Prosecutor Chided For “Slut” Reference

The Vermont Supreme Court has reversed a sexual assault conviction and chided the prosecutor for language in rebuttal argument.

The defense was consent based on the theory that the victim engaged in revenge sex after a disagreement with her boyfriend.

During the State’s rebuttal, the prosecutor claimed that the defense had presented a version of events which, to be believable, required the jury to conclude that complainant “would go off and be a slut.”  

While the court found that admission of other testimony was not harmless error, it noted

Because this error alone requires reversal and remand for a new trial, we do not reach defendant’s other arguments.  Although we do not decide the case on these grounds, however, we would be remiss not to mention the offensive language—namely, the use of the term “slut”—used by the State during closing argument.  We should not need to remind the state’s attorney’s office that this word has no place in the Vermont courts.  Moreover, the argument underlying the State’s use of the term was misleading and inaccurate.  From our reading of the transcript, defendant did not improperly malign complainant’s character: the State did, by drawing sexist inferences—that, if the encounter was consensual and motivated by complainant’s fight with her boyfriend, then she must be a “slut”—from defendant’s version of the facts.  It has long been improper for defendants on sexual assault charges to characterize complaining witnesses in these terms.  The State was on abundant notice that its argument was equally improper.

(Mike Frisch)