; or
4)legalize unilateral infanticide.

I suppose (5), a narrowly tailored exception that would permit male rape victims who have fathered children to walk is acceptable, which strikes me as something not at all dissimilar to a ban on all abortions except in the case of rape or incest--a ban generally considered misogynist.  Even then, I'm not even prepared to say it's better than the status quo.  Like Al said, the kid is a fait accompli.

*This may fall under the exception that currently exists for sperm donors.  At least, I'm pretty positive they're off the hook, although I vaguely recall some litigation in this regard.

[Ideologue]

A woman, if impregnated, can choose to terminate the child

That's not as legal as it used to be.  It's now classified as a "It Depends" right.

If she's got the moxy, she'll find a way to kill the little bastard.

[CountDeMoney]

Edit: Although, with he at 14 and she at 20, I'm very comfortable with their relationship being illegal.

Some assholes have all the luck, rape-rape or not.