Plea Hearing

The plea hearing was today. NB admitted to one charge of felony rape and 1 or 2 charges of GSI. (I'll have to check my notes.) The good news in that is that DD will not have to testify in court. She will not have to tell her story again, unless she wants to at some point in time.

The prosecutor wanted the one rape charge, because it would require the detailed sexual offender evaluation period before disposition of the case. There is a thick booklet of questions to be posed and answered. The prosecutor said I would be surprised at the answers they sometimes get.

Children who have been abused themselves will often answer TRUE to questions like the following:

True or False: Touching a child in a sexual way shows that you love them.
True or False: Doing sexual things to or with a child is okay if you don't hurt the child physically.

The purpose of the I and R (Investigation and Referral) evaluation is to determine how likely NB is to be a repeat offender.

After that process is complete (should be 4-6 weeks), then there will be a disposition hearing.

I or my daughter, or both of us, may speak at that hearing before the judge declares the disposition of the case. I will probably talk about some of what I posted earlier with regard to my frustrations with the process and how little control I had over that process as the parent of the victim.

As it turns out, my daughter says she also wants to speak. We'll talk more between now and then, so that I can get a better idea of what she might want to say, either to the judge, to the boy, or to his parents. We'll see where that goes.