Another strange case of sexual assault

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Some of you may remember the case of former Iowa lawmaker Henry Rayhons, which I reported a few months ago. In that case, the 78-year-old was charged with sexual assault for allegedly having sexual intercourse with his wife who at the time of the alleged offence was suffering from dementia and Alzheimer’s, and had been determined by authorities at the care home where she was living to be incapable of giving consent to sex. His wife passed away after the alleged assault and prosecutors charged Rayhons with sexual assault even though a rape kit carried out after the alleged assault did not show that there had been any sexual intercourse between Rayhons and his wife. Based on the facts of the case there was a lot of outrage over that fact that such a case was being prosecuted by the State and thankfully, a jury found Rayhons not guilty of the charges. The question in that case was whether a person with dementia and Alzheimer’s disease can give consent to sex. I am not sure we got an answer to the question, but what that case did was get more people thinking and talking about the sexual and intimacy needs of the elderly, and nursing homes spelling out their policies on sex for their residents.

And then along comes another case that seemed to fly under the radar for many months until it got to trial in September 2015, four years after the offences were committed. So, in this case, Anna Stubblefield, a woman, professor, wife, mother, ethicist, scholar, who held the title of Chair of the Department of Philosophy at Rutgers University – Newark, was charged with two counts of aggravated sexual assault for having sex with an intellectually disabled, man with cerebral palsy.

There can be several defences to sexual assault, the first one being innocence (simply, I did not do it), as in the case of Henry Rayhons. The second defence available is consent (I admit having sexual relations with the complainant, but they agreed to it). Depending on the charge and the laws in the jurisdiction they are in, defendants may also have the defence of reasonable, good-faith mistake.

Anna Stubblefield did not deny having sex with the man who is now in his 30s; her defence was that she and the victim had fallen in love and it was consensual sex. So how does a non-communicative man, who doctors say has the mental capacity of an 18 month-old toddler, and has little control over his bodily functions such that he wears a diaper, give consent? According to Anna Stubblefield, the victim in this case gave consent through Facilitated Communication.

How does this Facilitated Communication work? Well, in this case, the patient communicates by typing out their thoughts on a device, assisted by a facilitator who supports their arm. The method has been described by some as using a “Ouija” board and does not have the support of the American Psychological Association. In fact, the American Psychological Association, in an article titled, Facilitated Communication: Sifting the Psychological Wheat from the Chaff, dated Nov. 20, 2003, published on its website, says:

The short version of this long story is that study after study showed that facilitated communication didn’t really work. Apparently, the positive results that had generated so much enthusiasm were the results of a subtle process in which well-intended facilitators were answering questions themselves — without any awareness that they were doing so. Based on the findings of carefully controlled studies of facilitated communication, the American Psychological Association issued a resolution in 1994 that there was “no scientifically demonstrated support for its efficacy.”

As a result of the APA statement (and similar statements from many other scientific organisations), most schools and treatment centres stopped using the technique in the mid 1990s. Perhaps the saddest part of this story is that the most vocal advocates of this technique continue to use it and insist that it is effective — despite the disconfirming evidence. As one parent said, even if the technique is merely an illusion, it is an illusion that they wish to continue.

For those who strongly believe in Facilitated Communication, like Anna Stubblefield and her supporters, society and the conventional methods of assessing mental ability lock many people in a prison of non-verbal communication. They argue that even those who are diagnosed as non-verbal, with low IQs are mentally aware but unable to communicate and Facilitated Communication is their only way of expressing themselves and interacting with the world around them. The problem with this case and what was found in other studies is that only the “facilitator” is able to achieve communication with the patient. For instance, the mother and brother of Anna Stubblefield’s victim testified that even though they had taken some lessons from Stubblefield, they were never able to get the victim to communicate with them when she was not around.

There are too many things about this case that are strange. The victim in this case was entrusted into the care of Stubblefield by his brother who was one of her students, after seeing a presentation on Facilitated Communication by Stubblefield. As an ethicist, one would think that, if nothing else, some sort of professional ethical code would have kept her from crossing the line with the victim. All I can say are in the words of the noble Festus, “Anna, you are beside yourself! Too much learning has made you mad!”

It took less than three hours for the jury to return a guilty verdict and sentencing is expected in the first week of November. Stubblefield faces 10 to 20 years for each count.

Source: Punch