Scottish trans people are obtaining sex by deception?

With obvious parallels to the case in the Middle East just a few weeks ago, a rather worrying news story has appeared on BBC News. The headline, “Woman faces sex by fraud charges“, doesn’t sound too bad but the first paragraph is somewhat more chilling for anyone Trans…

A 25-year-old woman has appeared in court accused of tricking two women into sexual contact – by pretending to be a man.

Firstly, the obvious: a “woman pretending to be a man” could well be a transman but however they identify, it’s likely they’re on the Trans spectrum somewhere.

Secondly, even after an hour of searching through statute and case law, I can’t figure out what the person accused of this offence is actually guilty of. The case is in Scotland which has different laws from England and Wales and there is a history of “Rape by Deception” in case law, but nothing I can find written down. (If it was England or Wales, it would probably be Section 36 if the other party had mental health troubles) The article says the other people involved “cannot be named for legal reasons”, which would suggest something unusual.

It may be that it’s been misreported by the BBC and the “deception” isn’t relevant to the actual offence but whatever the specifics, this is quite worrying.

3 comments

  1. Look at section 76 of the act on consent.

    If you intentionally deceive somebody as to the “nature or purpose” of the sex act, they are not considered to have consented to it.

    This stops you from posing as a doctor giving gynaecological exams, when in fact you’re just doing it for sexual gratification.

    The question is whether having sex with somebody who is biologically a woman is sufficiently different in “nature” to having sex with somebody who is biologically a man for this clause to be relevant. This sort of question is left (probably deliberately) to the interpretation of the courts.

    It may also be that there is Scotland-specific legislation.

  2. Yet again the Scottish legal system rears its puritanical ugly little hate clogged hate again.

    The nature and purpose of sex is for procreation, therefore if you follow that rule our courts should be jailing every gay man on the street, well perhaps this is the first step….

    Its hysterical anti-trans hatred out and out It dose not matter if you have sex with an alien from mars if you say yes to sex you say yes. I don’t know the details of this but sounds like a female has found out they were attracted to a transman and are taking it out on them via the law and the law as ever is obliging there self-resentment. Welcome to 21st century Scotland. Disgusting.

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