The guy could be on his way to a lucrative sideline: Expert witness willing to testify that university athletes who rape unconscious women are innocent of the rape if the athletes are really drunk when they do it.
Forensic psychologist Dr. James Walker testified Friday that [Brandon] Vandenburg could have been so drunk that he had no idea what he was doing, The Tennessean reports.
“He was so intoxicated he was not his normal self,” Walker said. “He was doing things he would not normally have done.”
(A defense team also tried what George Huguely’s lawyer called the “stupid drunk” defense in Huguely’s case. That one was murder. He was a University of Virginia lacrosse player.)
So: Next up for Walker: Former Stanford University swimmer Brock Turner. Same MO: Rape an unconscious woman. Apparently they’d both been at a party. She seems to have been very drunk. Let’s assume he was too. Get Walker on the stand!
January 28th, 2015 at 2:29PM
As an attorney, I have to wonder what offers were on the table before the trial started. The defense was beyond weak, I don’t even see how the defense expert could have passed a Daubert hearing. I always thought that judges react one way to a recitation of facts off of a police report (as part of a plea hearing) and another way when hearing the victim testify. Now their only hope to avoid a serious jail term is an appeal.
January 29th, 2015 at 7:23AM
At least in the Turner case the bystanders actually stopped the rape instead of filming it.
January 29th, 2015 at 8:33AM
polisciprof: Yes. I’ll be talking about that as the case comes to trial.