Photo Courtesy of Bob Joseph/WNBF News
A seven-year-old boy has been charged with rape stemming from a November 25 incident in upstate New York, The Watertown Daily Times. reported.
According to the news outlet, Brasher Falls police responded to a sexual assault claim over the Thanksgiving holiday and filed charges against the unidentified child on March 23. The charges were third-degree rape as a juvenile – a felony.
The child was briefly taken into custody and then returned to the care of his parents. The case will be tried in a family court, according to The Daily Voice.
Authorities have released very little information about this case apart from confirming the age of the youth they consider to be the offender, the date the alleged incident occurred and the charges filed.
One New York attorney is outraged that a seven-year-old can be charged with such a heinous crime as rape has questioned whether or not the child knew what he was doing.
Anthony Martone, Director of Queen’s Defender’s felony youth defense unit, told WWNY, “Instinctually, it shouldn’t happen that a seven-year-old – I don’t think you even could really realize what you’re doing at seven years old. So I think it’s absurd to charge a seven-year-old with rape.”
Under current New York law, children can be charged with juvenile offenses at the age of seven years old. There is a movement to bring new legislation under consideration that would raise that age to 12.
Because of the child’s age and other mitigating factors that could possibly come up in a case such as this where the defendant is so young and the crime is so grotesque, Martone wonders if the prosecution will be able to prove their case adequately in court.
“They’d have to prove he actually physically committed this act, which to me it almost seems to be an impossibility.”