RE: Guys, You May Have to Lower your Freak Flag!
We had a huge case here in NYC back in '96. A Columbia University grad student, Oliver Jovanovic, met a Barnard College trick on the internet, and ended up convicted of kidnapping, sexual abuse and assault and sentenced to 15 years in prison two years later. He did 20 months, and refused a plea deal that guaranteed he wouldn't serve any more time. He turned it down on principle, insisting this "attack" was consentual. His conviction was overturned on appeal, blowing a hole in the prosecution's attempted use of rape shield laws...
Deal Proposed For Defendant In Net Sex Case
By KATHERINE E. FINKELSTEIN
Published: November 22, 2000
Manhattan prosecutors have proposed a plea bargain with no further jail time for a Columbia University graduate student facing a new trial on charges that he kidnapped and sexually abused a woman he had met on the Internet, say the student's mother and others familiar with the negotiations.
In 1998, the student, Oliver Jovanovic, was convicted of kidnapping, sexually abusing and assaulting the woman and was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. But the conviction was overturned last year when the Appellate Division of State Supreme Court in Manhattan ruled that the trial judge had erred in excluding certain evidence.
The retrial of Mr. Jovanovic, who complained bitterly during his first trial that he was the victim of overzealous prosecutors, is set to begin in March in State Supreme Court. The judge, William A. Wetzel, who was also the judge in the first trial, has given both sides until Dec. 13 to conclude any negotiations.
Sabina Jovanovic, the student's mother, said that the deal broached by prosecutors last month would require her son to plead guilty to some charge or charges, but that no details had been discussed. ''I understand that all that has been offered is a plea bargain for time served,'' she said.
Mrs. Jovanovic said her son, who was weeks away from a doctorate in microbiology when he was arrested in 1996, has made no decision on pursuing the offer. He served 20 months in prison before his release last December.
Mr. Jovanovic's lawyer, Paul F. Callan, said of plea negotiations, ''Oliver's position has been that as a matter of principle, he's not going to admit to something he didn't do.''
The Manhattan district attorney, Robert M. Morgenthau, would neither confirm nor deny that an offer had been discussed, nor would he discuss any other aspect of the case.
If prosecutors and Mr. Jovanovic agree to a deal that includes no additional prison time, it will amount to a remarkable turn in a case that has gained notoriety because Mr. Jovanovic met the woman on the Internet. The case raised questions about legal protections for rape victims and included allegations of prosecutorial overreaching.
At the 1998 trial, Mr. Jovanovic was convicted of a 20-hour attack on the woman, a 20-year-old student at Barnard College, someone he had come to know during regular, often explicit, conversations conducted over the Internet. Prosecutors alleged, and a jury agreed, that Mr. Jovanovic had tied the woman to the frame of a futon at his apartment, burned her with hot wax and sexually abused her with a nightstick.
From the time of his arrest, Mr. Jovanovic insisted that his encounter with the woman, while sadomasochistic, had nonetheless been consensual. During an often grueling cross-examination, Mr. Jovanovic's lawyer, Jack Litman, sought to undermine the woman's claims of physical injury and to show that she had willingly engaged in the encounter.
During that trial, Mr. Jovanovic's lawyers sought to introduce an e-mail exchange into evidence, arguing that the messages supported their claim of a consensual, nonviolent encounter. But Judge Wetzel refused to admit the messages, citing the state's rape shield laws, which are intended to protect victims from undue scrutiny of their pasts.
After Mr. Jovanovic was convicted and sentenced, his lawyer appealed Judge Wetzel's exclusion of the e-mail messages.
"The best kind of pride is that which compels a man to do his best when no one is watching."
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