murder is both a verb and a noun. Murder is usually a noun most oftn for legal expedience. Murder one, murder two etc.

rape is a verb, and could also be a noun for legalese. Rape one, two, and three could define the different degrees of rape.

Murder is never called “life assault” or life assault one, and so neither should be rape.

In doing so, with a statiscal lower conviction rate, I believe sexual assaults to be an intentional misappropriation of terms on behalf of defense attys trying to obfuscate what the hell is going on.

It must be a bit confusing studying in NSW and living in Qld! Good luck with that.

In WA at least there is a clear distinction between the legal definitions of sexual assualt and indecent assault and indecent assault is a lesser offence. Generally I think sexual assault is defined as penetration, indecent is not. (sorry if that’s too graphic for your readers) As River said indecent assault conjures up images of inappropriate grabbing and there’s every chance that’s what happened in the case you linked to (there weren’t any details of what he did). I think it can also include many other forms of forcible touching of a sexual nature. As far as what indecent means to you or me or a judge or jury, in the absence of an inclusive definition in the Criminal Code, it all comes back to those reasonable man tests doesn’t it? I’m sure there’s heaps of case law on it.

I think often the legal terminology used is an effort to distance the question of proving guilt from the preconceptions that juries bring to particular words and phrases. Sometimes that could really hold a conviction back, for example where someone is charged with sexual assault for an offence involving an object. (I’m trying to be a bit cryptic so as not to clutter your blog up with nasty images ) Your average juror might think “rape” just means person on person but if you explain the definition of “sexual assault” to them, they might be more open to a conviction. Of course lawyers could explain the definition of “rape” if that was the word used, but that carries a lot of baggage with it because it is an everyday term, not a legal term. I’m not saying the new terminology is a good thing or that its working, just that this is my impression of the justification for these terms. (Its also got a lot to do with legal jargon which the cynic in me puts down to lawyers making the law so complicated it is beyond the layman to understand, thus guaranteeing themselves ongoing work)

It’s an interesting point you raised and I imagine its strange being torn between 2 states in your studies and home. Criminal law in particular differs around the country because some states are Code states (WA and Qld I think) others are not.